The Complete Idiot's Guide to Hormone Weight Loss
     We live in truly amazing times. Every day we see new technological advances in every aspect of our lives; medicine, communication, travel, entertainment and many others. However, in a time where we are moving forward in so many areas, why are we struggling so much with our health? Obesity has reached epidemic proportions. Heart disease, diabetes, cancer, autoimmune disease, Alzheimer's and many other chronic diseases continue to plague us. Many of these diseases have some relationship to obesity.     As a physician, it is very difficult for me to watch patients coming to me struggling with weight gain, fatigue, low sex drive, difficulty sleeping and mood changes who've been told by other physicians that "you are just getting older" or "your laboratory values are in the normal range so there is nothing wrong with you." The reality is that many of our technological advances have put us in a situation where our metabolism is being damaged. Damage to your metabolism sets you up to easily gain weight then have great difficulty taking it back off. The driving force behind your metabolism is your hormones.     I have been focusing on the nutrition and hormone balance of my patients for over 10 years. Originally, I underwent the "standard" medical school training which meant that I had very little appreciation for the role of nutrition in disease. Of course, I knew about things like scurvy, rickets and beriberi which are diseases of extreme vitamin deficiency; which I knew were rare. However, I didn't truly understand the all-encompassing effect that your diet had on your metabolism and on your health overall. Hippocrates, the father of medicine, said it best when he said, "Let your food be your medicine."     My journey started back in 1997. I was very happy practicing in my OB/GYN practice and being the mother to my 18-month-old son, Eric. My life was turned upside down one day in October when, after experiencing back pain and visiting my physician, I was diagnosed with a spinal cord tumor. The tumor was not aggressive and was completely surgically removed 4 days later. However, surgery left me temporarily paralyzed from the waist down and in chronic pain. With therapy, I regained the use of my legs and was able to return to my practice in a few months. But, my life was very different. I began to research ways, besides pain medication, to help me cope with the pain.     I began the study the effects of nutrition in medicine with the American Academy of Anti-Aging. As I learned more about nutrition, and begin understand its importance with relation to metabolism, hormone balance and disease. As I began implementing my knowledge, I began to feel much better. Then, I started using the things I learned to help me to start helping my patients. I talked to them about their diets, their sleep habits and their levels of stress. I began diagnosing hormone imbalance and treating with diet, lifestyle changes and, when necessary, bioidentical hormone therapy.I noticed drastic improvements in the health of my patients as we began focusing on true prevention of disease rather than just treating there symptoms. They lost weight, they slept better, they had better sex and they were happier in general.     One of the biggest problems with our current medical system is that we tend tofocus on medications to treat symptoms of diseases rather than looking at the causes of those diseases. Many times, the thought process is, once you're on medication for something like high blood pressure or high cholesterol, you're on it for life. These medications are not without their own side effects. Often, you might get a side effect from one medication and be put on another medication to help with a side effect of the first one. The risk of drug interactions increases with every medication that is added to the list.     When you really start understanding the delicate balance of our hormones and their influence on our metabolism, it is easy to see how using medications only to treat symptoms can become a recipe for disaster. I definitely believe the medications have a place in patient treatment. However, I also believe that we have great power to manage our health and keep our hormones balanced by the way we eat, sleep, manage stress and eliminate toxins every day.First of all, you have to understand how all of these relationships work. Why does a matter if you eat white bread and candy instead of apples and green beans? If you can get by on 5 hours of sleep a night, why shouldn't you? You're eating almost no fat and no cholesterol, yet you continue to gain weight and your cholesterol keeps going up, what's up with that? You try diet after diet and exercise plan after exercise plan, yet the scale never seems to move or worse yet, it moves up.     It's important to understand that our hormones are designed to work a delicate balance. They all have a job to do and there is no "good" hormone or "bad" hormone in our body. In my first book, Hormone Harmony, I compared the hormones in our body to instruments in an orchestra. You need just the right amount of all the instruments to create beautiful music and the flute is as important as the tuba.     Most of us think of our metabolisms only as our bodies' ability to burn calories. This is partially true. But, it is actually much more than that. Our metabolism is actually every biochemical reaction in our body and the messengers that keep our metabolisms running efficiently are our hormones. One of the most difficult problems we face right now is a number of forces working against our hormones. There are additives to the foods we eat such as antibiotics, pesticides and hormones. On top of that, in order to increase the shelf life and low or the cost of processed foods, they include ingredients such as trans-fats and high fructose corn syrup. Our bodies are not equipped to handle these types of ingredients and they cause huge problems with insulin and our appetite hormones. Our environment is loaded with hormone disrupting chemicals. Worst of all; we live in a fast paced, highly stressed world that doesn't allow us enough down time or sleep.      As our hormones become more out of balance, we start to get symptoms: weight gain, fatigue and many others. At this stage, it might not be enough to qualify for a disease diagnosis or create abnormal lab values. So, you are told that "nothing is wrong." But, you know that "something is definitely not right." This is the point where many of my patients seek me out. I can help them to determine where their hormone imbalances are and what they can do to fix their damaged metabolism.     This book is the culmination of years of experience with thousands of patients. As I work with these patients, I have found that 7 basic principles can be used to create hormone balance, a healthy metabolism and weight loss. As you utilize these principles and balance your metabolism, you will find that you lose weight, flatten your belly, sleep better, have more energy, build more muscle, have better sex and feel better in general.     In his book, I will teach you what to eat and what to eliminate from your diet. I have included meal suggestions, 56 days' worth of menus and a number of excellent recipes. You will learn what toxins you encounter in everyday life and how to avoid them. I show you the fastest and most efficient ways to burn fat and build muscle. You will see hidden sources of stress you may not know about and what to do to reduce them. You'll also learn which supplements might be important for you.     We have much more control over our health and well-being that we think we do. The first step is understanding how this has happened . The next step is implementing the things you learned into your life so you can fine tune your hormones, heal your metabolism, lose the weight you want to and live a much healthier life.