Elevated Insulin- The Culprit Behind Metabolic Syndrome #StubbornFatFix

Elevated insulin is the underlying cause of weight gain, unstable blood sugar, low blood sugar, mood swings, low energy levels and many health conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, some cancers, and, in women, polycystic ovarian syndrome. Elevated insulin is also to blame for metabolic syndrome, an increasingly common condition characterized by three or more of the following factors: abdominal obesity, elevated triglyceride levels, low HDL cholesterol, elevated blood pressure, and elevated fasting glucose levels. #CBHealthNY #MetabolicSyndrome

The Importance of Beneficial Bacteria #StubbornFatFix

Intestinal yeast overgrowth and bacterial imbalances can slow metabolism and trigger health problems. Maintaining a thriving population of probiotics, or beneficial bacteria, in your gut is very important to tamp down dangerous bacteria. When you eat fiber, you support your probiotic population because fiber is a “prebiotic”, a precursor to food that keeps healthy bacteria alive. Because the typical American diet is so low in fiber, it literally starves these good bacteria, allowing harmful organisms such as yeast (which survive on sugar, not fiber) to flourish.

The Thyroid Gland #StubbornFatFix

Thyroid hormones help regulate metabolism, energy levels, mood, body temperature, and various bodily organs. If your thyroid is not functioning optimally, you will gain weight easily, resist weight loss, feel cold, become depressed, and suffer from dry skin, thin hair, low sex drive, joint and muscle aches, high cholesterol, and fatigue. The American College of Clinical Endocrinologists estimates that 1 in 10 Americans have an underactive thyroid and that half of them remain undiagnosed. #CBHealthNY

The True Coronary Culprits #StubbornFatFix

Countries that consume diets rich in saturated fat tend to suffer very little heart disease, whereas countries that consume diets rich in hydrogenated trans fats suffer high rates of heart disease. Population studies show that people who eat small amounts of trans fats, white flour, or sugar do not have heart attacks. Common sense should tell us that the problem isn’t animal fat alone. It’s trans fats, sugar, high-fructose corn syrup and refined carbohydrates. #CBHealthNY

Metabolic Resistance. High cortisol levels cause fat to be deposited in your abdomen, and insulin and cortisol rise and stay elevated. #StubbornFatFix

In the case of insulin, your muscle cells now don’t recognize its signal. Once your cells stop responding to insulin (called insulin resistance), your pancreas must produce 10 times as much of the hormone to shuttle sugar into cells. Your brain doesn’t recognize increases in insulin either, so it never responds by turning off your appetite. As a result, blood glucose is even more erratic than during metabolic overdrive, alternating from very high highs to very low lows, and you’re constantly hungry. High insulin levels tend to lower levels of other important hormones, too, which can erode health in many additional ways.

Your sleep is probably starting to become erratic. You may feel okay when you are at work and under stress, but you crash when you get home or go on vacation. Elevated levels of cortisol during the overspending stage have now taken a toll on various bodily tissues, slowing metabolism through a loss of muscle mass, impairing digestion, and weakening immunity. #CBHealthNY

Our consumption of omega-3s are low for a number of reasons. #StubbornFatFix

Few of us eat enough fatty fish, walnuts, flax, greens, and other foods that are rich in this type of fat. Commercial farming also reduces the natural omega-3 fats that would normally be present in animal meats, eggs, and vegetables. Eggs from hens that eat insects and green plants for example are richer in omega-3s than eggs from hens that are fed soy. Worse, most processed foods are loaded with omega-6 fats from corn or soybean oil.

This imbalance of omega-3s to omega-6s throws off our delicate metabolic balance, triggering the body to make more pro-inflammatory substances that raise blood pressure, irritate the GI tract, lower immunity, and even contribute to weight gain. This contributes to cancer, heart disease, poor immunity, liver damage, reproductive problems, GI distress, learning disabilities, and obesity. #CBHealthNY