“No matter what I do Karen, I can’t lose weight!”
That is one of the most common statements I hear from women. They tell me they are doing everything they “should” be doing; exercising for ridiculous amounts of time in a day, eating all the right foods and yet they are not losing weight and for many, they are continuing to gain it.
I was there once ladies, I had the personal trainer put me through grueling workouts and I was on the diet program from my naturopath but yet I couldn’t lose a pound. I finally had to look beyond diet and exercise to find the answer to my weight loss and today I am going to share with you one of the key things I discovered.
Wonder Woman Syndrome In today’s world women have been taught to value their worth on just how much they can do in a day, I call it the Wonder Woman Syndrome. Holding down a job five days a week, while raising children, cleaning a house, cooking food, working out and maintaining a relationship is completely normal in today’s society. Unfortunately, to our bodies, this is far from normal.
YOUR FREAKIN STRESSED OUT! Here is what happens to Wonder Woman;
When you are always running from one task to the next you are keeping your body in a state of stress which raises the hormone cortisol. Cortisol is your fight or flight hormone which is a super important feature we have for survival but too much cortisol is not a good thing. When your cortisol levels remain high it signals to your body that there could be a famine coming or some other form of stress to the body and to be prepared. Guess how the body prepares for that famine? By storing your fat, cortisol not only will store your fat but will also increase insulin levels, and insulin is the fat storage hormone. To make matters worse high cortisol increases blood sugar to help get you through the stressful situation, but high blood sugar = increased sugar cravings. Do you see where all this is going -you guessed it-right to your ass! Not only that, high cortisol can cause insomnia, pms, lowered sex drive, anxiety, depression, poor digestion and lowered immunity.
Where's the Tiger? For you, this state of stress is probably your normal and you probably think but everyone’s life is like this, but it is far from normal. Here is an analogy; back in hunter-gatherer times let’s say a saber tooth tiger started chasing you down while you were out hunting. Your body’s cortisol raises, it travels through the bloodstream and converts amino acids into sugars or glucose, our basic fuel needed to fuel our system to fight or run and so you run like hell and get away from the tiger, great! But here we are in the modern day and we are pumping out this cortisol like we are being chased by a tiger day in and day out. Your body knows no different; stress is stress whether from a tiger or from a bad day at work or fight with your spouse.
So my advice to you is get off the treadmill Wonder Woman and get that butt to a couch! I am not kidding ladies you need to replenish your bodies constantly, take rest, start asking for help! You are no less of a woman if you ask your kids and husbands to help share the workload at home. Hire a housekeeper, a baby sitter and start doing things for you this will help keep those cortisol levels in check.
When I realized that my cortisol was sky high I wouldn’t have even considered that my life was stressful because it was my “normal”. I made some very challenging changes to my life to ease the stress: I hired a house cleaner, I quit the personal training sessions and started doing yoga instead, I started implementing relaxation breathing exercises to my daily routine and I started doing more for me. Guess what… I lost weight.
You can too; if all this sounds familiar to you start making some changes and see what happens. If need be to start slow and pick one thing from the list below to add to your daily routine and go from there:
Did you know that inside the Women's OnTrack weight loss and hormone balancing master class you get access to guided meditations, mindfulness techniques, and a course on building resilience and lowering stress levels with Christine Patton certified Heart Math practitioner?
Get started in the women's weight loss and hormone balancing master classOnTrack today!
That is one of the most common statements I hear from women. They tell me they are doing everything they “should” be doing; exercising for ridiculous amounts of time in a day, eating all the right foods and yet they are not losing weight and for many, they are continuing to gain it.
I was there once ladies, I had the personal trainer put me through grueling workouts and I was on the diet program from my naturopath but yet I couldn’t lose a pound. I finally had to look beyond diet and exercise to find the answer to my weight loss and today I am going to share with you one of the key things I discovered.
Wonder Woman Syndrome In today’s world women have been taught to value their worth on just how much they can do in a day, I call it the Wonder Woman Syndrome. Holding down a job five days a week, while raising children, cleaning a house, cooking food, working out and maintaining a relationship is completely normal in today’s society. Unfortunately, to our bodies, this is far from normal.
YOUR FREAKIN STRESSED OUT! Here is what happens to Wonder Woman;
When you are always running from one task to the next you are keeping your body in a state of stress which raises the hormone cortisol. Cortisol is your fight or flight hormone which is a super important feature we have for survival but too much cortisol is not a good thing. When your cortisol levels remain high it signals to your body that there could be a famine coming or some other form of stress to the body and to be prepared. Guess how the body prepares for that famine? By storing your fat, cortisol not only will store your fat but will also increase insulin levels, and insulin is the fat storage hormone. To make matters worse high cortisol increases blood sugar to help get you through the stressful situation, but high blood sugar = increased sugar cravings. Do you see where all this is going -you guessed it-right to your ass! Not only that, high cortisol can cause insomnia, pms, lowered sex drive, anxiety, depression, poor digestion and lowered immunity.
Where's the Tiger? For you, this state of stress is probably your normal and you probably think but everyone’s life is like this, but it is far from normal. Here is an analogy; back in hunter-gatherer times let’s say a saber tooth tiger started chasing you down while you were out hunting. Your body’s cortisol raises, it travels through the bloodstream and converts amino acids into sugars or glucose, our basic fuel needed to fuel our system to fight or run and so you run like hell and get away from the tiger, great! But here we are in the modern day and we are pumping out this cortisol like we are being chased by a tiger day in and day out. Your body knows no different; stress is stress whether from a tiger or from a bad day at work or fight with your spouse.
So my advice to you is get off the treadmill Wonder Woman and get that butt to a couch! I am not kidding ladies you need to replenish your bodies constantly, take rest, start asking for help! You are no less of a woman if you ask your kids and husbands to help share the workload at home. Hire a housekeeper, a baby sitter and start doing things for you this will help keep those cortisol levels in check.
When I realized that my cortisol was sky high I wouldn’t have even considered that my life was stressful because it was my “normal”. I made some very challenging changes to my life to ease the stress: I hired a house cleaner, I quit the personal training sessions and started doing yoga instead, I started implementing relaxation breathing exercises to my daily routine and I started doing more for me. Guess what… I lost weight.
You can too; if all this sounds familiar to you start making some changes and see what happens. If need be to start slow and pick one thing from the list below to add to your daily routine and go from there:
- Start a grateful journal: every day in a journal write down three things you are grateful for you will be amazed at how this instantly can brighten your day or a bad situation
- Do this amazing breathing exercise twice a day it takes no longer than a few minutes and known to instantly lower anxiety. Breathing Technique.
- Meditate even for 10 minutes a day to start to work your way up to at least 20 minutes. If you google meditation on youtube you will find hundreds of guided meditations for different amounts of time. Try a couple till you find one that works for you and stick to it! Mediation has massive proven benefits of lowering stress levels
- Journal spend 10-15 minutes jotting down your thoughts and getting out any worries you might be stewing about
- Read a self-help book, I love doing this just reading about bettering myself always raises my spirits, give it a try!
- What feeds you? Dancing, a bath, painting your nails, long walks, reading a good romance novel? Pick one and make it a daily practice, make it your time to relax.
Did you know that inside the Women's OnTrack weight loss and hormone balancing master class you get access to guided meditations, mindfulness techniques, and a course on building resilience and lowering stress levels with Christine Patton certified Heart Math practitioner?
Get started in the women's weight loss and hormone balancing master classOnTrack today!
