Top 3 Reasons Why You cannot lose Weight
As a Nutritionist I I have heard it all. I cannot lose weight, I have tried everything, I don’t understand this, I eat healthy, I exercise a lot and now I just feel depressed. You are not alone.
We live in a world where burger is the King and Dairy is the Queen where the five new food groups dress our tables. Is it any wonder why people are having a hard time losing weight?
In this article I would like to explore Three Real Reasons why people cannot lose weight.
The Four types of fat and the problem one
Metabolic Syndrome and the solution
How does insulin play a role?
The Four types of Fat and the Problem one
There is fat and then there is fat. We have basically four types of fat in the body. Brown fat, White fat, subcutaneous fat and Visceral fat (the one that makes it difficult to lose weight). Brown fat is the natural fat babies have plenty of to help keep them warm. If you jumped into a lake and got chilled your brown fat will be called on to keep you warm.
White fat stores energy and produces vital hormones, think of it as a necessary and needed part of us! Subcutaneous fat is the one we dread as it the fat we can grab around our mid sections and drives a lot of people crazy. This is due to us simply eating too much of the wrong food than our body can utilize, so it has to go somewhere. The most harmful fat is visceral fat.
Visceral fat runs deep and wraps around your organs and spells trouble increasing your chance of developing metabolic syndrome and affects your hormones. This fat is stored there because of what we are eating, and low exercise levels.
This is the fat that can be managed well with a unique program for you taking in consideration all of your blood values.
Metabolic Syndrome and the Solution
Most people believe that counting calories is the answer but it does not cover the full story. I never counted a calorie in my whole life but I watched plenty of others attempt it. We have to look at the whole person. Our waist size is the indicator of Metabolic Syndrome. If you are female and your waist size is greater than 35 inches and 40 inches for a male you are at a risk of developing Metabolic Syndrome which often leads to heart disease, blood lipid disorders, high cholesterol and diabetes. The problem here is that many of these people have too much of the visceral fat, and the hormone insulin is behind it all. This also raises our CRP levels which stand for C-Reactive Protein – a protein that increases in response to inflammation. Recent evidence has suggested that our CRP levels are useful in predicting heart attacks and strokes!
Does Insulin have anything to do with it??
Insulin is a fat storage hormone. Eating often and snacking between meals will keep your levels of insulin constantly elevated. This encourages your body to make more fat as opposed to building muscle mass. Also, a consistently elevated level of insulin can block the production of many hormones that protect the body from inflammation and aging.
I cannot tell you how many people still believe it is best to have 5 or 6 small meals a day… Science is always advancing. Waiting between 5 to 7 hours between meals allows insulin levels to drop very low so that fat can be burned easily. Drinking only water between meals is the best thing you can do. Starting each meal with 2 bites of protein will have a long lasting effect on insulin. When your stomach receives protein first your pancreas will secrete the hormone glucagon which is an antagonist of insulin and blocks insulin production. This lowers insulin levels, stimulates fat burning and prevents hunger.
Remember food can burn like straw or coal…. A diet with great quality protein, the rights fats and high fibre is step one. Avoiding the five new food groups is a great step two. Fast, frozen, fried junk and processed are typically foods low in fibre, water, protein and miners all of which makes our body create more insulin. The fat storage hormone.
Here’s a tip, if you have a morning smoothie or yogurt, add some cinnamon to it! Cinnamon has been shown to improve our insulin sensitivity, not to mention it tastes great!
So get started!
In conclusion seeing a Nutritionist and taking a good hard look at your diet and lifestyle can help you figure out if you have Metabolic syndrome, lower your visceral fat, reduce the CRP levels and create a customized plan for you based on your personal blood values, so that you can finally shed those unwanted pounds and zip to your life, increase your energy and get back into all of those beautiful clothes sitting in your closet!