Weight loss can be challenging under normal circumstances, but it becomes even more frustrating when a hormone imbalance is at play. Today’s guest is the author of The Women’s Guide to Hormonal Harmony, Lacey Dunn.

Lacey Dunn, MS, RD, LD, CPT, founder of UpliftFit Nutrition and host of the UpliftFit Nutrition podcast, is a functional medicine dietitian with a fiery passion for helping women feel and look their very best. People call her the “Hormone Fairy Godmother,” as her one mission in life is to help women go from surviving to thriving. Dunn specializes in all things hormones, thyroid, gut, and metabolism and incorporates on-going education into her daily life.

In this episode, Lacey will share information and strategies that will help you get your hormones back in balance and shed a few pounds in the process.

Calories in vs. calories out is not all that matters. Your body is an ever0changing organism, not a car with one set fuell-need and way to run. You have hormones that can increase or decrease your metabolism, and hormonal imbalances can play a great role in your ability to maintain or change your body composition and weight.

Hormonal Imbalance Signs and Symptoms

Some of the signs and symptoms of imbalanced hormone levels may include the following:

• loss of muscle mass
• accumulating more belly fat
• hot flashes
• tender breasts
• menstrual cycle being either too light or too heavy
• debilitating pain with menstruation
• low motivation
• low libido 
• hair loss
• trouble sleeping
• cold intolerance
• heart palpitations
• insulin resistance 
• overweight or obesity
• night sweats (mostly occurring during menopause)
• infertility

Hormone Imbalance Weight Loss Tips

We want to bring back that hormonal balance. Especially if you have low levels of cortisol, progesterone, testosterone. Caring for your adrenal glands is one of the best things you can do for overall wellness, including being at the right body weight for you.

• Allow yourself to sloth (chill out when you need to and rest when necessary)
• Focus on good sleep hygiene (wear blue light blocking glasses)
• Don’t starve yourself in dieting
• Balance your blood sugar throughout the day
• Smart snacking – always adding in that protein to balance meals
• Avoid the grind and treat your body well
• Have thyroid hormones checked 
• See a practitioner well versed in women’s health, have hormone levels checked
• Know about leptin, ghrelin, and how to stop cravings

Estrogen

One of the major role players when it comes to metabolism. Estrogen dominance can cause weight gain around the middle body and even hips and thighs. 

keeping estrogen levels balanced is important for the maintenance of lean muscle tissue, bone health, and regulating body temperature.

Cortisol

Too much cortisol will cause your body to store fat, you may notice it in your face, back, and abdomen. With an excess of cortisol, the body holds on to water weight. 

Blood sugar levels and blood pressure along with proper immune function are controlled by cortisol. Having too much cortisol will leave you tired and wired, crashing mid-day, but unable to sleep at night. Too much cortisol can lead to insulin resistance and even heart disease.

Meaning we can less use glucose for fuel and more readily store glucose as body fat. So we develop insulin resistance. We develop a lot of inflammation because the cortisol that normally helps combat inflammation then actually becomes inflammatory.

Which further makes you insulin resistant starts causing you a lot of pain, aches, holding water weight. Then it starts contributing to sleep dysregulation because our cortisol levels have a natural rhythm. 

On the flip side… Too Little Cortisol

Too little cortisol will lower your tolerance to exercise and cause energy crashes late in the day, both can keep you from getting in that daily walk or workout. In addition, the muscles will begin to lose tone and become hard to maintain.

With too little cortisol, everything feels stressful, you may get sick frequently and those blood sugar swings will keep you feeling pretty rough. 

Lack of cortisol will lead to a lack of motivation. Those with too little cortisol will struggle to lose weight. The libido will suffer as well, so there goes that form of exercise!

The Women’s Guide to Hormonal Harmony dives deeper into the subject of how progesterone can be converted to cortisol in your adrenals and why that’s important. If you have an imbalance of cortisol levels, hypothyroidism, or improper adrenal function, you would do well to read the book!

Progesterone

Without a proper balance of progesterone, it can be hard to stay calm and relaxed, it may even be harder to get a good night’s sleep. Quality and quantity sleep is one of the pillars of weight loss. Progesterone helps to balance the mood as well, so when there is too much or too little, mood swings follow.

A Word About Vitamin D

While we call it a vitamin it is actually a precursor to your hormones; your body converts it from sunlight or dietary cholesterol. Without it, you may experience fatigue, depression, muscle weakness, pain, or cramps. Being low in this hormone may steal your thunder when it comes to your workouts.

Vitamin D levels can be checked with a simple blood test, you can even do it at home.

Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT)

Bioidentical hormones

Covered in this episode

• Tell us a little bit about yourself
• Why did you write The Women’s Guide to Hormonal Harmony?
• Let’s talk about the stigma of weight (at any age) and how people relate it to “being healthy” 
• What are the signs and symptoms of hormonal imbalance?
• What is happening with hormones when someone is trying to lose weight but doesn’t seem to be able to? What are the hormones that are most responsible for weight gain? How do hormone imbalances lead to metabolic disease?
• What hormones can cause hormonal imbalance? How do they work together?
• What tests are recommended to address and find hormonal imbalance?
• You say a little food and lots of exercise is a recipe for disaster, can you explain why and what is better?
• Why is “the grind” is the last thing that is helpful for your body and weight loss goals?
• What foods and nutrition changes can someone make to support their hormones?
• Your book has a ton of information in it, what would you say is your best advice/top tips for hormone health for women of any age? What lifestyle changes are essential to create and keep healthy hormones?
• Wrap up – where people can follow you.

Lacey 

The Women’s Guide to Hormonal Harmony: How to Rebalance Your Hormones, Master Your Metabolism, and Become the Boss of Your Own Body gives women the knowledge, tools, and confidence to rebalance their hormones, master their metabolism, and become the boss of their own body. From thyroid disorders, hormonal imbalances, and gut disorders, to navigating the best “diet” plan, this guide serves as the one book you need to feel your best and reclaim your hormones, health, and body. In this book, you will be given the knowledge that you need on what your hormones are, how they work, and how they interact and influence the body. You will learn the truth about what healthy eating really means, what foods will help nourish your body, and how to live a healthy, sustainable lifestyle. This is a secret sauce book of knowledge bombs for all women to not only know what is going on in their bodies, but why

Key takeaways include: • Your hormones are like a symphony. If one is out of balance, it ruins the entire performance. • Just because period problems are common, does not make them normal. Birth control can act like a band-aid, but it won’t truly heal the wound. • “Calories in vs. calories out” is not all that matters. Your body is an ever-changing organism, not a car with one set fuel-need and way to run. You have hormones that can increase or decrease your metabolism, and hormonal imbalances can play a great role in your ability to maintain or change your body composition and weight. • Your health will not be optimized if your digestion and gut health is not optimized. You are not what you eat, you are what you digest and absorb. If you want a healthy body, you need a healthy gut

The Women’s Guide to Hormonal Harmony: How to Rebalance Your Hormones, Master Your Metabolism, and Become the Boss of Your Own Body gives women the knowledge, tools, and confidence to rebalance their hormones, master their metabolism, and become the boss of their own body. From thyroid disorders, hormonal imbalances, and gut disorders, to navigating the best “diet” plan, this guide serves as the one book you need to feel your best and reclaim your hormones, health, and body. In this book, you will be given the knowledge that you need on what your hormones are, how they work, and how they interact and influence the body. You will learn the truth about what healthy eating really means, what foods will help nourish your body, and how to live a healthy, sustainable lifestyle. This is a secret sauce book of knowledge bombs for all women to not only know what is going on in their bodies, but why.

Connect with Lacey Dunn, MS, RD, LD, CPT on Instagram @faithandfit, Twitter @laceyadunn,

and Facebook @LaceyDunnRD. Visit www.upliftfitnutrition.com and listen to UpliftFit Nutrition

on most podcast hosting platforms.

The Women’s Guide to Hormonal Harmony: How to Rebalance Your Hormones, Master Your

Metabolism, and Become the Boss of Your Own Body is available May 25, 2021 on Amazon.

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