21
Feb

Here’s How Your Hormones Affect Your Ability to Lose Weight

Weight loss is often boiled down to an issue of willpower. If you consume fewer calories than you burn, you supposedly see pounds just melt away and achieve your ideal weight in a matter of weeks or months.

But, weight loss is far more complex than simply cutting out the cookies and walking an extra mile. Your hormones interfere with your ability to lose extra weight. Disruptions in the levels of estrogen in women and testosterone in men can cause unwanted fat to pile on. Both sexes can be affected by erratic thyroid, cortisol, and leptin hormones, too.

At Purple Lotus Aesthetics, we understand how these chemical messengers can get in the way of your best efforts. Read on to understand more about how hormones affect your ability to lose weight. Don’t blame yourself; we can help you reform your health status so weight loss is possible.

Hormones matter
Especially for women, but also for aging men, hormones matter when it comes to weight loss. Yes, you do need to watch your calorie intake and physical activity levels to achieve your goals — but hormones are important too.

When your weight-loss plan fails to address the hormonal root causes of your body’s desire to hold onto fat, most plans fail.

Issues that can stand in the way include:

  • Insulin and/or leptin resistance
  • Estrogen dominance
  • Sluggish thyroid
  • Low testosterone
  • Excess cortisol

At Purple Lotus Aesthetics, we can help identify irregularities in these hormone systems and offer lifestyle changes and other interventions to resolve them, making weight loss possible.

Stress and hormones
A primary hormone that affects your ability to lose weight is cortisol, which is made in response to stress. Because most people are stressed due to overscheduling, family matters, jobs, or finances, cortisol is a very real problem. High levels of cortisol reduce your levels of happy brain neurotransmitters, like serotonin, which can affect your ability to sleep and cause you to store fat. High cortisol levels can cause cravings, food addiction, dependence on tobacco and alcohol, and depression — all of which add to the pounds padding your frame.

The answer to reducing your cortisol levels is to calm down. At Purple Lotus Aesthetics, we can help you with lifestyle changes that reduce your stress levels, ease cortisol output, and help you lose weight.

Other hormone control
Insulin is a hormone that helps your cells store fat from the sugar (glucose) you eat for energy. But, if your body is insulin resistant, it means your cells can’t absorb the extra blood glucose and it’s instead converted into fat by your liver.

Leptin is a hormone that signals to your body that you’re satisfied and full. If you’re overweight, however, your fat cells emit excess leptin, and your body stops listening. You just don’t feel full anymore and you keep gaining weight.

Many women experience irregularities in their estrogen levels, especially around the time of menopause. Erratic estrogen levels can make you resistant to weight loss, cause you to feel moody (and thus medicate with food), and experience sleeplessness. Low testosterone levels have similar effects on men.

Thyroid hormone plays an important role in your metabolism. When you produce too little thyroid hormone, you don’t burn calories as efficiently as you should, and you feel fatigued and tired. Low thyroid (or hypothyroidism) can cause weight gain and fluid retention.

At Purple Lotus Aesthetics, we offer solutions to these hormonal irregularities that contribute to your difficulty in losing weight. With monitoring, diet plans, and personalized exercise prescriptions, you can get the extra pounds off for good. Call today or book an appointment online to benefit from our experience and support when it comes to weight loss.