If you’re trying to lose weight, you’ve probably already cut out the fast food portion of your daily diet. With high fat content and very few nutritious calories, fast food is one of the worst culprits for making Americans struggle with obesity. We all know it’s not good for us, but our busy lifestyles and sometimes-difficult economic downturns make it too tempting.

Although fat is a major concern with fast food, another factor that contributes to its lack of good nutrition is the sodium content of most fast foods and processed food varieties. When you gain weight, your body gains it in three different ways: Fat, water, and lean weight. The more sodium you take in, the more water weight you will gain – and although water weight might be the easiest to lose, it is also the easiest to gain.

Sodium can be found in the body within the fluids surrounding cellular structures. When you eat high-sodium foods, the body experiences a type of sodium overdose, in which it doesn’t know how to handle the excess of sodium. The overdose requires the kidneys to work harder to excrete the sodium, and a type of “backlog” develops. This additional sodium that the kidneys can’t handle is stored in held in fluids, causing the fluids to be retained by the body.

It’s important to understand how your daily dietary habits have influenced your weight gain throughout your life, and how weight loss is more than just a fad diet every once in awhile – it requires a change in habits and lifestyle. For more information about how you can start on the right track to keeping your unwanted weight off for good, contact our office for more information.

You’ve probably heard that stress can cause unwanted weight gain. In fact, you’ve probably experienced this exact situation yourself – finding that in times of the most chaos surrounding you, you pack on the pounds quickly.

In case you’re wondering, this isn’t your imagination. There are research-based reasons why this happens to most people, and why stress is a major factor in weight gain (also making it a major obstacle in weight loss).

One of the primary reasons why people become stressed is financial. Especially in times of economic turmoil, many people worry over money and therefore tend to have less to spend on food. This results in buying lower-cost foods that are not nutritionally sound, and foods that have more caloric substance than actual nutritional substance.

Eating fast food in place of a solid meal, allowing more junk food in the house, and then turning to these foods for “comfort” during emotional times – all are factors that cause significant weight gain in most individuals.

Another factor is that stress causes your body to release certain hormones, namely cortisol and epinephrine, which cause fat to form. This is actually a biological process that stems from the “fight or flight” syndrome that is inherent in our programming, and while it might have benefitted our ancestors, it does not necessarily benefit us in a modern world.

While our ancestors had to go for long periods of time without any food (therefore making it a positive thing that their bodies stored extra fat), we live in a world where food is readily available, just often not the right kinds of foods.

Once you recognize the role that stress plays in both causing weight gain and becoming a major obstacle to weight loss, you’ll be taking the first step you need to take in learning to conquer its effects on your body. There are several weight loss programs and therapies available that help you adjust the hormones in your body, thereby reducing the negative effects stress has on your weight.