Leptin Resistance

So what is Leptin Resistance?...

When this hormone is working correctly, it orchestrates the delicate balance of keeping our weight steady regardless of the amount of food we eat.  It does this by triggering thyroid hormones to speed up the metabolism and well as triggering fat burning by the liver. 

So when we gain weight, our own fat tissues release the hormone leptin which suppresses our appetite and speeds up our metabolism to burn off the fat so that we return to our original weight.  Can you believe it?  Our fat actually regulates itself and returns us to our optimal weight or set-point!  Leptin also helps us to feel full and satisfied after eating and reduces sugar and food cravings.  Basically, it tells us when to eat and when to stop.

This is why you will often see healthy slim people who eat amazing amounts of food, but they burn it all off.  We enviously attribute this to their incredible fast metabolisms.

And this is perfectly correct.  They do have fast metabolisms.  But the interesting thing is that this is the natural order of things. 

This is how our bodies were created and all human beings have this capability … until we unbalance our body’s natural weight-regulation system.  Yes, that’s right … if our bodies were working as nature intended, then if you gained a few pounds, your body’s natural weight-regulation system would burn them off automatically.

The problem is that when things upset this natural order, our bodies develop leptin resistance.  Our fat tissues are still releasing leptin, but when we have leptin resistance our bodies become resistant to the hormone and it stops working effectively.  When this happens, our bodies lose the ability to burn off fat and return to our original weight and we start to gain weight instead.  This is the reason why just taking leptin tablets doesn’t work to reverse leptin resistance.  We have enough leptin in our system, we are just not using it effectively.

Unfortunately, there are many things in our modern world that interfere with this delicate balance.  Our bodies are geared towards life as it was hundreds or even thousands of years ago.  Our world has changed amazingly in the last 100 years and our bodies have not had a chance to evolve to cope with these changes in such a relatively short period of time. 

1) Thanks to all our time-saving devices, we are becoming more and more sedentary and do not exercise as much as our ancestors did.

2) Our modern society is also extremely fast-paced and hectic, causing much stress-induced health problems.  Our bodies were built to cope with “fight or flight” types of stress, not the chronic daily stress which never gives our adrenal glands the chance to shut off.

3) Our food has changed dramatically with more and more processed foods as well as more chemicals, preservatives and additives showing up in our food.  Our bodies were never meant to eat so many de-natured and “empty” foods … empty in vitamins and nutrients, that is, but not empty in calories!

4) As well as chemicals in our food, we are surrounded by environmental toxins like chemicals and pollution in our daily lives.  Many of these chemicals enter our bodies in different ways:  through our breathing, through our skin, through our water and food.  Our bodies are then left with the monumental task of trying to safely detoxify these chemicals so that we don’t poison ourselves.  Our detoxification systems excrete these chemicals through various ways, but when our bodies are overwhelmed and can’t excrete all these chemicals, it will try to find a safe way of storing these chemicals.  The safest place in our body to store these chemicals is in fat tissues, therefore, our bodies will often trigger increases in fat in order to cope with all these toxins.  That is why this Liver Detox Diet program is so important ... it is essential to find a safe and healthy way to detox your body of all these toxins.

5)  Our ancestors also never purposely “dieted” to lose weight.  Dieting is a relatively new phenomenon and unfortunately has caused more health problems than the original overweight condition it was supposed to help!  And of course, as everyone knows, you can lose weight by dieting, but it always comes right back on again.  But what people don’t always know is that once you get caught up in the “yo-yo” dieting syndrome, it actually pre-disposes you to leptin resistance and fat-storage, so not only do you gain the original weight back, you’ll usually gain additional pounds increasing your weight every time you yo-yo diet.

So simply put, leptin resistance is a chemical imbalance caused by your body’s resistance to the hormone leptin, so even if you have enough leptin, it is not being used properly.  This is very similar to insulin resistance.  These are both hormones which are essential to metabolism and if they do not work properly, it is impossible to regulate our weight efficiently.

This is extremely important to understand, because anybody who is overweight and has tried to diet to lose weight has felt the frustration, and even the shame, of not being able to lose weight and keep it off, and of not being able to resist the intense food cravings.  But please understand that it is not your fault.  You are not weak or lack willpower.  There is a physical, biological, chemical imbalance that is working against you and until you start to eat in a way to combat this chemical imbalance, you will never be able to lose weight and keep it off.

The Answers I’d Been Looking For

When I came across Leptin Resistance in my research, I was amazed because here was the scientific explanation of why my Liver Detox Diet program worked!

I had never heard of Leptin Resistance before, but over the years I had pieced together a Liver Detox Diet program that worked to not only help me to lose weight, but to overcome many health conditions that I had been suffering from including insulin resistance and diabetes, fibromyalgia, bloating, swelling, inflammation, water retention, hot flashes, hair loss, plantar fasciitis, burning sensations in my feet, poor memory and problems with concentration and much, much more.

What I noticed is that as I gained weight, I seemed to suffer from water retention, swelling legs and ankles, as well as fibromyalgia, and pain and burning sensations in my feet.  These pains made it more and more difficult for me to even walk short distances, let alone exercise.  This, of course, threw me in a vicious cycle of gaining more and more weight.

Now, interestingly enough, I had tried many different weight loss programs, including low fat, low carbohydrate, low GI, and calorie restriction, but what I found was that I was losing less and less weight on these diets and gaining it back in a very short period of time when I stopped dieting.  And following these diets did absolutely nothing to improve my health conditions and symptoms.

That was when I decided to research toxic overload and created my Liver Detox Diet program and when I followed the Liver Detox Diet program, I had the following results:

1)      Steady weight loss

2)      Reduction in water retention and swelling

3)      Stabilised my blood sugar levels

4)      Major improvement in my painful symptoms

5)      Much more energy

6)      Slept much deeper and better

7)      Felt better able to cope with the stress in my life

To say the least, I was extremely pleased with these results I got from this Liver Detox Diet program!

Now, I am not a scientist or a doctor.  I’m just someone who has tried to understand the confusing downward spiral my health has taken over the last number of years.  In order to understand what’s been happening, I have had to do a tremendous amount of research.  Some of it has been useful, but much of it hasn’t.  I had to use my own common sense and my intuition of what felt right for me and what didn’t and I have done a lot of trial and error in the process.

What excited me about finding this research on leptin resistance is that it has answered many questions I had about why my Liver Detox Diet program worked.

I suspected that my inflammation and painful symptoms and weight gain had something to do with toxic overload because as soon as I stopped eating processed foods and started eating whole, natural foods and started taking steps to increase my detoxification through liver support, supplements and skin brushing, I not only lost weight, but my symptoms improved.  (My naturopath has helped me tremendously by putting together a supplement program that has been very effective in increasing my detoxification.  I strongly suggest finding an experienced naturopath to work with you to help you to detoxify naturally and safely.)

I figured out that I probably had so many toxins stored in my fat tissues that if I ate food that was processed and had a lot of chemicals in them, my system would overload and would not be able to detoxify the chemicals, which in turn caused inflammation and many health problems, including weight gain.

The research I have read on Leptin Resistance agrees with this.

So What Causes Leptin Resistance?

There are many things that trigger Leptin Resistance.  Here are the main ones:

As you can see, quite a few conditions trigger Leptin Resistance.  But luckily, there are ways to overcome this condition ... and this Liver Detox program is a safe and healthy way to reverse Leptin Resistance and bring your body back to its natural state of health and wellness.

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