Carbs Are Not the Enemy

Ask anyone and they will probably say: "To lose weight you must cut out carbs." Sound familiar? I know many people who have success losing weight when they have cut carbs out –in fact, so have I. However, long term it was not beneficial and actually costs us.

Cutting carbs to lose weight is a short term solution.

We require some level of carbs to function at our best. And cutting out carbs for too long can have bad consequences. And this is especially true for those of us who work out.

Carb restriction can lead to stress hormones going up, metabolism slowing, and muscle-building hormones going down. This causes you to feel lousy, cranky, sluggish, and in the long term, you don’t lose that much weight.

In order to function properly and maintain a proper metabolism, our bodies produce a hormone called T3. T3 is the most active thyroid hormone and is important for blood glucose stabilization and proper metabolic function. Studies have shown that T3 is very sensitive to carb and calorie intake. When carbs and calories are too low your T3 levels drop.

Some studies even show that a low carb diet such as ketogenic reduce T3 as rapidly as starvation.

Thyroid hormones are important not only for weight loss but have profound effects on our overall healthy and energy levels.

And ladies, the truly interesting part is that we often suffer the most from doing low carb diets. These diets cause significant disruptions to many of our hormones. So we try to eat healthy by cutting out carbs but in reality they disrupt our hormone production and can lead to many undesirable results:

-stopped or irregular menstrual cycle
-lowered fertility
-hypoglycemia and blood sugar swings
-more body fat (especially in the stomach area)
-chronic inflammation
-chronic fatigue and disrupted sleep
-loss of bone density

So basically if you are ACTIVE you NEED adequate energy and carb intake for a healthy thyroid and functioning hormones.

Now I am not saying pig out on pizza and pasta. But eating minimally processed whole foods and by being strategic with your portions is truly sustainable and better for your overall health.

You don’t hear this often but for those of us who are active--carbs are your friend!

If you are like, "Wait, what? I have been doing the low carb thing and it just isn’t working for me" hit join my next 4-Week Nutrition Boot Camp starting March 27th and let's take control of your nutrition!