How to Master your Metabolism without Starving Yourself
May 4, 2021 - Episode #64 - How to Master your Metabolism without Starving Yourself
Hey mama if you are over the age of 40, this is for you. You are getting older, and you have noticed changes and not good changes!! You cannot get the weight off! It’s so frustrating. You are trying ALL the things, but your metabolism feels like it has come to a screeching halt! It’s time to Master your Metabolism. We are separating fact from fiction on the female metabolism today on Healthy Harmony! It makes me so angry that we as women have been handed a bunch of lies our whole life about metabolism and weight loss. It’s ridiculous because the science doesn’t add up! How often have you heard….if you want to lose weight, eat less move more, It’s just about calories in vs. calories out. So, you do that. You diet, cut calories and exercise. You feel like you are doing everything right. You about kill yourself and nothing happens!! Zero, Zilch, Nada! The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results! Aren't you tired of starving yourself and not seeing the results you are looking for?? Then this podcast is just for YOU!! Listen in as I give you 5 healthy habits to boost your metabolism!! And tune in next week, as I interview an expert guest and we further unpack the myths about women, exercise and metabolism! PS....If you are LOVING this podcast, don't forget to leave a 5 star rating and a written review! For Apple listeners, click here https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/inspire-healthy-harmony-health-transformation-functional/id1494961750 And if you missed the podcast where I go OFF on the food industry and fill you in on a secret called "health washing," click here!! Part 2 What the Heck do I Eat? Exposing Food Industry Lies https://www.inspirehealthyharmony.com/exposing-the-food-industry.html#/ Read Full Transcript below Where else to listen: (note: Google is only available on android devices)
FULL TRANSCRIPT May 4, 2021 - Episode #64 - How to Master your Metabolism without Starving Yourself Hey, mama. If you were over the age of 40, this one is for you. You're getting older and you've noticed changes and not good changes. You cannot get the weight off. It is so frustrating. You're trying all the things! Your metabolism feels like it has come to a screeching halt!! It's time to master your metabolism. We're separating fact from fiction on the female metabolism today on Healthy Harmony. Hey there. Welcome to the Healthy Harmony podcast. I'm Jennifer Pickett, your host, your health coach, your friend. If you're ready to tap into the healthiest version of you so you can live life with confidence and intentional harmony, then my friend you're in the right place. As a Dietitian turned Functional Medicine Health Coach. I'm here to walk beside you and show you how to take control of your complete health… body, mind, and soul. Don't forget if you are loving the content on this podcast and have found it simple and encouraging click that subscribe button on your favorite podcast platform. Be sure to leave a rating and write a written review. I love this review written by a recent subscriber. She goes by the handle walk runner. She said, I love this new podcast. It's been added to my library and I listened to all the episodes. I'm so glad to have found this perspective on the diet industry. And can't agree more. Thank you for what you are giving. Listen, and you will not be disappointed. Walk runner. Thank you so much for leaving that a wonderful review. I appreciate it. And thanks for tuning in. Let's get right into it. Let's talk about metabolism. I'm about to bust up some myths up in here. Are you ready? First, let’s get our facts straight about what your metabolism is and what it does. What does metabolism even mean? Okay. So technically metabolism is all of the chemical reactions that take place in a living organism every day to keep it alive. It's your body's method of converting calories from the food you ate into the energy that you need to power through all of those physiological processes that keep you alive and kicking 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Our metabolism is a process of the body turning calories. What we eat into usable energy. So calories are really a measure of energy and our body depends on getting enough of them to keep us functioning in all aspects of life. If we look at this at a deeper level at that cellular level, we see that every single system within the body from the endocrine system to the digestive system is linked to energy production at the cellular level. So for us to be healthy, we need to have healthy cells. Our cells need to be functioning at an optimal level. A strong metabolism is so much more than a lean body. A strong metabolism is beneficial for immune function. It lowers your rates of infectious and degenerative diseases is good for fertility, a healthy sex drive, lean muscle mass, having more energy and feeling good. Even your brain functionality, your longevity, how you age and so much more. Your brain is actually one of the biggest benefits to a strong metabolism because the brain's energy demands are extremely high. Did you know that 16 times more energy is needed to keep the brain working than to support skeletal muscle 16 times? That's interesting. Right? So research shows your metabolism naturally slows steadily after the age of 40. Okay. You knew this, right? Like we don't need research. We see it. What this means is that you need to be proactive and add metabolism boosters into your daily life to keep you feeling young, looking young and acting young. Okay. Now buckle up. This is where I get on my soap box. First of all, I hear horror stories every day because I'm speaking with women every single day and I'm hearing their struggles and I'm hearing lifelong struggles. And so much of that struggle comes from misinformation where they have received advice. They've tried to implement that, implement that advice and nothing happened, nothing worked. So a lot of times, by the time someone gets to me, she's very, very frustrated and overwhelmed and doesn't even know where to get started. So we have to unpack the lies and it makes me so very angry that we, as women have been handed a bunch of lies our whole life, literally our whole life about metabolism and weight loss. It's ridiculous because the science doesn't add up yet. We keep saying the same thing. How often have you heard? If you want to lose weight, eat less, move more. It's just about calories and calories out. So you do that. You about kill yourself and nothing happens. Zero zilch, nada, my friend and client Jolene. And I were talking about that this week. How in the past, she has done extreme diets, counting every single calorie. I mean working out twice a day and the weight wouldn't budge, she's not alone. I hear these stories every single day, a lifetime of struggling to get the weight off. I have had this experience myself when trying to get healthier and lose weight, eating less, moving more, and it doesn't cut it. And it's so frustrating. So here's what I did. I started digging in and researching. And let me tell you, there is more to this. It is much more complex. And those stupid myths that are being shoved down our throat are missing crucial facts about the female body. And that's who I'm talking to you today. This is for you girls. There is a very big difference in the male body and the female body. God designed it very, very differently. Women. You already know this, your husband and you try to lose weight together. He drops it very easily and you're standing there with your hands in the air saying, what the heck? Here's something else you need to realize this whole world of weight loss. It's a, it's a huge, massive industry. Okay? When there is research, guess what? Most of that research is is done on young males. The research is male based. Hello. Women are doing male dominated programs. Now there's aspects of those programs and aspects of some of that. They can be beneficial, but I will tell you, the female metabolism is very tricky. What works for a man may not work for you. In fact, it might have the opposite effect. So are you ready? Are you ready to put aside the myths and master your metabolism? I'm going to give you five healthy habits to master your metabolism. Let's go. Number one, forget counting calories. Your focus needs to be on optimizing nutrition. So often we fall into this trap where counting calories. We're just worried about the calories. We need to start focusing on calories and focus. Instead on optimizing nutrition, we do that with real whole foods. One of the biggest mistakes that people make when trying to improve their metabolic speed, and they're trying to lose weight is going on a diet. The foundation of a good metabolism is the right amount of nutrients and calories in the body. So if you cut down too far on your caloric intake, your body may start devouring your muscle tissue for energy because it's lacking in the nutrients that it needs. Healthy metabolic function is one of the body's ultimate forms of protection, and we need to consistently eat and rest enough to keep ourselves thriving. So while dieting or cutting calories, counting calories is usually your go-to approach for attempting to lose weight. Taking this too far can have a really negative impact on metabolism. It ultimately backfires on you in terms of fat loss. Remember on that cellular level, the pathways of your metabolism rely on your nutrient intake. So you need the various nutrients, including proteins, carbs, fats, trace minerals and vitamins. In order to produce energy, you have very specific needs for building upkeep and repair up all those body tissues, those low calorie diets. They miss key nutrients. Your potential to lose weight decreases when your body becomes convinced that you're starving, even though you might intentionally cut calories and work out more. What's interesting is that sometimes the body can not tell the difference between starvation done on purpose and the kind that we experienced during times of famine. Now over a lifetime, if you think back, how many times have you been on a diet? How many times have maybe you lost a little bit of weight and then you regained it and you've done this whole diet thing, your whole life. It's a trap. It's like a hamster wheel, right? You're just running over and over and over. And it's so very frustrating. And what happens in the body is that has devastating consequences, dieting over and over, sends a signal of deprivation and starvation to your metabolic hormones, which means you unknowingly hold on to every precious calorie you ate in order to, to ensure survival. It's like a cruel joke, right? This is why it is so very important to instead focus on optimizing nutrition. Let's be honest, just a quick side note here. Aren't you busy, do you have time to count calories? I don't have time to count calories. I know you don't have time to count calories. You've got enough on your plate. Counting calories is a pain. And also it's making the assumption that all calories are created equal. This is false. Okay. All calories are not created equal. Do not fall into this trap. Remember that we have been sold a bill of goods our whole entire life. Okay. This is just about marketing. Now you can go in the stores and you can tell they are making a product look like it's healthier than it is. Okay. It's a term called health washing. I did a whole podcast on this. I want you to go back and listen to that. It's so very important. I'll link that in the show notes. So what we're going to do is focus on real nutritious foods because this increases your metabolic flexibility and it improves your fat burning and your digestive efficiency. So how do we do this first? Let's talk about what we need to include. The first key to revving up that metabolism is eating a whole foods, real food diet lane, clean protein, plant-based fats and oils, fresh fruits and veggies. And of course drinking lots of water. We need to limit carbohydrates, especially the sugars and the heavily processed grains and starches add in powerful protein. Here's why a lot of women are not getting enough protein. We need protein. Protein is broken down to amino acids. Amino acids rebuild healthy cells. Protein is one of the most important elements in any diet, but it's very important in the development of lean muscle. And this is the type of muscle that is closely associated with that high metabolic rate proteins also beneficial for keeping your energy in your blood sugar stable. While it also helps to build calorie burning lean muscle mass, like it's such a win here's interesting proteins, a little bit harder to digest than fats or carbs. So this means that the body spends more time and burns more calories digesting protein than it does many other elements of your diet. So the question is, are you getting enough protein? Are you getting enough? Real foods, those vegetables, those that fruit, the healthy fats. This is what we need to focus on for our metabolism. Let's talk about the foods that are really limiting us and destroying our metabolism. By the way, in all likelihood, I can just tell you at the outset here, that it's going to be those processed foods that are full of toxins and chemicals that have great marketing and they're labeled healthy. And so you think, Oh, that's a good choice. It's not. So what we really want to do, what, what we really want to do, excuse me, is try to avoid the inflammatory foods because these foods slow down the digestive process and it increases free radical damage. Okay. Free, radical damage is the cause of aging. So these inflammatory foods, these foods that we're going to talk about right now, I want you to, I want you to think of them as a metabolism, death food. Like this is, these are the foods that are killing your metabolism. The body recognizes processed and inflammatory foods as toxins. It says, wait a minute. You're not supposed to be here. And so that starts this innate immune system fight or flight response. This increases the stress hormone production, and it slows down the metabolic functioning. You know, even some of those foods that seem healthy. They're the culprits for unwanted weight gain thyroid dysfunction, ongoing fatigue, hormone imbalance, and yes, even digestive distress again, go back and listen to that health washing podcast. So you know how you are being deceived by the food industry. I know that this is something that I speak to almost every single session with my clients, because the question is always okay, well, how do I shop in the grocery store? What do I get? So we spend a lot of time working on this and my clients are so grateful that I have equipped them, how to shop in the grocery store. So these inflammatory foods, the one that we, the ones that we want to avoid as much as possible, those sugary drinks, including the soda, the energy drinks, the juices like it, that liquid sugar does a number on your blood sugar. And it's a disaster processed foods and all that stuff in the middle of the grocery store, that's really, really confusing the stuff that has to have a nutrition label and an ingredient list on there. Okay. So we really want to limit that kind of stuff. That's processed foods especially the ones made with grains and gluten. Okay. So like the bread, the pasta, the cereal, the crackers, the methods, the desserts, the flowers, the chips, the granola bars. Yep. Even their granola. Those are the ones we're not getting much benefit from. Refined vegetable oils is another one that is very inflammatory artificial sweeteners, artificial ingredients, and then the very low quality dairy and animal products. So if we're going to choose dairy products or protein, if we can choose clean and organic, that is ideal. So grass fed pasture raised raw organic. That is ideal. That's the way to go. Number two exercise, but do not over exercise. Here’s, what's interesting. And this is what's very, very important. You know, you need to exercise like, you know, what makes a big difference with your metabolism. But I think sometimes we get caught in that trap of over extra, over exercising, over-training so here's a reality. If you overtrain and you do that repeatedly, it causes fatigue. It causes muscle loss and it lowers your metabolism, not the opposite you cause you're thinking, okay, the more I train, the more I'm going to boost my metabolism and that is not fact. That is fiction. So we've got to exercise and exercise smart. So exercise impacts your hormonal status and intense workouts without resting really elevates that cortisol, that stress hormone level. Okay. So what happens when we increase cortisol, it winds up impairing insulin sensitivity. It stalls the body's ability to recover from workouts. And it damages the process that rebuilds and repairs healthy muscle tissue. And I have seen this in my own health journey over exercising can really deplete the adrenal glands. You feel very, very depleted like the rest of the day. I've certainly seen that with me, so we need movement, but we need smart movement. Now exercising three to five times a week is an excellent way to shore up your metabolic rate. And there's some specific strategies here. You know, that I'll go over very, very briefly hit training, bringing that heart heart rate up and then bringing it that down, giving yourself a time to recover is very important. A good example of this is sprints. My trainer that I work out with had me do in sprints recently, Hey, this girl does not sprint, but I'm sprinting. I'm trying, I'm not saying I look pretty doing it, but I'm out there. And I feel proud of myself for doing that, but that's a good example of some hit training where you're bringing that heart rate up and then bringing it back down. Another excellent example here is is of smart exercise is strength training. And so often again, we're thinking we've got to we, we've got to keep our heart rate up and we've got to do a lot of cardio. Do a lot of cardio, do a lot of cardio or it doesn't count.. false. You've got to have that strength training. Strength training helps to build muscle, which increases your metabolism because muscle mass has a higher metabolic rate than fat. This means that muscle mass requires more energy to preserve a person's body. Naturally loses muscle as they age, we're losing muscle. So regular resistance training, like with weights, body, weight resistance bands can really help to build muscle. You're building lean muscle mass, and that uses more calories than body fat. Now this is a big topic. Okay? So I am not the expert on exercise, but guess what? Next week we are diving into this topic and I am going to bring in an expert and we're going to talk about those myths of exercise. What are we doing wrong? Because we want to exercise smart so that we can get the mass, the mass number of benefit. Does that make sense? Yes. The maximum number of benefit. Okay. Number three, manage stress. You've heard me say this before a lot before that, I want you to understand stress affects hormone levels and it can cause the body to produce more cortisol. Cortisol is called the stress hormone that we know. It also helps to regulate appetite. I don't want you shooting yourself in the foot. Your metabolism is a stress barometer. We are the gender that bears children. As women, our body is far more sensitive because we can bear children. So unmanaged stress increases inflammation in the body and inflamed body and low metabolism go hand in hand. What can you do to help your body dial back the stress response. Number four, get plenty of sleep. Body will not release weight. You will not be able to boost your metabolism if you're not getting sleep. And yes, you've heard me about it before. You've heard me talk about it before. In fact, I'm bringing on a sleep expert two weeks from now, and you're going to love that. But here's what, here's the bottom line. When you think about sleep, I want you to think this lack of sleep, lack of weight loss. If you want to lose weight, you've got to get some sleep running on themes can seriously slow down your metabolism. Since the body works to conserve energy, when it's fatigued, make it a priority to get seven to nine hours of sleep every single night. So you can keep those hormone levels in check, including cortisol. This leads the body. When you have high cortisol, it leads the body to store more fat. When you have high cortisol, you've got poor mental functioning. You become more resistant to insulin that controls blood sugar. It's a disaster. So you see how important this is by the way, this is the key. If you want to really make a difference with what you're choosing to eat the next day, get good sleep. The night before when you get too little sleep, the body releases ghrelin. Ghrelin is the hunger hormone. So you feel really hungry the next day and leptin, which is another hormone that makes you feel full. You has let you have less leptin, so you don't feel very satisfied. So this is not just willpower. I think as women we're like, Oh goodness, I just, I need more determination. I need to have more willpower. I need somebody to follow me around and knock the food, the bad food out of my hand. No girl, you might just need to get some good sleep. And you're going to find how much easier it is to make those good choices, sleep influences what you ate the next day. And also what you crave. Number five, our last healthy habit to boost your metabolism, add in some metabolic boosters. Now you're going to love these suggestions. So green tea is another healthy addition to your daily consumption because it is a natural metabolism booster. It's been that way for centuries. And it's all thanks to a special antioxidant compound. In addition to some low levels of caffeine. Now, garlic is another one. This acts as a thermogenic in the body. So it revs up the metabolism. And it's also tied to lower blood sugar levels and less fat accumulation. This is thanks to a compound in garlic called allicin. Now B vitamins is another metabolism booster. They play a essential role in your metabolic rate. So B1, B2 and B6, and can be found in bananas, baked potatoes, eggs, peas, and spinach. There's also evidence that warming spices like cinnamon pepper and ginger aid in lipid oxidation. And this is the process of burning fat for energy. Very interesting stuff, right? You can see how easy it is to fall into this deceptive trap of what to do to boost your metabolism. It is not eat less and move more today. I outlined very key strategies to boost your metabolism and we're continuing the conversation next week. As I bring on a guest to discuss exercise and women, are you working out effectively to boost your metabolism, join us next week and find out! Before you go, don't forget to subscribe to the Healthy Harmony podcast, share it with a friend. I don't want you to miss anything and I don't want your friend to miss anything. And I appreciate you so much for leaving that five star rating and a written review until we meet again. I hope you guys have a healthy and happy day. Bye y'all. |