Women Over 40 - Can a Blood Sugar Hormone Make You Fat?

Are you a woman over 40? Do you experience hormone changes? If you are a woman over 40 and want to lose weight permanently, an important hormone to look at is insulin. It can prevent your ability to lose weight permanently and make you fat instead. Do you know why?

The pancreas is hugely involved in regulating blood sugar levels and digestion. Insulin is emitted from the pancreas. There are many hormones increasing your blood sugar, including glucagon, adrenalin and growth hormones. Health risks, such as diabetes are correlated with high blood sugar. So all of these hormones are able to increase your blood sugar level what is not good for you.

But: There is only one hormone helping you to decrease blood sugar, and that's insulin. So insulin is extremely important to balance your blood sugar level because it reduces your blood sugar.

After eating, sugar is entering the blood stream- for example as a result of digesting starchy foods. The cells of your body need this sugar to produce energy from it and to function. And that s exactly what insulin does: It promotes the transfer of sugar from the blood into the cells.

Insulin has more tasks to do. It helps to get fatty acids from the blood into the fat cells where they are stored. Insulin keeps your body from burning fat as well. Insulin helps the body to store fat as energy needed for starvation periods. Nowadays, we do not face this threat any longer- but the fat storing mechanisms are still in place.

If your insulin level is too high, you are facing severe health risks: diabetes, fat metabolism disorders, heart attacks, strokes. And: you'll gain belly fat and have a high risk of being overweight.

In women over 40 the hormone system can be disturbed much easier compared to women in their twenties. You need to pay attention to your insulin level if you are a woman over 40. There are two major errors in nutrition contributing to a high insulin level:

1. High glycemic index (GI). The insulin level rises higher and faster if digested sugar can enter the blood fast. To measure how easy sugar from foods enters the blood usually the glycemic index (GI) is used. Cakes, most sweets, white bread and rice or sweet fruits are common foods with a high GI. Generally speaking, the GI rises with the amount of processing for food. So natural foods have a comparably low GI, whereas highly processed foods often have a high GI. Stay away from anything containing corn syrup, or containing ingredients ending in? -ose, particularly fructose.
2. When you eat artificial sweeteners your brain gets the message "sugar has entered the blood". The pancreas releases insulin, what will prevent burning fat. That's one of the reasons diet sodas do not contribute to losing weight permanently in a healthy way.

If you eat too much fat and have a high insulin level, the fat goes right into fat cells- what you need to avoid if you really want to lose weight permanently over 40. A long-term successful weight loss program must assist you in finding foods low in GI- food you actually like so you love to eat it frequently.

Are you a woman over 40? I've created a free, personalized program for women over 40 who want to lose weight permanently. How would you like to get excellent, lasting weight loss results- be attractive, healthy, energetic, youthful? This program adjusts to your specific situation and keeps you motivated while you enjoy healthy eating and exercise.

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Perry Permann