Want to know why eating less and exercising more can work AGAINST your metabolism?
We have been taught to think that eating less and over-exercising will make us lose weight and be healthy. This is only partially true some of the time. There is some validity to calories in/calories out, but it is not a perfect mathematical equation that keeps us thin, and it does NOT set us up for long term healthy metabolism. What is not factored in to that equation is the ability and control of the body’s endocrine system, or hormone communication system, to overrule calories in and out. The body is incredibly smart and efficient and tries to maintain homeostasis (balance) in any way it can through a series of chemical signals and reactions.
Many people hang on to trying to make calories in and out work because it worked in our 20’s and some of the 30’s. When we are younger we naturally synthesize more human growth hormone that helps with mainlining higher/faster metabolism. Further, as we age we tend to become more resistant to insulin. This is a natural protective function of the body that allows for greater hormone storage that protects against things like bone loss. It
Let’s talk about the muscle/hormone/brain connection
Your muscles and what you do with them sends hormonal messages regulating you large and in charge hormones and filtering down to your sex hormones and other important hormones and neurotransmitters.
What do muscles release and why?
Why you should give up on being a cardio junkie.
I’m not suggesting no cardio forever, there are certainly many benefits, we just do not want to signal cortisol to work against your fertility.
Take into account your body type and what sort of exercise you prefer. Let me give you some information and let you tailor your exercise plan to keep you excited, interested and in a fertile place exercise wise.
If you have been told to lose wt for fertility health, you may be tempted to eat less exercise more. This can actually lead to decreased metabolic processes and increased weight gain later. Law of metabolic compensation. Metabolism will eventually push back by having cravings, unstable energy and increased hunger and metabolic rate will begin to decline. We think this is willpower. You will lose against your body’s own protective physiological processes. Sleep and mood will be affected. Your body will do all it can to make us eat more, crave more and save more fat.
Muscle is more expensive for your body to carry, so the first thing you body will lose is muscle. **In this you are losing your hormone regulation. 70% of wt lost is from lean muscle when you restrict calories and exercise more with cardio.
When you regain wt, you are losing lean muscle (metabolic tissue) Rate of calorie burn is much less after the diet because muscle burns more calories than fat. Now you break the diet and have a slower metabolism leading to increased gain. You must maintain muscle and lose fat, it is the only way to beat the law of metabolic compensation.
We think of fat as storage and muscle as movement , they are actually endocrine components that release hormones. When you are moving (and building) muscle you are releasing hormones to talk to the liver and make it burn sugar more effectively and signals fat to burn and tells the brain to be less hungry and have less cravings. We are not just moving muscle to burn calories, we are regulating endocrine system.
Stop thinking about exercise, think about movement and types of movement. We do not want to lose muscle tissue!
Lifting weights alone high protein no cardio is “muscle fat” look muscular but not that lean
Cardio is burning too much muscle “ skinny fat”
Metabolic compensation – hunger energy cravings need to be in balance, in order to build muscle and burn fat, you need to :
Eat more exercise less- couch potato
Eat less exercise more – skinny fat
**Better is to eat more exercise more (athletic) OR eat less exercise less- to build muscle you need to do one of these. This allows the metabolism to adapt. This approach allows you to stay in check and we NEED change and diversity.
On the days you train heavy with wts you eat more, on other days you eat less. Be guided by your hunger and cravings
Women in follicular phase eat more exercise more. Estrogen helps build muscle and burn fat better is counteractive to insulin and cortisol. In follicular phase e2 drops a bit. Now be more careful about stressing body out. Eat less exercise less. At menses e2 and p4 drop, dopamine and serotonin drop, crave choc around menses (use cocoa powder) elevate brain chemistry shuts down carb and sugar cravings
Serotonin – anandomide and magnesium in chocolate
Female phase training
Burn fat all over but we burn fat faster from some areas. Alpha and beta receptors in fat, beta burn fat, alpha have slow fat release. More alpha in love handles etc. will lost more quickly from beta areas.
We can control density of these by cycle diet and exercise because when the metabolism compensates, the thyroid takes a hit. The thyroid upregulates beta receptors and downregulates alpha receptors. Getting into problem with thyroid stimulates stubborn areas to hang on.
Low carb diet can upregulate beta vs alpha.
Your metabolism does not care how you want to look, it will respond
Supplements are 5% in making a difference for metabolism
I don’t know your body, create the program that works for you, look for signs and follow the guidelines