What creates belly fat, anyways?

Healing insulin resistance is all about YOUR health and well-being. If you have extra fat around your midsection, it’s likely that you have insulin resistance. And if action isn’t taken for healing insulin resistance, it simply grows in magnitude over time. With serious health outcomes. 

But not you! Because you’re about to get in the know and take action.

Understanding something can change behavior

What follows is straight out of the Day 3 email from my 28toGreat™ program. A program about healing insulin resistance and building health. More on that in a sec, but I’m sharing this now for two reasons:

1. So that you can get a feel for the type of education, inspiration and empowerment that is the hallmark of my programs.
2. Because many, many folks struggle with increased belly fat. They don’t like it. And education can be empowering.

Let’s explore.

I’m careful not to overwhelm people with biochemistry. That said, it’s my experience that, more often than not, when people understand WHY they are doing something, they are more likely to stay committed to their habits and goals.

If you tell a kid, “Hey dude, don’t touch fire…because I said so,” there’s a really good chance that he’ll touch fire. But when you tell a kid, “Hey dude, don’t touch fire because it’s really super-hot and can melt your skin off and make you cry for days and days,” that information changes things. There’s a really good chance that not only will he not touch fire—ever—but he’ll also tell all his friends so that they don’t melt their skin off either.

So why is INSULIN a word that seems to be coming up a lot—in the news, on social media, etc.?

I’m challenging myself to keep this explanation to roughly 700 words, and to rely heavily on metaphor, because there’s a lot here to explore AND it’s important that you understand it. So that you’ll understand why you shouldn’t touch fire (keep your insulin levels high…and why that happens). 

Our body’s genius energy storage system 

We have energy needs, all the time, not just during exercise. Energy is used to think, digest, make new cells (at the rate of 300 million a minute), form urine, watch TV, detox. Our brain is a huge energy-hog. Exercise uses enormous amounts of energy, too. We need energy for EVERYthing and use quite a bit even when we’re sleeping. This means we need a foolproof system to store energy.

We have three ways to store energy in the body:

1. Short term storage: blood sugar. This is like unwrapped food, sitting on your counter.
2. Medium term storage: glycogen. This is like food wrapped up in the fridge.
3. Long term storage: fat cells. Fat cells are simply stored energy. This is like food stashed away in your basement freezer.

Understanding how we use these storage compartments is key to healing insulin resistance.

These three storage compartments—metaphorically the counter top, fridge and basement freezer—are not accessible simultaneously. Instead, they are accessible SEQUENTIALLY:

1. First, we use short-term energy stores: whatever energy molecules happen to be zipping around in our blood stream. Metaphorically this is that open bowl of M&M’s sitting right on the counter.
2. Next, we turn to the medium-term energy stores of glycogen, which is just a fancy name for “sugars that we make into longer chains for compact storage and then store in our liver (can be used anywhere in the body) and in our muscles (can only be used in the muscles)”. Metaphorically this is the bacon in the fridge that we have to cook before we can eat it.
3. Finally, we turn to fat storage. Metaphorically, this is going all the way down to the basement chest freezer, digging around until you find the frozen soup, defrosting it, and then heating it up to eat.

How body fat stays stuck

You need to use all your blood sugar, and most of your glycogen, before you can burn fat. Basically, you can burn sugar (short and medium term storage) or you can burn fat (long term storage), but you can’t burn both at the same time. And as long as sugars are available, we won’t burn fat. Cuz who the heck wants to go through all that to get the frozen soup when the M&M’s are right there?

The ease of getting to your basement freezer (energy stored as fat) depends upon (drum roll) INSULIN. Understanding a bit about the hormone insulin shines an important light on healing insulin resistance.

Is the basement freezer well-organized and right at the bottom of a short flight of stairs? Or is it down two flights of stairs, where you then have to navigate a messy basement with precariously stacked boxes everywhere, past the snarling basement monsters, all while searching for the key that opens the steel cage that the very unorganized basement freezer lives in?

Insulin levels are the prime determinant of how easy it is to get to your fat stores (basement freezer). The gatekeeper of whether you store fat or burn fat.

When you’re not eating, or eating straight fats, your insulin levels are low, allowing full and easy access to the basement freezer. Your body can easily tap your fat stores to serve its energy needs. With low insulin levels, you don’t even have to fully empty the fridge (glycogen stores) before opening the freezer (fat stores) because it’s just so easy to get to.

Empty carbs thwart you in healing insulin resistance

Insulin is triggered by eating carbohydrates; and is turbo-triggered by eating empty carbs (everything made with refined flour, sugar, white rice and white potatoes).

To be clear, we NEED insulin and insulin does its job well, when we adopt a health-building food lifestyle.

But when we overeat on empty carbs, and especially when we do that while not exercising every day, the insulin cycle becomes imbalanced. This becomes a vicious cycle, as our cells become less welcoming to letting insulin in. “Stop! We’re overloaded!”

Intermittent fasting and healing insulin resistance 

Intermittent fasting is the secret sauce for healing insulin resistance. It helps to re-regulate the food=>blood sugar=>insulin=>fat storage process. We create longer periods of time when insulin release is not being triggered in our body.

Not only do low insulin levels allow us to easily burn out fat stores (the basement freezer), it actually TRIGGERS our body to burn fat for energy. When insulin levels stay low, fat is continually burned. If insulin is continually triggered, that stored fat stays locked deep in the messy basement at the bottom of the long stairs with the messy boxes and snarling monsters and the steel cage for which you can never find the key. And insulin-guided weight gain tends to accumulate around our mid-section, aka: belly fat.

This is also why the “calories in, calories out” horsesh*t that’s been continually promoted by the diet industry is W-R-O-N-G. This isn’t my opinion, dear friends. This is biochemistry.

The good news is, intermittent fasting, over a period of months, can help people in healing insulin resistance. Teamed up with more nutrient-dense foods, you have a winning combo for building health and balancing the insulin system.

A program for healing insulin resistance

The 28toGreat™ group program is open for registration, and registration closes this Friday 10/2 at noon ET! Our large and interactive spring 2020 group simply raved about this new program, and everyone came out of it with wins.

28toGreat™ is a program that provides 28 days of clinical instruction and support around 16:8 intermittent fasting and the power of whole, nutrient-dense foods. Around healing insulin resistance.

You can learn more and register HERE.

This top-notch, clinically-created program supports you—physically, emotionally, mentally—while encouraging:

• Induce body fat loss
• Lower blood sugar levels
• Improve insulin sensitivity
• Help you heal/avoid cardiovascular disease
• Reduce chronic inflammation
• Increase energy
• Improve memory
• Increase mental clarity and concentration
• Prevent Alzheimer’s disease and other neurologic disorders
• Slow the aging process and extend a life of vitality
• Help you heal/avoid cancer
• And more

And YES….

• You can have coffee
• Alcohol is allowed
• The program accommodates any kind of special diet
  (GF, vegetarian, paleo, keto, etc)
  
• You will eat plenty of fabulous food, every day

LEARN MORE & REGISTER HERE to join the growing circle of 28toGreat™ fans.

Create Vibrant Health: BodyMindSpirit®

To your good health,
Laurie