5 Signs of Hormonal Belly

by Christine Hronec

I'm going to be specifically talking about the hormonal belly. The reason we're discussing this is because there are some of you who may have this condition and as a result, may need to approach your nutrition in a completely different way than you may think. I'm going to first get into 5 signs that you even have a hormonal belly.

Other than having excess body fat on your frame, signs that you may have a hormonal belly include the fact that you are eating right. You are eating healthy, you are eating modest calories, and your waistline keeps getting bigger even though you are eating correctly. That's number one.

Number two is you have been craving a lot of sugar lately. It's an uncontrollable type of sugar craving, not the type of thing where it's like that time of the month, but it's above and beyond that. As you guys know, I've done lots of videos on insulin resistance and diabetes. Type 2 diabetes, insulin resistance, is a condition where your body is not able to process carbohydrates because your cells are resistant to the insulin hormone and your body has a hard time utilizing carbohydrates as a fuel source. However, insulin resistance can also lead to another condition called leptin resistance.

Leptin is a very tricky hormone. Leptin is the hormone that if you don't get enough of, it's going to tell your body that you're starving and it's going to tell your body to hold on to body fat. The other problem with leptin is that if leptin levels are too high and leptin is produced by fat cells. If you begin to accumulate more and more and more fat, your body will release more and more and more leptin. When leptin levels get too high, on the other end of the spectrum, it never gives your body the signal to stop eating because our bodies have an internal mechanism that goes from our cells to our brain that says, yes, I am full, stop eating. However, hormonal dysfunction can cause that to stop, and it comes from a condition called leptin resistance.

The next thing that may be a sign that you have a hormonal belly is that you are experiencing a lot of mood swings. Outside of the mood swings, another one is if you are constantly stressed. High levels of stress, as we know, it can increase the cortisol hormone levels. However, when the cortisol hormone goes up, what ends up happening is it sends the signal to your body to store even more fat. Yes, if you are stressed, those hormones tell your body to store more fat.

Last, but not least, is that you are exhausted all the time but cannot sleep. The hormonal belly shape is distinguishably different. It tends to sit a little bit lower on the abdomen and it tends to have a lower protrusion beneath the navel. If this is you, if you are hearing every single thing I'm saying and you're like, yup yup yep yep.. here is what you need to do.

The first thing, I recommend you is you want to focus on weight loss to a certain extent. If you are one of those people where your waistline is getting bigger, you are eating healthy, and you have been in a caloric deficit. If you're in that boat, what I need you guys to do is bring your calorie level up to maintenance. You may not feel comfortable with this. For some of you, it could be 1,700 calories, it could be 2,000 calories, it may be higher. Bring your calories up to maintenance, increase your healthy fats, increase your protein, reduce your carbohydrates with respect to starchy carbs, and specifically bring up your fiber.

Now, a general recommendation for women and what I recommend in most of my shred style plans is a minimum of 17 grams of fiber per day, but if you have hormonal belly, you are going to want to do an estrogen detox in the range of 30 to 50 grams of fiber per day, at least for the first 7 days. After that, I want you guys at least over 30 grams of fiber on the daily. You want to be eating things like flax seeds, chia seeds, avocado, and psyllium husk. You want to have foods that are very rich in fiber. Leafy greens with every meal.

You can definitely get your hormones tested to actually confirm if you have a hormone imbalance. You're going to want to get your estrogen levels tested, specifically estradiol. You want to get your progesterone tested in order to facilitate the detox of excess estrogens because remember, if you are not ovulating regularly, meaning an irregular period, if you are in perimenopause or in menopause. If you're not ovulating, what happens is your body doesn't have the opportunity to detox the excess estrogens through your monthly cycle, so you are left with high levels of estrogen that's going to cause you to store fat.

Elevated insulin resistance, elevated leptin resistance, and it is a biochemical storm for fat gain, for lack of better terms. What I want you guys to know is that you can address it. You can improve it. This does not mean you have to go on a keto diet, but we got to get that fiber all the way up. We got to get those hormones in line, and we have to elevate those healthy fats and minimize the starches. If you're in the boat where you do have a substantial amount of weight to lose, when I say substantial meaning, if you have well over 25 pounds to lose and you've been working on it, but you're kind of stuck, you do need to be very dialed in with your nutrition.

Determine your BMR (basal metabolic rate), determine your TDEE (total daily energy expenditure), all that is BMR + activity. From there, be in a caloric deficit of no more than 500 calories. Then from there, utilize an appropriate macronutrient split of all of my meal plans that I have available on www.gaugegirltraining.com. I could help you out through a customized program, but the thing is, we need to pay close attention to these hormones. What I need you guys to know is that it's not going to be good enough to just exercise more. It's not going to be good enough to just eat less. If you really want this to go away, let me know your questions.

Is there is one supplement that I strongly urge you guys to consider? Yes, it is called IC3 (indole-3-carbinol). Foods high in indole-3-carbinol are kale and brussels sprouts. Kale, brussels sprouts, those are two really big ones. IC3 is known to help naturally detox excess estrogens. Click here https://gaugelife.com/collections/hormone-reset/products/prime-indole-3-carbinol to learn more.

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