It’s 10:00am - Do You Know What Your Hormones Are Up To?
Did you know that every time you eat you are setting off a hormonal reaction? What you choose to munch on can take you down the path of healthy energy storage, or lead you on a perilous course into the land of high blood sugar levels, elevated cortisol levels and unwanted fat storage.
If you look around our world today it would appear that many of us are oblivious to this connection between food and health, choosing their food more for its entertainment value than its nutritional value.
This scenario was sadly displayed to me recently. I was spectating at an elite cycling event and hundreds of people came out to watch along the race route with chairs and blankets, ready to stay several hours. Over the course of these several hours I could not help but notice a young girl sitting alongside of us. She looked to be about 9 or 10 years old and was quite obese. She sat on the hillside with her brother and what appeared to be her grandparents. Over the course of two hours she consumed a 32 ounce Gatorade, a large snack bag of Doritos, a 20 ounce soda and a bag of Skittles candy. It is obvious the adults in her life don’t consider what goes into this young girl’s mouth to be a source of sustenance which would allow her to grow and thrive in a healthy manner. Instead they are seemingly unaware that they are leading their granddaughter on a path that most certainly, if not already, will result in a disease state. Watching this young girl sit for hours eating foods that are poisoning her health was deeply troubling to me.
I don’t say this to harass the young girl or her grandparents, but to demonstrate the fact that the majority of people don’t seem to be making the connection between what they eat and the state of their health. There is a disconnect between the two. This is evidenced as stated on the website www.preventdisease.com ‘Preventable illnesses account for 8 of the 9 leading categories of death.’ I decided then and there to write this particular blog post to hopefully make more people aware of the fact that WHAT YOU EAT REALLY DOES MATTER if you want to live a long, healthy life!
You can prevent most diseases by taking the time to learn and be aware of what things will or won’t contribute to disease! Who really doesn’t have time to learn how to live a longer, healthier life?
What happens when you eat
So, let’s begin to break down the hormonal process that occurs when you eat and see how it can make or break your health. Let’s say you sit down to a breakfast of 3 pancakes with some syrup, two slices of bacon and a 12 ounce glass of orange juice - that’s going American size. Or perhaps a bagel with cream cheese, fruit jam, and a grande latte. Sounds pretty standard right? These will give you a carbohydrate count between 100 and 148 grams. The high end of a moderate daily carbohydrate count tops out at 150 grams, so with that first breakfast, you have eaten your MAX carbohydrate count for the day and with the second - two thirds of your daily carbs.
It’s important to keep in mind that the carbohydrates in these meals (or any other carb loaded meal of your choice) all become simple sugars once they are digested, so from here your blood sugar levels (or blood glucose levels) skyrocket. This is when you feel full, groggy, and ready for a nap even though it is only 10:00am. To counteract all the sugar running through your system your pancreas releases the hormone INSULIN. Insulin is the “key” that opens the doors to the places where sugar can be stored either as glycogen in the liver and muscles, or as fat in the fat cells for future energy stores. Sweet! The doors opened, the excess sugar was stored, all is good. (Except that you just stored your meal as fat but that’s another post.)
Yeah good, that is, until you eat lunch. Your sub sandwich, chips, soda and cookie cause the same process to repeat itself. Over time the insulin response fails to work its magic and you become insulin resistant. This means the “key” to open the door and store the excess sugar doesn’t work anymore. That spells trouble. Now you have a high level of blood glucose which is toxic to your cells, causing damage to your nerves, blood vessels and organs.This is what causes the complications of diabetes.
Chronic high blood sugar and high insulin levels are a big problem. While the liver and muscles become insulin resistant, the fat cells take longer to become resistant. They are the champs, taking on the extra effort for the team. When insulin is flooding the system your fat cells are going to be working overtime along with an enzyme called lipoprotein lipase (LPL) to convert all that excess glucose to fat. Now once again, your body has dealt with the excess blood sugar, but you can see how chronic high levels of insulin create a chronic FAT STORING mode. Not cool!
Excess insulin also creates INFLAMMATION which is the beginning of most disease states. Inflammation now pulls it’s hormone pal CORTISOL into the mix. You have probably heard of cortisol, it’s the stress hormone. YES, your body is under stress now and cortisol, with your best interests in mind, starts shutting down things like your immune system and starts stimulating the creation of more glucose to help with the “stress emergency”. WOW! Can you see how this creates a giant hormonal response nightmare? Your body is doing it’s best under the circumstances but seriously... better eating choices sure would be a simpler solution in order to avoid this whole scenario!
Amazingly, there is a lot more that goes on in this process and it is equally as fascinating and eye opening as what you have read here. In the next post we will go further in depth, learning about fat storing hormones and fat burning hormones and how they fit into this important hormonal interplay. We will also get around to an optimal way of eating to prevent this cascading reaction.
In the meantime, I hope you have gained new insight on the importance of food selection.
If you consider the act of eating in this manner, reflecting on what is actually happening in your body as a direct result of what you put in it, hopefully it will make you think twice when making food choices.