There was a season when I truly felt like something was wrong with me before my back went out. Not only because my energy was low, but because I wasn’t taking care of myself nutritionally, physically, or spiritually.
And when my back did go out, it became the wake up call I couldn’t ignore. I couldn’t go to work, I couldn’t clean my house, I couldn’t sit for any length of time, and I had to focus on healing first.
Getting my nutrition right, then slowly adding in stretching, physical therapy, and simple walks. And that’s when I began to realize something really important. My body wasn’t betraying me, it was waving a flag, a big red flag.
It was responding to stress, instability, and honestly, neglect. Up until that point, my mindset had always been, burn it off, work harder, push through. But suddenly, I couldn’t burn it off anymore.
And that’s when I started to understand something that many women begin experiencing in this season in life. Our bodies change, our hormones shift, and the strategies that once worked don’t work the same way anymore.
Not because our bodies are broken, but because they’re responding to what we’ve been giving them. And when I began to understand how hormones actually work, and what they respond to, everything started to shift.
What if the real shift in this season isn’t about working harder, but understanding what your hormones have been trying to communicate to you all along?
Factors Affecting Hormones
So let’s start with one of the biggest misconception of all, and that’s we’re blaming our hormones, instead of stabilizing what’s affecting them.
Because hormones respond to blood sugar swings, which are the extreme shifts between the high and low blood glucose levels. That’s like your fatigue, you’re starting to feel irritable.
And generally this happens because we’re eating throughout the day, snacking throughout the day. Constantly your blood sugar is raised five or six or seven times throughout the day, and it’s messing with our systems because of the blood sugar swings.
Another thing that our hormones respond to is chronic stress. Always being stressful, your body is under constant stress, overwhelm, worry, anxiety, that whole fight or flight mode, and that is not serving you. This is affecting your hormones.
Under eating can also affect your hormones response. Overeating as well, and then even overexercising, because you cannot out-exercise a poor diet. So if you are eating poorly and trying to exercise it off, your hormones are responding to this.
And then again, poor sleep, not getting enough sleep, waking up throughout the night, insomnia, and it’s also leading to chronic stress because you’re not getting enough sleep.
And here’s the thing, we’re blaming it on, it’s just menopause, it’s just aging, I have slower hormones and this is just not true. This is not true because your body is adapting to its new environment. Your body is changing with your hormones.
So I want to ask you, are you skipping meals? Are you living on caffeine? Are you doing intense workouts?
Are you sleeping five hours a night? Are you eating light all day and then snacking at night? These are the things that are probably affecting your hormones if this is what you are doing.
Stabilizing Blood Sugar
Our hormones respond to instability, which is the things that I just listed. So what creates stability? Let’s talk about the foundation.
Blood sugar is your foundation because when blood sugar spikes, insulin rises. Insulin is an essential hormone. It helps your body turn food into energy and then it manages your blood sugar levels.
Your cortisol rises. Cortisol affects several aspects of your health and helps regulate your body’s response to stress. High and low levels of cortisol can impact your health.
Your fat storage increases because of the insulin and the cortisol rising. Then you have your energy crashes, and that’s exactly where the blood sugar spikes come in. Increased cravings.
We know what that feels like. I get that as well. If my, this is one thing, I know my hormones are off if I’m having increased cravings.
And especially in midlife, insulin sensitivity changes because as we age, insulin sensitivity decreases, meaning that the body becomes more resistant to insulin, which can lead to higher blood sugar levels, increased abdominal fat, and higher risk
for type 2 diabetes. And busting that myth is not just saying, I just need to eat less. I need to cut out all carbs. I should skip breakfast.
Because stability beats restriction every time. If you are doing this, you’re restricting. You’re staying in that punished restrict mode.
And it’s time to get out of that.
You may even know what I’m going to say next, but the practical, simple shifts are three meals a day, no snacking, 30 grams of protein per meal, not to fear the healthy fats, reduce your processed carbs and sugar, and then to stop skipping meals.
When blood sugar stabilizes, cortisol calms. When cortisol calms, the body feels safe. And that word safe is so important because weight loss is not just about food.
When your body doesn’t feel safe, when it’s in that fight or flight mode, the chronic stress, it’s holding on to the weight.
Calm Nervous System
The shift number three is faith and physiology working together. Now, physiology is how our bodies function to keep us alive. Our nervous system, our cardiovascular system, our respiratory systems.
So when we’re in chronic stress, it elevates our cortisol. Cortisol levels signals the survival mode. Survival mode holds on to weight because you’re staying in that fight or flight mode.
Our bodies have one thing to do and it is to keep us alive. So when our bodies are not functioning correctly, we are in that fight or flight mode. And it’s not just about calories in, calories out.
You can be in a calorie deficit and still be highly stressed. And this also messes with your hormones and is holding on to the excess weight. We cannot live in a fight or flight and expect our body to feel safe enough to release weight.
So here’s where the faith piece comes in. Have a slower morning. And if you don’t have the opportunity to have a slower morning, have a slower evening, prayer time, restful time, meditation time, go on a prayer walk, gratitude.
Think of three things that you’re grateful for every single day. Letting go of the all or nothing thinking. You are not perfect.
You will have those opportunities, those things that come up where we’re not perfect. And that’s okay. And really learn learning how to release that meditation.
You could do a calm app. You could do deep breathing. And you could do one of my favorite things, which is box breathing.
Box breathing is a simple four step stress relief technique involving inhaling, holding, exhaling and holding again, each for a count of four. It calms the nervous system, increases focus, and it can be practiced anywhere in 16 second cycles.
It’s ideal for anxiety. It helps regulate your emotions and it helps lower your blood pressure. I love this one so much and I swear by it.
So how to do the box breathing? I want you to sit up right in a comfortable chair with your feet flat on the floor. Inhale, slowly breathe in through your nose for a count of four.
Hold your breath for a count of four. And then gently exhale through your mouth for a count of four. Hold the lungs empty for a count of four.
And then repeat this cycle three or four times. When you’re calm, your nervous system, cardiovascular system, respiratory systems, they calm and weight loss starts to begin naturally because you are not in that fight or flight mode.
And you can start regulating your hormones.
Three Core Shifts
So let’s recap. The first shift is to stop blaming the hormones and to stabilize them. The second shift is to build the blood sugar foundation.
And the third shift is to let faith and physiology work together. Your hormones don’t respond to punishment. They respond to nourishment.
They respond to rest and they respond to safety. You don’t need another extreme plan. You just need to stabilize your hormones.
Can you imagine? No more guilt, no more going rogue, no more 3 p.m. desperation.
And in one private session, I’ll give you a strategic plan you can actually stick to so your health locks in and you stop quitting on yourself. The link is in the show notes. Thanks for listening.
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