There was a study that came out recently. In a nutshell: Research subjects were then given diets intended to maintain their weight loss. A year after the subjects had lost the weight, the researchers repeated their measurements. The subjects were gaining the weight back despite the maintenance diet — on average, gaining back half of what they had lost — and the hormone levels offered a possible explanation. Their hormones were working against them!
One hormone, leptin, which tells the brain how much body fat is present, fell by two-thirds immediately after the subjects lost weight. When leptin falls, appetite increases and metabolism slows. A year after the weight loss diet, leptin levels were still one-third lower than they were at the start of the study, and leptin levels increased as subjects regained their weight.
Other hormones that stimulate hunger, in particular ghrelin, whose levels increased, and peptide YY, whose levels decreased, were also changed a year later in a way that made the subjects’ appetites stronger than at the start of the study.
It was determined that the dieters are putting their bodies into a circumstance that it will resist.
A solution might be to restore hormones to normal levels by giving drugs after dieters lose weight. But, researchers just do not know enough about obesity to prescribe solutions. GREAT!??!
SO, what do we do?
Dr. Mercola (well-known writer/doctor) writes about Leptin resistance. http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/10/29/leptin-resistance.aspx
Dr. Mercola’s Leptin Resistance Summary
Insulin and leptin resistance are core factors in obesity, which in turn is a risk factor for cancer and may boost tumor growth. But the answer lies not in a pill. To reverse insulin and leptin resistance:
- Avoid, sugar, fructose, grains, and processed foods
- Eat a healthful diet of whole foods, ideally organic, and replace the grain carbs with:
- No-to-low sugar and grain carbs
- Low-to-moderate amount of protein
- As much highly quality healthful fat as you want (saturated and monosaturated). Most people need upwards of 50-70 percent fats in their diet for optimal health. Good sources include coconut and coconut oil, avocados, butter, nuts, and animal fats. Also take a high-quality source of animal-based omega-3 fat, such as krill oil
Similarly, while researchers investigate the pharmaceutical avenues to convert white fat cells to brown in an effort to reduce the potential for cancer growth, other research has already shown that this can likely be achieved through exercise.
80 percent of the health benefits you reap from a healthy lifestyle comes from your diet, and the remaining 20 percent from exercise – but it’s a very important 20 percent, as it acts in tandem with and boosts the benefits derived from a proper diet. For maximum benefits, you’ll want to make sure to include high-intensity interval training.
Can you take leptin or supplements to stimulate leptin to help? There is no proof of it helping, except in very rare cases. The suggestions are rather than taking supplements that haven’t been fully proven to help, overweight people have other options to aid leptin functioning. So therefore, you have to reduce resistance to insulin (a hormone that controls blood sugar) and to bring down high levels of triglycerides (a blood lipid).
Insulin resistance generates leptin resistance. The practical advice is: Get your insulin down by cutting the sugar down, and your insulin resistance would improve and that would help with the weight loss.
So, we are back to sugar again as the enemy. CUT OUT SUGAR AND cut down on UNHEALTHY carbs. Stick with only natural healthy carbs! And watch the amount of fruit you eat. Fruit has fructose (sugar).
Skinny-Rules 