ADVERTISING: Advertorial — Healthy weight year-round: Part II
In Part I of "Healthy year-round," we discussed briefly the varying reasons for gaining weight or the inability to lose it. This second part will detail more of the reasons.
We discussed that you could have a problem with your endocrine system — the system that produces your hormones — not just sex hormones, but hormones related to sleep, inflammation, emotional health, digestion, energy, etc. The organs involved could be the thyroid, adrenals, liver, pituitary, hypothalamus, gonads, ovaries or pancreas. You could have issues with PCOS, menopause, or other hormonal-related challenges.
A problem with brain hormones could result in depression, lack of motivation, skewed body image, stress eating and other issues that could result in stubborn weight issues. These can be helped with nutrition, acupuncture, counseling and other such therapies, and not just drugs.
Sleep is a big deal in reaching your optimal weight. But if you’re not sleeping well, just taking a medication for it won’t always help. We need to find out WHY you are not sleeping — not falling asleep, not staying asleep or not returning to sleep if awakened, and not waking feeling refreshed. All these can have different causes, all with different solutions.
Certain medications, such as steroids, antipsychotics, antidepressants, birth control pills, high blood pressure pills (especially beta-blockers) and epileptic medications, can make you hungry (causing you to eat excessively), slow your calorie burn, or inhibit nutrient absorption. Taking care of the underlying condition can mean no longer needing the medication and helping your health and weight improve.
One area to be careful of is edema, especially swelling of ankles, which can mean something more serious such as congestive heart failure or kidney disease. If you are gaining weight quickly and see swelling, or nothing else has changed, it would be prudent to check out and rule out any serious condition.
Blood sugar problems — insulin resistance, diabetes or prediabetes, metabolic syndrome and/or the excessive consumption of sugar/carbs— will almost certainly contribute to weight gain and is essential, in my opinion, in weight control.
As you can see, difficult weight control isn’t as easy as just eating less and exercising. There can be more to it (even more than just listed in this article). Finding a practitioner who can do deep investigative work and offer solutions to overcome the health challenges is vital to getting your weight under control. Join us for tonight’s webinar, 5 Key Obstacles to Eliminating Excess Weight, 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 13. Webinar registration: https://bit.ly/Weight2021
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Holly Carling is a Doctor of Oriental Medicine, Licensed Acupuncturist, Doctor of Naturopathy, Clinical Nutritionist and Master Herbologist with over four decades of experience. Carling is a “Health Detective.” She looks beyond your symptom picture and investigates WHY you are experiencing your symptoms in the first place. Carling is currently accepting new patients and offers natural health care services and whole food nutritional supplements in her Coeur d’Alene clinic. Visit Carling’s website at www.vitalhealthcda.com to learn more about Carling, view a list of upcoming health classes and read other informative articles. Carling can be reached at 208-765-1994 and would be happy to answer any questions regarding this topic.