The hormone diet eliminates meat, alcohol, high fructose fruit, gluten grains, and dairy to restore hormonal imbalances. Organic eggs, lean meats, gluten-free grains, cold-water fish, and some vegetables are permitted.
Insulin, a hormone produced by the pancreas, is important for the regulation of carbohydrates and the metabolism of fat.
Additionally, improving dietary choices, increasing physical activity, getting more sleep, managing stress levels effectively, quitting smoking, and limiting alcohol are all ways to decrease and avoid hormonal weight gain.
If you're putting on weight easily and having a hard time taking it off, you should know that hormonal imbalances affect weight loss and weight gain. These imbalances could be part of the problem or the entire problem. In fact, some hormonal imbalances can make it downright impossible to lose weight!
Hormones that affect female weight loss include:
Oestrogen and progesterone.
While body weight and fat are distributed equally in weight gain due to excess caloric intake, people with hormonal weight gain usually notice increased weight around specific body parts, such as the waist, arms, thighs, chest, and lower body.
Insulin is the hormone that tells your body to store fat. Sometimes, your insulin stores can spike, even if you're not battling diabetes. Avoiding sugary foods and not overeating are great ways to help keep your insulin in check. You can also eat more protein and drink green tea to achieve similar effects.
Elevated levels of ghrelin in the blood can lead to weight gain. Obese people are particularly sensitive to ghrelin, encouraging them to eat more. Ghrelin levels can also rise when you're on a strict diet or fasting.
Estrogen promotes the storage of fat for healthy reproductive years. When estrogen is balanced, the right amount of fat helps carry out female reproductive functions. However, when there's too little or too much estrogen, weight gain often results.
Leptin isn't a vitamin or mineral. You can't absorb it from a pill. In fact, “leptin supplements” don't contain any actual leptin. If they did, your stomach would simply digest them before they could have any effect on your body.
Increasing physical activity, getting enough sleep, decreasing sugar intake and including more fish in your diet are some steps you can take to improve leptin sensitivity. Lowering your blood triglycerides is important, too.
Hormone imbalance symptoms that affect your metabolism
Symptoms of hormonal imbalances that affect your metabolism include: Slow heartbeat or rapid heartbeat (tachycardia). Unexplained weight gain or weight loss. Fatigue.
Sometimes, excess fat around the belly is due to hormones. Hormones help regulate many bodily functions, including metabolism, stress, hunger, and sex drive. If a person has a deficiency in certain hormones, it may result in weight gain around the abdomen, which is known as a hormonal belly.
The hormonal changes of menopause might make you more likely to gain weight around your abdomen than around your hips and thighs. But, hormonal changes alone don't necessarily cause menopause weight gain. Instead, the weight gain is usually related to aging, as well as lifestyle and genetic factors.
Some evidence suggests that estrogen hormone therapy increases a woman's resting metabolic rate. This might help slow weight gain. Lack of estrogen may also cause the body to use starches and blood sugar less effectively, which would increase fat storage and make it harder to lose weight.
Vitamin A was positively associated with leptin (p < 0.05). When stratifying by BMI, % body fat and waist circumference, high leptin concentrations were associated with lower zinc and lower vitamin C concentrations in women with obesity (p < 0.05) and higher vitamin A concentrations in women without obesity (p < 0.01).
Leptin resistance results in a decrease in the ability of leptin to suppress appetite or increase your body's energy use. Because of this, the main symptoms of leptin resistance are constantly feeling hungry and increased food intake despite having adequate or excess amounts of body fat.