Hormones You MUST Address For Fat Loss Articles | Weight Loss

By: Richard Bleuze

Hormones you MUST Address for Fat Loss

Most fat loss programs on the market today focus on one main thing: to burn fat, you have to expend more energy than you take in.  This is true.

However, that works very well for what is called “beginning” fat. However, it is not a plan to fat loss forever.

As anyone who has ever been on a diet and exercise program of any kind can tell you, at first it is easy to lose fat.  Eat less, do more, lose fat.  However, later the fat loss is more difficult. 

Speaking generally, you actually have to eat closer to maintenance calorie levels and expend more calories through exercise. 

Even then, things do not always happen very quickly.  For this reason, once you have hit a fat loss plateau or when you are trying to lose the last few pounds, fat loss becomes less about energy balance and more about hormones.

Some hormones, such as leptin, control the majority of your general fat loss efforts and all of the factors thereof such as appetite.  However, assuming you are eating enough and trying to create an energy deficit through training, leptin is not the issue.

Unlike leptin, there are other hormones which are a bit more insidious in their effects on your physique.  These hormones do not just determine if you gain fat, but these hormones also determine where you gain it, and whether you are able to lose it from those areas.

It is these hormones that force your body to have particular fat storage patterns.  In other words, these regional fat storage areas are often called "problem areas".

The three most common types of regional fat storage or problem areas and  which hormones cause them are:

1.  The most common types of fat storage that we often see in women is the “pear shape” (fairly thin on top but heavy on the bottom).  This type of fat storage is heavily dependent on the female sex hormone estrogen.  This is one reason why you see this type of fat storage primarily in women.  It is also why women usually have more trouble losing fat than men.

However, anyone, male or female, with high estrogen levels will often have trouble losing fat.  The bottom line is, the higher your estrogen levels, the greater the likelihood you will store fat in your lower body; mainly in the hips and thighs.

And yes, it IS possible for men to have high estrogen levels.  Unfortunately, outside of having to deal with a slower rate of fat loss and lower body fat, these guys also have to deal with the ignominy of man-boobs.

2.  Another regional fat storage area is what is often known as love handles and lower back fat.  The reason why you store fat this way is because of how your body reacts to certain hormones, and because of the effect those hormones have on fat storage.

The reason this occurs is because of your eating habits and how your body processes and handles insulin period.  The degree to which you are able to process and respond to glucose, better known as sugar, in your body is called insulin sensitivity.  The higher this is, the easier and more efficiently your body utilizes carbohydrates for energy, and the less likely you are to store carbs as fat.  However, if you do not deal well with carbs, you are gonna hang on to some fat.

It has been shown that people who store fat in the love handles are generally very insulin resistant.  Therefore, it can be reasoned that insulin resistance leads to love handles and lower back fat storage. 

The good news is that insulin resistance (and the resulting regional fatness) can be mitigated with certain types of training.

3.  The most common type of regional fat storage is belly fat.  Abdominal fat storage obviously has a lot to do with your diet and overall body fat level.  Again, this regional fat storgae problem has to do with hormones.

The hormone involved in this situation is cortisol.  This hormone is sometimes called a “stress” hormone.  Since your body will produce cortisol (and encourage belly fat storage) under conditions of nearly any type of stress – both emotional and physical.  Thus, to combat cortisol, it is advisable to get more sleep.   Although, it is of far greater effect to combat cortisol through resistance training.

However, it is important to note that long duration cardio and extended lifting sessions are what produces the most cortisol, and thus should be avoided.

Instead, short, intense training sessions using a particular type of training modality will help to counteract the effects of cortisol; both the muscle-wasting effect and the cortisol related belly fat storage.

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