The Connection Between Hormones and Weight Loss

What is the connection between hormones and weight loss? A very good question! My goal here is to provide you with a high level overview, so you can start to think about what this connection means for you and your own personal health journey.

What are hormones and what do they do for us? They are chemical messengers that regulate processes in our bodies. We naturally produce about 50 different types of hormones. The hormones leptin and insulin, sex hormones and growth hormone influence our appetite, metabolism, and body fat distribution.

Our hormone levels are always changing - hour to hour, day to day, and over the course of time. There are however, certain health conditions that can interfere with your hormones and cause hormonal imbalance.

What role do hormones play when it comes to our weight? Hormonal imbalance affects your body in numerous ways. One of the most common symptoms is weight problems. Having a hormonal imbalance can cause weight gain or make it hard to lose weight, even when you diet and exercise. Here is a short breakdown of the different hormones that can affect weight:

• Insulin is a hormone that influences metabolism, and insulin resistance increases your risk of obesity. Insulin resistance also increases your risk of diabetes, making maintaining a healthy weight more difficult.
• Leptin is the hormone that controls your appetite and tells you when you’re full, and high leptin levels or leptin resistance can lead to overeating and weight gain. 
• Ghrelin is the opposite of leptin, telling you that you’re hungry, but low ghrelin can make you feel hungrier and cause you to overeat.
• Cortisol, the stress hormone, also influences weight. High cortisol affects metabolism and may increase your risk of overeating or make weight loss more difficult.
• Women with low estrogen levels during and after menopause may experience increased weight gain, while men with low testosterone levels often lose muscle mass and gain body fat.

Signs of hormonal imbalance include: Weight gain, difficulty losing weight, depression, fatigue, hair loss, insomnia, mental fog, mood swings and sexual dysfunction.

While eating a healthy diet, regular exercise and stress management are all effective ways to keep healthy, so are your hormones and a hormonal imbalance could be negatively affecting you. 

If while reading this, you find some of the symptoms sound like your experience, be sure to reach out to a doctor who will be able to refer you for screening for hormonal imbalance. This gives you the opportunity to be best informed and make the necessary changes to help you reach your full potential to achieve your goals!