Hormones do have an effect on your health and your weight. If your hormones are out of whack, losing weight is tough and gaining weight in all the wrong places comes easily. At BioFit Performance in Oviedo, FL, we focus on helping you get back into shape, which also means improving how your body functions and regulating hormones with exercise and a healthy diet. There are a lot of different types of hormones in the body. Most people think of sex hormones like estrogen or testosterone, but there are so many others that play a role on your health. Hormones are chemical messengers that trigger various functions in the body, including heart rate and temperature.
Insulin is also a well known hormone.
If your body doesn’t produce insulin, you have a condition called Type 1 diabetes. However, you can also have too much insulin, which results in insulin resistance and ultimately Type 2 diabetes. In both Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes, the cells don’t receive adequate energy. Insulin allows the cells to receive the glucose in the blood. In type 1, there’s no insulin to do that. In type 2, because of an overproduction of insulin, the cells fail to respond. That lack of ability to get energy causes nerve damage, high levels of toxic keytones, stomach problems, high blood sugar levels, lack of energy, cell damage throughout the body and vision problems.
You need adequate sleep to be healthy and that calls for a hormone.
If you have problems sleeping, maybe your body isn’t producing enough serotonin. Serotonin is created in the thalamus and low serotonin levels are linked to the inability to sleep. If you don’t get enough sleep, it can cause heart issues, difficulty thinking and low energy levels. Studies find that there’s a link between low serotonin levels and depression, irritability, mood swings, poor memory and a low sex-drive. Exercise helps increase serotonin levels.
Hormones of stress not only play a role in your health, but also where you store fat.
You need stress hormones or you’d die. Besides being a stress hormone, cortisol also regulates many bodily functions. That’s why all cells have cortisol receptors. It controls your metabolism, lowers inflammation, controls brain function and aids in the control of blood sugar levels. Just like all hormones, there’s a perfect balance and having too much cortisol is bad. It causes low blood flow to the digestive tract, rapid heart rate and even is linked to the accumulation of belly fat.
- Sex hormones, such as estrogen, progesterone and testosterone can get out of balance. That causes many different conditions that range from stubborn weight gain to gall bladder disease.
- The fifth hormone that plays a big role in your health is HGH—human growth hormone. It helps you build strength, while also aids with heart functioning, bone growth, fat and sugar metabolism, body composition and regulating body fluids.
- Exercise and a healthy diet are ways to help regulate your hormones. For instance, exercise burns off the hormones of stress and gets your body back to normal. It also aids with normalizing estrogen levels.
- Controlling insulin levels and exercise is extremely important in preventing type 2 diabetes. It helps prevent insulin resistance, which is the precursor to Type 2 diabetes.
For more information, contact us today at BioFit Performance