Most of us are wanting yet struggling to lose weight, and with such a reason, we are timely searching for various diet plans that might help us lose weight and achieve that slender yet healthy body figure that I know most of us are yearning to have.
But some individuals are maybe looking for a fast way to lose weight, and there’s no shortage of fad diets that you can search online, and of course, we could not exclude diet guides that pledge these individuals to lose weight quickly.
Sometimes, being overweight doesn’t mean that you lack physical training or exercise and calories in your body. But mainly, people are gaining a lot of weight because of having a hormonal imbalance.
As we know, hormones are crucial factors for regulating most of our bodily functions, so a hormonal imbalance can significantly affect many physical processes.
And hormonal imbalances occur when there are too much or too few hormones in our bloodstream. And symptoms of hormonal imbalance are familiar to us, but these imbalances are not typical and might need you to check with a doctor immediately.
Women, compared to men, experience several phases of hormonal changes in their lifetime, mainly during puberty, just as before, during, and after menstruation. Likewise, with pregnancy and menopause.
And when feeling exasperated, feeling bloated, experiencing hair loss, problems with blood sugar, having trouble concentrating, or simply not feeling your best, are some of the many changes in your hormones that may cause hormonal imbalance.
According to a study, most women have at least one or more significant hormonal imbalances. More specifically, these imbalances can also be due to issues related to thyroid, liver, gut, diet, adrenals, and other lifestyle-related factors.
And these imbalances might cause chronic health problems that will also have you gain extra weight. And many diet plans, including the hormone diet, claim to fix these hormonal imbalances.
Most diet plans may restrict you from consuming specific food groups or eating an inadequate amount of calories that other dietitians thought to cause hormonal imbalances.
These diet plans also may often be more harmful than good to you. Furthermore, your weight isn’t always an indicator of your health or hormonal functioning. Hence, numerous other factors make up a healthy way of life.
The Hormone Diet also claims that you can completely “reset” your hormones by following each phase while losing weight in the process quickly. Therefore, most women indulge in this fad diet trend in the hope of losing weight and wishing to achieve their body goals.
The hormone diet plan aims to fix these imbalances by eradicating meat, alcohol, fruit, grains, and dairy, which results in weight loss.
But is doing the hormone diet safe? And does it also serve its purpose to make people lose weight? To answer these questions, experts and other registered dietitians share their thoughts on the Hormone Diet, whether or not it is excellent and safe, and what the pros and cons are.
Find out everything you need to know about the hormone diet in this post.
What Is the Hormone Diet?
A hormone diet is a diet plan that came into fame recently. Most people, especially women, who try this kind of diet happily claim that they lose weight in a short amount of time. And the reason why this hormone diet plan came into the spotlight is mainly because of their testimonies.
The idea of a hormone diet initially came from the same title, “The Hormone Diet,” where the author claims that hormonal imbalances are why most women gain weight.
It focuses on hormonal fluctuations that negatively affect people’s health, specifically on a person’s weight. It also talks about other factors that contribute to gaining weight and other health issues.
The book also claims to have a fool-proof strategy to balance your hormones and is a preventive health manual for men and women. In line with the author of The Hormone Diet, the book is more than just a diet guide.
Dr. Natasha Turner also gave out some recommendations for anti-inflammatory detox, nutritional supplements, physical exercise, sleep, stress management, toxin-free skin care, and natural hormone substitute, along with a personalized diet plan.
A hormone diet is a three-step diet plan that lasts for six weeks designed to harmonize your hormones and promote a healthier body through a specific diet. Additionally, the hormone diet plan includes instructions for exercise, nutritional supplements, and detox methods. And it also states that healthy eating and exercise are essential to ‘resetting’ your hormones.
The diet is somewhat relevant to a Mediterranean eating style with nutritional supplements, low glycemic index foods, and exercise. A hormone diet controls what you eat and tells you when to eat to ensure that your hormones get most of their benefits.
The Hormone Diet aims to be the first book that emphasizes the importance of hormonal balance that influences weight. It also tells us to be the first to rationalize the lifestyle patterns that can help boost your hormones in burning fat, including sleeping, eating, managing stress, and exercising. Also, have water weight.
Following the hormone diet will prohibit you from consuming almost 1,000 to 1,200 calories per day to lose weight. The calories level is below the recommended calorie levels of the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) of 1,800 to 3,200 calories for weight maintenance depending on your age, sex, and activity level.
Advocates of hormone diets allege that people can rapidly lose significant weight by following each phase.
How Does the Hormone Diet Work?
Phase one involves a two-week “detoxification” process. You have to eliminate several foods, including eating gluten-containing grains, dairy products made from cow’s milk, several oils, alcohol, caffeine, peanuts, sugar, artificial sweeteners, meat, and citrus fruits.
During this stage, only foods that include most fruits, most vegetables, beans, nuts and seeds, fish, eggs, poultry, plant milk, dairy from sheep or goats, certain oils, and naturally gluten-free grains and starches are acceptable. This phase also includes taking some nutritional supplements like probiotics and anti-inflammatory products like turmeric and fish oil.
Phase two has you incorporate some of those foods back into your diet while observing how your body reacts to each food type. However, in this phase, you still have to avoid the so-called “hormone-hindering” foods. These include fructose corn syrup, fish with high mercury levels, non-organic coffee, dried fruit such as raisins, meats, and peanuts. In this phase, other foods also off-limits contain processed foods, nitrates, such as cured meats, peanut butter and chocolate, refined grains, and artificial sweeteners.
Phase three focuses on whole physical and mental wellness by improving cardiovascular exercises and strength training, and the diet plan of the second phase continues into the third phase.
Is Doing the Hormone Diet Safe?
The hormone diet’s nutritional advice and other recommendations don’t seem wrong, but the hormone diet is beyond the CDC’s proposed amount of weight loss regarding weight loss.
(Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) suggests having a minimum of one to 2 pounds per week, which might be four to eight pounds per month, emphasizing that this could come from a mixture of dietary changes and exercise.
Nevertheless, the hormone diet claims that you will have a significant amount of weight loss of 12 lbs within the period of doing phase one, which is much too fast for what’s deemed healthful, safe, and sustainable. Some dietitians say it is unrealistic.
Additionally, the load loss in phase one is due to dietary changes alone. And any potential weight loss will probably be from the change in calorie intake, instead of a right away effect on your hormones.
Likely, the loss of weight during the initial phase is mainly because of you excluding grains and other several foods from your dietary pattern, including water weight.
Hence, a hormone diet does not guarantee that the amount of burden loss couldn’t easily come. There is still a significant tendency that you’ll be able to rapidly gain weight after the initial phase is over or if you come to your regular eating habits.
“The ample amount of weight loss that happens in an exceedingly brief period can create a stand for unrealistic and unsustainable weight loss expectations of a person who is searching and hoping to attain a long-term weight loss. Additionally, the hormone diet often contributes to cyclical yo-yo dieting, which hurts your body,” warns Mary Wirtz, a clinically registered dietitian.
“The disastrous aspect of which is that they suggested 12lbs of weight loss in the short span—precisely two weeks. That’s excessive and extreme. Healthy weight loss is defined collectively to 2 lbs per week.” Jana Mowrer agreed, a registered dietitian and nutritionist.
Moreover, Professor John Dixon, a global expert in obesity research at Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, says there’s no scientific proof that eating or excluding certain foods can result in hormones to stimulate weight loss.
“We’d like to have a particular detox or diet that works better than usual for weight loss, but we haven’t found it yet,” Professor John Dixon stated.
“When people are gaining much weight and are obese, they greatly need support from dietary experts or doctors and must search for a medication to assist them in losing weight and sustain that over time. Since the hormone diet excludes processed foods and artificial sweeteners and it completely relies on healthy, fresh foods and physical activity, those things are good,” Dr. Sumithran stated.
“Any weight that you simply have lost from doing the phases of the hormone diet will probably be the result from eating a lower-calorie diet and exercising, instead of foods having an immediate effect on your hormones.” Dr. Sumithran furtherly added.
Pros
The hormone diet is low in processed foods, and it relies only on natural, healthy, and fresh, nutritious foods. These organic foods often have more beneficial nutrients than their counterparts. Those who have allergies to food chemicals or preservatives may find their symptoms lessen once they consume only organic foods.
This diet also relies on physical activity, specifically cardiovascular workouts and strength training, which makes an excellent addition to any lifestyle.
Also, this diet plan promotes emotional health that features stress management techniques that will help lower your cortisol levels which support weight loss. A decent night’s sleep can enable you to maintain energy, rebalance hormones, and block infections and illness, which are all essential factors that you should be doing, whether you’re on a diet or not.
According to Mary Wirtz, registered dietitian, various foods recommended by the “Hormone Diet” are somewhat relevant to some other diets, contributing considerably to a healthy lifestyle. Foods that are abundant in fiber and low in saturated fat prove to bring goodness to our bodies.
Just like the Mediterranean diet pattern, the hormone diet also includes foods like beans and lentils, fruits, vegetables, lean protein, and unsaturated oils, and overall, these are well-researched and are supportive for long-term health.”
Cons
Unfortunately, this diet plan recommends 12 pounds of weight loss in an exceedingly brief period. As most experts say, losing this much weight amount is analyzed to be unsafe and unhealthy. And any weight that’s lost will likely be regained. Then, it can cause other changes that make it harder to lose bodyweight.
“There is the least value to the current diet and unfortunately no research-based evidence to support that the hormone diet will improve your sleep. Furthermore, the diet claims a 12lbs weight loss within a brief timeframe, which is unrealistic and unsustainable for many individuals,” Wirtz explains.
The hormone diet plan is far too expensive for a few since the approved foods are mainly required to be organic, and also, the cost of the food may be much higher than typical foods since it bans you from consuming any processed foods.
The diet has another high order which is to consume only organic meat and organic coffee. You can certainly regulate your hormones with conventional meats and a diet.
“Lastly, the “Hormone Diet” plan is often unmanageable, and it does promote individuals to organize and cook most meals since it excludes you from consuming processed foods. So, if you depend upon packaged and processed foods in any way for you and your family, this might be unrealistic for your lifestyle,” Wirtz added.
However, if you have a natural hormone imbalance, specifically insulin resistance, it’ll not be corrected within the hormone diet’s six-week time frame. The turnover of blood takes a minimum of three months. Moreover, the elimination of varied food groups into your diet plan doesn’t correct hormonal imbalances.
Instead, it is the balance of food intake and overall consistent carb intake. As an example, someone can consume many healthy fruits and yet have an insulin imbalance. This diet doesn’t use citrus for hormonal balance, and I do not know of any information and indication to support that,” explains Mowrer.
Another instance, if you’ve got PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome), you will have insulin resistance. Eating foods like refined carbohydrates can cause a rise in insulin production, leading to fat storage and stopping you from losing weight.
Additionally, as most experts and registered dietitians say, there’s no scientific evidence to prove that excluding varied foods from your eating plan from a particular pattern can influence your hormone production.
The Bottom Line
In the end, everyone needs to follow a healthy lifestyle based on their body type.
This fact means that what others do in their diet plan probably won’t fit you, so you need to consult your trusted registered dietitian and concentrate on making permanent lifestyle changes rather than approving momentary dieting measures.
Besides, even without explicitly doing the hormone diet plan, you can still lose weight if you eat healthy foods and do physical activity and exercise. It won’t only help you lose weight in the not too distant future but also for the long term.
Moreover, hormones in our body are complex, and they help in mainly regulating our body’s function. So, trying to control them only to lose weight or achieve your body goal can considerably influence the functions of other organs and systems in the body.
In addition to everything else, there is only minimal proof that can link hormone synchronization to weight loss, aside from the fact that a doctor of naturopathic medicine writes the hormone diet book.
So, before starting a new diet plan or taking any nutritional “detox” diet, you need to consult a registered dietitian on the diet plan that will perfectly suit you, particularly if you have an intrinsic health condition to avoid you from getting complications.
Besides, having a complicated diet is not the answer to balancing levels of several hormones. Actually, following a consistently healthy eating plan and physical training will help you feel better and improve your health.
Moreover, the key to having a balanced hormone is to eat enough protein at every meal, engage in daily exercises, avoid sugar and refined carbs, and manage your stress by doing stimulating activities like yoga. Consuming also the right amount of calories avoids hormonal imbalances.
If you are worried and concerned about whether you have a hormonal imbalance, lifestyle-related or otherwise, you should ask professional medical advice from your doctor. They can give you hormonal therapy, recommendations for lifestyle changes, or a combination of both.
And instead of relying on potentially dangerous and restrictive fad diet trends, consume your meals with whole foods and participate in regular physical activities and exercises for the best results. Trend dieting is one burden you don’t require in your life.
In this post, we presented the essential things you need to know about the hormone diet. These facts are necessary for helping you to make an informed decision and a coherent plan for what works best for your nutritional needs that will surely fit your budget and goals.
References:
- https://www.healthline.com/health/hormone-diet
- https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/wellness/what-are-hormone-diets–and-can-they-really-help-you-lose-weight-quickly/2019/08/02/19ce5ab4-9f51-11e9-b27f-ed2942f73d70_story.html
- https://www.byrdie.com/hormone-diet-5186407
- https://www.houseofwellness.com.au/health/dieting/hormone-diet-weight-loss
- https://www.hud.ac.uk/news/2019/september/hormone-diets-naughton-huddersfield/
- https://www.verywellfit.com/the-hormone-reset-diet-pros-cons-and-what-you-can-eat-5128100
- https://www.eatingwell.com/article/7805452/hormone-balancing-foods-how-diet-can-help/
- https://www.coursehero.com/file/83243077/weight-loss-and-fad-dietspdf/
- https://www.endocrineweb.com/news/the-best-exercise-for-hormonal-imbalance
- https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/05/24/burnout-modern-affliction-or-human-condition
- https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/balance-hormones
- https://www.prevention.com/weight-loss/a20459677/hormone-reset-diet/
- https://www.healthline.com/health/hormonal-imbalance
