Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Resetting Your Hormones to Kick start your Diet

One of the newest diet trends out there is the “Hormone Reset Diet”. In essence, this 21-day diet plan consists of cutting out certain foods to reset any hormone imbalances within the body that are affecting weight loss goals. Gynecologist, Sara Gottfried has written a book specifically on this concept. In an interview with FOXNews.com she states,” The number one way you know [if you have a hormone imbalance] is that if you’re gaining weight because 99 percent of weight gain is hormonal, and a lot of people don’t connect the dots. They don’t realize that their problems with energy, with feeling fatigued maybe even depressed or moody is related to their hormones”.   As the interview progressed, Dr. Gottfried explains which foods affect certain hormones, as well as how and why they are related to weight loss.
Some examples of this include:

  • Going meatless to reset estrogen- Gottfried explains that adopting the vegetarian lifestyle for 21 days will reduce the levels of estrogen in the body. People who consume a lot of meat in their diets, tend to have higher estrogen levels than vegetarians. This is because farmers tend to add estrogen to their cattle in order to promote growth. This means that estrogen is constantly circulating through a meat-lovers body, which is something that is not necessarily a good thing, especially when trying to lose weight. 
  • Substituting sugar to reset insulin- It’s a well-known fact, that decreasing the amount of sugar and artificial sweeteners from your diet will help you lose weight. Have you ever thought about why though? Well, it has a lot to do with the hormone insulin. When someone consumes a lot of sugar, the body continuously craves more, thus creating an insulin resistance. Insulin resistance is often the main cause of unwanted belly fat. 
  • Rethinking your fruit options helps reset leptin- For those of you that do not know, leptin in the hormone that is in charge of controlling the feeling of hunger. One of the nutrients that have a large negative effect on leptin is consuming high levels of fructose. Fructose is a natural sweetener found in a lot of fruits, such as, apples. In order to reset the hormone leptin, Gottfried suggests staying away from sweeter fruits with high levels of fructose and to consume fruits like avocados and olives, for example. 
  • Dairy free to reset growth hormones-It is no secret that most cattle are injected with hormones and steroids to make then grow larger and fatter. In fact, “the average cow in the U.S that’s raised as livestock is injected with six different steroid hormones”. When we eat or drink dairy products, these hormones affect the fat deposited in our stomachs. Not to mention, we’re also ingesting those toxins and bad bio-chemicals, as well. In her novel, Gottfried suggests drinking milk alternatives, such as, coconut and almond milk to reduce the levels of these toxins and growth hormones ingested from regular dairy products. 
  • Toxin-free to level out testosterone- Going along with the previous bullet point, eating organic is another way to rid the body of toxins. Organic foods are produced without pesticides and fertilizers, unlike most of the produce grown in the U.S. A lot of chemical cleaners, plastics, and even receipts from the grocery store contain toxins that can be harmful to the body, as well. Most of these products contain toxins such as BPA or Biphenol A, a common chemical found on receipts. This chemical can be disruptive to testosterone levels in males and females. For women, BPA increases the level of testosterone and decreases the level of testosterone in men. By decreasing the amount of chemicals we surround ourselves with, we can stabilize the endocrine system, thus stabilizing the thyroid and boosting the metabolism.
This theory is still fairly new, but there has been solid evidence to support doctor Gottfried claims. To learn more about resetting your genes as a means of dieting, you can go to the link below or Doctor Gottfried’s website at http://hormonereset.com/ .
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