When I was in my twenties, I always come home from a weekend with my mom feeling like I need to lose 10 pounds ASAP.  Now that I am in my thirties and writing a health blog, I realized that my mom needs to a perception adjustment in the weight loss department.  I am surprise that she did not end up with three daughters low self esteem because she is constantly talking about her need to lose weight and projecting that negative vibe on everyone around her.

There were a few instances I can dreg up from my memories of her trying to lose weight as a child, but the majority of the time, my mom was too busy raising her brood of children and work.  It was not until she became an empty nester and all of her older siblings started having health issues that she became obsessive about weight loss.

But is your health really about weight loss?

My mom is fixated on the idea that as she loses weight, she will become healthier (or at least outrun the health issues plaguing her siblings).  But is your health really about weight loss?  Prior to writing my health blog, I would say yes with the absolute confidence that I am right.  Now, I am not so sure.

According to The Obesity Myth, it is healthier to maintain the same stable weight (whether you are overweight or not) over your adult life than is to have cycles of huge weight fluctuations from losing and gaining every few years. I am talking about being overweight here, not morbidly obese. In order words, yo yo dieting where your weight can change by as much as 25 pounds every few years is more detrimental to your overall health than if you had been able to hold your weight stable for most of your adult life.

Yo Yo dieting and fat cells

I also remember reading in one of my fitness magazines that the healthiest seniors are those who are within 5 to 10 pounds of their weight in their 20s.  Though few and far in between, I have met a few individuals who weighs the same now as when they graduated from high school.

I think the book might be right about how maintaining a stable weight over your adult life is a predictor of your overall health.  If you read any of my fat cells postings, you would know that fat cells are more than just storage of excess calories in our bodies.  It also produces hormones.  So if you were 20 pounds heavier, your body is used a certain amount of hormone production from your fat cells.  But when you lose weight quickly on a fad diet like Atkins, your body is left trying to figure out what happened to the hormones your old fat cells used to produce.  By the time your body finally adjusted to that 20 pounds weight loss… BAM!  You gain it all back again.  Yo-yo dieting stresses your body with this hormonal roller coaster every time your weight fluctuate wildly.  If you do this your entire adult life, is it any wonder you will be less healthy than your overweight peers who have maintained the same stable weight their entire adult life?

Toxins release with yo yo dieting

And then there are the toxins.  Your fat cells are one of the dumps sites for toxins that your liver cannot process.  Lipids surrounds the toxin (think of plastic wrapping the toxin), and then the whole thing gets shoved into a fat cell.  It is meant to be a temporary storage.  Once your liver cleans it current load of toxins, it is suppose to work on the extra toxins in your fat cells.  However, with modern day living, it is rare for your liver to catch up on its work load.  So when you lose weight quickly, all that toxins are released into your blood stream.  This is why some people who lose weight quickly sometimes get really sick.  If you are going to do a fad diet to drop weight quickly, at least do it while eating whole foods.  Then you will give your liver a fighting chance of riding your body of stored toxins.  If your fad diet is based on microwave dinners, your body is now trying to rid the toxins in the microwave dinner and the toxins released from your fat cells.  Hello, toxic overload.

Does this mean you should stop trying to lose weight?

No.  Even if your cholesterol levels and blood pressure are in the normal range, it does not lower your risk for cancers or osteoarthritis on the knees when you are overweight. The goal is to lose the weight slowly and steadily so you do not gain it back.  None of that 15-20 pounds weight loss and gain within a couple of years.  Not if your goal is to be healthy.  Like the tortoise, slow and steady to win the race.

Until next time and thanks for stopping by Small Steps to Health.

Photo by:  Nicholas Petrone.

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• Leptin and Weight Loss
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• Women Hormonal Phases – Your Teens Through Your Early 20s
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• Womens Hormonal Phases – Your Late 20s Through Your Early 40

Welcome to Small Steps to Health where we do not take orders from a cookie!

This post is a discussion of common medication prescribed for PMS and how they do not address the underlining problem of balancing your hormones to prevent PMS.

As discussed in my last post, the four categories of PMS is often caused by an imbalance in our hormones. Common PMS medication include birth control pills, Valium, Prozac, and Naproxen. The problem with these medication is that they only mask the symptoms, getting us through the month, but we will have to rinse and repeat for months afterward. Do you really want to rely on drugs to get you through your period?

Using birth control pills to treat PMS

The problem with birth control pills is that it often depletes the same vitamins and nutrients needed in our bodies that help minimize PMS. For example, women with high estrogen and low progesterone often have low B6 (a vitamin used in the manufacturing of serotonin). And serotonin is important because it is our natural antidepressant.

This is not to say that birth control pills are to be avoided at all cause. But to understand that if you have out of control PMS, your birth control pills might be the culprit.

Using Valium to treat PMS

Valium is an addictive drug and not designed for long term use, but it is a commonly prescribed medication for PMS. Valium is used to correct anxiety and relief pain. The problem with Valium is the severe side effects of drowsiness, nausea, confusion, irritability, blurred vision, hallucinations, panic, and insomnia.

If you are looking for long term treatment of PMS, Valium is not the answer.

Using Prozac to treat PMS

Prozac is a drug used for the treatment of depression. But the root cause of PMS is often high estrogen and low progesterone. This hormone imbalance leads to low serotonin. Using Prozac will mask the depression we might be feeling from PMS.

However, the most frightening side effects of Prozac is the destructive outbursts and suicidal reactions that a lot of women experience while on this drug. Supposedly I am taking Prozac to get relief from my PMS, but I might end up feeling so bad about myself that I throw myself off a bridge (exaggerating here, but you get the idea).

Using Naproxen to treat PMS

Naproxen is a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAIDS) that acts like aspirin for pain relief.  As with most pain medication, we have to worry about stomach ulcers and gastrointestinal bleeding, kidney dysnfuction, and liver damage.  NSAIDs erode the cartilage around joints and prevent joint repair, which can lead to joint damage like arthritis.  Naproxen will only provide temporary relief from PMS.

If not these common PMS medication, what else is there?

I will talk about the dietary changes and the natural herbs and supplements that will help you manage your PMS during my next post.  In the meantime, if you are already taking PMS medication, do not go cold turkey.  You need to slowly wean your body off these drugs with the care of a qualified natural practitioner.

Until next time and thanks for stopping by.

Photo by:  yananine.

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This post is the first of a series of posts about our periods and other womanly issues that are related to our reproductive system. Men, you can stop here and wonder off for a while.

With dread or excitement, most of us get a visit every month from our periods.  But how much do you know about your period?

We know what it means when we have one and when we don’t.  We know that an egg is released.  We know that at some point in the distant future we stop having them.  But what is a “normal period?”  How does one have a “happy” period?  And is it normal to have pain and bloating?

What is a “normal” period?

Our monthly menstrual cycle is regulated mainly by two sex hormones – estrogen and progesterone.  They ensure that our ovaries release an egg, the lining of our uterus is ready to house the egg, and breaks down the lining when the egg is not fertilized.  There is a very delicate balance between when estrogen and progesterone levels at any given time.  The estrogen-progesterone balance impacts our entire life from our PMS symptoms and menopause symptoms. I will discuss menopause in follow-up posts.

Our menstrual cycle is broken up into three phases – follicular, ovulatory, and luteal – that last for approximately 28 days, give or take a few days.

During the follicular phase (approximately 10-14 days), estrogen level is progressively rising to help mature the egg in the ovaries.  At the peak of estrogen level, the egg is release.  As soon as the matured egg is released from the follicle in the ovaries, the empty follicle starts making progesterone.  While the egg is traveling in the fallopian tube to our uterus, progesterone is building up the lining to house the egg.

The ovulatory phase is only 36 hours long.  It is a very small window to get pregnant!  But sperm can live in the uterus for up to 7 days, waiting for that 36 hours window.  This must be enough time when you consider that there are over 5 billion people in this planet.

The luteal phase is approximately 7 days long.  When the egg is not fertilized, progesterone production goes down and your period begins shortly after.  This cycle begins again and continues until we reach menopause.

The four categories of PMS

According to the alternative medicine books I am reading, when our hormones (particularly estrogen and progesterone) are balanced, we should only experience mild discomfort during our periods (aka. a “happy” period) instead of the cramping, bloating, moodiness, acne, and food cravings known as premenstrual symptom (PMS).

PMS falls into four different categories depending on the hormonal imbalance.  But most women often experience 2 or 3 categories.

PMS Category 1:  high estrogen, low progesterone

High estrogen and low progesterone’s main symptoms include anxiety, tension, irritability, and craving for sweets and carbohydrates.  High estrogen can result in low serotonin levels which can cause depression.  This occurs when the empty follicle in the ovaries do not produce enough progesterone.  PMS category 1 is most common in women.

PMS Category 2:  excessive aldosterone (a hormone produced by our adrenal glands)

Excessive aldosterone’s symptoms include water and sodium retention, bloating, breast pain, and weight gain.

PMS Category 3:  low magnesium

Low magnesium’s symptoms include cravings for sweets, a racing heart, an increase in appetite, fatigue, headaches, mood swings, and fainting.

PMS Category 4:  low estrogen, high progesterone

Low estrogen and high progesterone’s symptoms include sleep disturbances, lack of coordination, and loss of concentration, confusion, and depression.  This is least common in women.

Why is high estrogen a problem?

Higher estrogen and low progesterone hormone levels produce multitude of health problems for women, both during our fertile years and afterward in menopause.  As mentioned under PMS category 1, this hormone imbalance can result in lower serotonin levels in our bodies.

Serotonin is our brain’s version of an anti-depressant drug.  As mentioned in Gender Matters when it comes to Sugar Addiction, low serotonin means we will have a hard time saying no to a cookie.

The pharmaceuticals solution to our depression from low serotonin level?  Prozac and painkillers.  More than 80% of the 12 million Americans on Prozac are women between 25 and 50 years old.  A coincidence that so many women are on Prozac during their fertile years when it is likely for them to experience PMS?  I think not.

Drugs prescribed for PMS do not correct the hormone imbalance

Historically, PMS is not recognized by the medical community as an actual physical problem.  Doctors believe that it is all in our heads and prescribe antidepressants or other drugs that mask the problems of hormonal imbalance with possible side effects.  Sadly that is still common practice today.

Until next time and thanks for stopping by.

Photo by:  K?vanç Ni?.

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This post is a discussion on the leptin hormone and how it impacts our weight loss goals.

Besides being a great insulator, our fat cells produce a number of hormones in our bodies.  When our fat cells perceive there is enough nourishment in our bodies, it releases leptin into our blood stream.

What is the function of leptin?

Leptin has two jobs.  Leptin travels on the bloodstream to our brains and tells us to reduce our appetites.  Leptin also boosts our metabolism by encouraging the cells to burn calories quickly.

How does a leptin impact weight loss?

Sounds like leptin is one of those hormones we want to have a lot of.  Unfortunately dieting reduces our leptin levels.  When we go on a weight loss diet, our body misinterprets the diet as starvation.

And being the great self-preserving machine that it is, our fat cells quickly slow leptin production so that our appetite can increase again.  Instead of weight loss when we diet, often times we find that we are even hungrier because our bodies are trying to make sure that our appetites are back to “normal.”  If we are not careful, low leptin levels can lead to binging later on.

If leptin is so critical to weight loss, how come drug companies don’t bottle the stuff and sale it?  They tried.  And they failed.    Leptin treatments in humans failed miserably.  Unlike mice, overweight individuals have a considerable amount of leptin their blood stream already, so adding more does nothing.

Leptin and food

Researchers believe that a low fat, plant based diet helps keep leptin levels up while a high fat processed diet suppresses leptin.  That is not surprising since we know that a diet high in fat and processed foods does strange things to our bodies’ natural ability to self-regulate.

Testing leptin levels

Though our doctors can easily check our leptin levels, they might not know how to interpret the results.  The amount of leptin in the blood varies immensely from one person to the next, from one blood draw to the next, and changes made to our diet.

How to boost leptin to maximize weight loss?

Do not go on a low calorie diet.

We need to eat at least the minimum calories necessary to sustain our bodies in order to keep leptin working.  Most low calories diet use 1,200 calories as the starting point.  Yeah, if you weigh less than 120 pounds.

To calculate the minimum calories necessary to sustain your body, multiply your weight by 10.  For example, if you are 150 pounds, you should aim to eat 1.500 calories.

But what if you are trying to lose weight?  Reduce 1,500 by 100 calories, to get 1,400 calories.  The absolute maximum calorie reduction should be 200 calories to keep your leptin levels functioning.

Do not forget to take into account the calories you are burning with exercise.  For example, if you are 150 pounds, you burn 200 calories with a 30 minute workout, then you should continue to eat 1,500 calories for the days that you exercise.  But reduce your daily calories to 1,400 calories for days that you do not exercise.

If you are active than add 200 calories to maintain your weight.  For example, if you are 150 pounds, you should aim to eat 1,700 calories if you are moderately active and want to maintain your weight.

Please keep in mind, these are minimum calories intake.  Depending on the composition of your body, your body might need more calories than the minimum.  For example, at 137 pounds, I would be ravenousness eating a 1370 calorie diet.  Looking over my food journal, I eat between 1,600-1,700 calories on average.

Eat more vegetables and fruits.

Besides being less calorie dense than steaks and French fries, vegetables and fruits keep leptin functioning properly.  Enough said.

Exercise makes your body respond better to leptin.

In a Harvard study of 268 participants, men who exercised regularly had dramatically increased their leptin sensitivity, making their existing leptin levels work more effectively.  A half hour walk is enough to make a difference.

The fat cells in our bodies are happy to produce leptin for us all day long.  But the key to making sure that leptin function properly is to eat the right amount of calories based upon a diet high in vegetables and fruits and to exercise regularly.  Our bodies will do what it takes to self regulate.  We only need to supply the building blocks.  Have a little patience with yourself.  If your appetite has been severely disrupted from restrictive dieting, it will take some time to get it back to normal.

Until next time and thanks for stopping by Small Steps to Health.

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As many of my readers know, I am fascinated by the differences in between women vs. men.  I love my husband.  Though he is my best friend and we have similar values and viewpoints, sometimes I think he is a stranger.  How much of that difference is in our head?

Nature”s default gender setting is female.

Though the male sperm supply the Y chromosome that determines the eventual gender of the fetus, a fertilized egg still starts off the first few weeks of life as female.

A large testosterone surge during the 8th week of pregnancy in the brain turns on the switch for a male infant.  If this increase in testosterone does not happen, then the fertilized egg continues to develop as a female.

What does an increase in testosterone do to the brain development of the female infant?

Testosterone basically kills of some of the cells in the communication centers and grow more cells in the sex and aggression centers for the male fetus.  This fork in our brain development establish our future.  It is not just the reproductive organs that make women and men so different.

Men pick up subtle signs of sadness about 40% of the time, while women pick up the signs 90% of the time.  With smaller communication centers in their brains, males are just clueless at picking up subtle emotional signs.

Differences in the adult brains of women vs men

The male brains are larger than female brains by approximately 9 percent (after correcting for the larger male body size).  However, men and women have the same number of brain cells.  This means that women”s brains are more dense than male brains (think muscle vs fat).  If you have more muscle mass, you will look smaller than a person with more fat, even if you are both the same weight.

The brain chemistry in menstruating women change by as much as 25% every month.  Though things get rocky at times, for most of us it is manageable.  Each hormonal phase (childhood, the teens, the dating years, motherhood, and menopause) causes fluctuation in our brain chemistry and how we view reality.

Men”s brain chemistry is like the mountain that is worn away with time by the weather and the movement of the earth (small stable changes).  Women”s brain chemistry, due to all the hormonal changes in our lifetime, is the weather that beats against the mountain. 

Until next time and thanks for stopping by Small Steps to Health.

Photo by:  jenn_jenn.

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