How Hormones in Weight Loss Supplements Work

How fat loss hormones like insulin and cortisol work in weight loss supplements.

Most people falsely believe that fat loss boils down to how many calories you are eating versus how many calories you are burning. While this is true to a degree, there’s a whole other factor that gets thrown into the mix: fat loss hormones.

Essentially, your metabolism and lipolysis (fat metabolism) is controlled largely based on a large variety of hormones that are running throughout the body, a few of which include leptin, insulin, and cortisol.

The big problem is that when you go on a very strict diet, these hormones tend to get shuffled around, so they are no longer functioning optimally. Because of this, your metabolic rate will slow, making it even harder for you to continue to lose weight despite eating so few calories.

So, in theory, while the diet might be set-up to provide optimal weight reduction, it does not because your body is not functioning properly.

What is the trick to getting it to function as it should?

Periodic "refeeds" or "cheats" on your diet program. These will basically be either a meal, a full day, or a week-long break where you eat a higher calorie intake to try and trick your body into thinking that it is no longer dieting, thus it can speed the metabolism back up and start burning body fat again.

Unless these refeeds or cheats are factored into the equation, you are likely to just carry on with the struggle for weight loss.

The important thing to remember though is that if you just go about having these cheat meals at your leisure without any type of planning, they could result in weight gain. The key is understanding your calorie balance and timing them so they come when your body needs it - when it is most likely to use the calories to boost the metabolism and fix those fat burning hormones. When you do this, weight loss becomes much easier.

Written by Shannon Clark for losew.com: Shannon Clark holds a Bachelor Degree in Exercise Science, specializing in Sports Performance from the University of Alberta and has been working in the health and fitness field for the last 7 years.
Between personal training, working with athletes, and writing for a variety of online sources, she is always busy helping others reach their goals. Her biggest interest lies in the nutritional realm of health, reading and researching about how the foods you eat affect the way the body functions, feels, and looks. To learn more about the advanced nutritional program she created to optimize fat loss, please visit cheatweightloss.com.