There are myriad strategies aimed at weight loss. If you are like the vast majority of women, at one point in your life you have struggled with weight loss. As a personal trainer and fitness expert, even I have had to fight the battle. Most of my clients think that because I have dedicated my life to health and fitness, weight loss comes easy. I’m here to tell you that weight loss is never easy for anyone.

This is the second in a series of “Q&A” articles that specifically address some new approaches to weight loss and body chemistry. The questions come directly from my clients and will help you to see your body from a new perspective. While aimed at weight loss, these questions will help you to understand your body’s chemistry better so that you can tackle any challenge you might have such as sugar cravings, fatigue, mood issues, dependency on certain foods, inability to stop eating, food distraction/obsession.

2 Why is it that when I eat certain foods, I always want more and can’t stop eating even when I’m full?!

This is a super interesting and fun question to me. I can’t tell you how many of my clients have asked me this. For the most part, this question comes from women: women who are exasperated with themselves and their inability to walk away from certain foods. Many women erroneously think it is a matter of self-control. Thankfully, the issue is not that simple. As with many of my discussions, the answer lies in body chemistry.

There are two major players here I’d like to discuss: hormones and food “dependency” and technically they are related. Women are blessed and cursed by the hormone estrogen. I like to believe that we are supremely blessed and while our monthly cycle does present challenges I love being a woman. One role of estrogen is to increase the metabolism of carbohydrates in the body. This means that when estrogen is high, you will process and digest carbohydrates very quickly. As you know, estrogen levels vary throughout the month depending on where you are in your menstrual cycle. What is less known is that estrogen can fluctuate daily and even hourly- depending on several factors including what you eat and drink, age, quantity and quality of sleep, and prescription drugs. Certain foods increase estrogen due to their natural composition and to environmental influences. Regardless of the reason for high estrogen, your body will process, desire and “need” carbohydrates more than when your estrogen is lower. Anytime carbohydrates are processed quickly there is a resultant blood sugar shift. After eating a high carbohydrate food the blood sugar rises. Once the carbohydrate is processed, the blood sugar drops dramatically. This cycle-and subsequent blood sugar plunge- causes the body to think it is hungry and needs sugar (see The Cure to Cravings) therefore causing false hunger. The first answer to our question is this: when hormones cause the blood sugar to fluctuate, your body thinks it’s hungry and requests, desires and adores carbohydrates. It’s a primal urge causing you to eat, eat, eat. To make the issue even more complicated, eating carbohydrates causes you to desire more carbohydrates- the more you eat, the more you want! This concept leads to the second answer to today’s question. Your body is an extremely complex, finely tuned computer that is incredible smart. Many of us reach for certain foods during times of stress or emotional and/or physical pain because the make us feel better. While some experts and psychologists say that this approach is inaccurate, that reaching for these comfort foods is purely psychological without true physiological benefit, food science studies have shown the opposite: Foods high in carbohydrates cause a boost in circulating serotonin. Serotonin is a hormone that influences the brain and causes us to feel happy, content, physically comfortable, and peaceful. Because you turn to these foods over and over, your body programs the intimate details of the reaction such as the exact food that you are choosing (chocolate chip cookie or potato chips?), the time of day, and the specific benefit that this food brings (coffee and cookies cause perkiness and mood lift or ice cream causes calmness and satiety). During times of stress, fatigue, frustration, or pain your brain will signal you that it “needs” your favorite comfort food.

Your body wants to feel good and knows the influential foods. Your brain then wants the food you gravitate towards, and like a drug addict, gets a high from the food. What brain wouldn’t want more, more and more of this wonderful drug!? Your complex hormonal and instinctual system tells you to eat more. If you are extremely low- exhausted, major life trauma, over exercised, severely sleep deprived- your body will request great quantities of your specific solution.

During these times of unnecessary eating, ask yourself:
“Am I tired?” “Do I sleep well?” “What is on my mind? Is there something bothering me?” “Where am I in my menstrual cycle?” “Did I have more caffeine or sugar than usual today or yesterday?” And on a larger scale, take a look at your overall diet and eating habits. Do you eat high carbohydrate foods regularly more than three times each day? Carbohydrate foods to keep an eye on are bread, pasta, cereal, instant oatmeal, crackers, sweets and sweetened beverages. Other foods that may influence hormones are coffee and highly caffeinated beverages, chocolate, all soy products, protein bars, birth control prescriptions, non-organic dairy, high fructose corn syrup and the new, sneaky high maltose corn syrup.

Remember: You are an extremely complicated machine driven largely by numerous hormones. Relieve the guilt of overeating, and recognize that underneath the behavior, there are chemical equations at work. Watch and learn!