|

6 Metabolism Busting Foods To Avoid- How To Burn More Calories

The 6 Metabolism Busting Foods To Avoid
-How To Re-Boot Your Metabolism –

If your metabolism is healthy and running as it should, it efficiently burns calories and keeps you feeling energetic and excellent overall. Exercise and plenty of sleep also help your metabolism function optimally, but did you know that certain foods you eat could be sabotaging your efforts? Six foods in particular will bust your metabolism. Try to do what you can to avoid them if you want to burn more calories. 

These foods that could be slowing down that burn you count on your metabolism for to keep things running optimally. Are you consuming any of these metabolism-busters regularly?

Avoid These 6 Foods If You Want To Burn More Calories:

1. Refined grains

There’s a difference between whole grains that fuel your body and refined grains. Refined grains are stripped of that necessary fiber and nutrients your body needs. These grains are refined in the interest of taste and texture, but they leave your metabolism slower.

Grains, in general, as well as nuts, seeds, legumes and lentils, are high in phytic acids. These are micronutrient-blocking foods that contribute to digestive, cellular and hormonal imbalances. It is best to soak, sprout and cook these foods prior to eating to render the phytic acids harmless.

2. Sugary Drinks

Sugar is dangerous, especially in liquid form. Sodas, lattes, energy drinks, or even sports drinks can all drag your metabolism down. If you want to make sure your efforts at the gym aren’t wasted, stop drinking your calories.

 

Sugar is considered a high-reward substance, meaning it tastes really good and is unnaturally intense. It is also highly addictive.

When the brain is hijacked, you don’t eat based on need but rather for pleasure. Modern, processed food is the most rewarding because it is engineered to be addictive with its combination of sugar, fat and artificial ingredients.

Save the sugar for a rare treat, like a little slice of birthday cake on your big day. It’s a much better tradeoff!

3. Processed vegetable oils

They might sound healthy with names like sunflower oil or soybean oil. But these processed vegetable oils, which include canola oil, have a higher risk for heart disease. They also can cause inflammation throughout the body.

Choose single source extra virgin olive oil, avocado oil or coconut oil instead, which all supply healthy fats to help calm inflammation and speed up your metabolism to boot.

4. Artificial Sweeteners

Perhaps the only thing worse than sugar itself is artificial sweeteners. You may think you’re making a healthier choice, but choosing sucralose, aspartame, and saccharin are all linked to health issues you certainly want to avoid. They can also mess with the good bacteria in your gut, which could hinder your weight loss efforts and your immune system. 

The FDA also categorizes stevia and Luo Han Guo or monk fruit as artificial sweeteners, even though they are “plant-derived”. All non-nutrient sweeteners over stimulate sugar receptors – these chemicals cross the blood brain barrier.

People who routinely use artificial sweeteners may start to find less intensely sweet foods, such as fruit, less appealing and unsweet foods, such as vegetables, downright unpalatable. They can cause over-eating and binge eating of high sugar, refined carb foods.

Avoid artificial sweeteners — if you “need” to use a sweetener, use something natural such as pure maple syrup or raw honey.

5. Non-organic Produce

Organic produce might cost more, but in the end, you’ll wind up spending less on healthcare by staying healthier. When you buy non-organic, you’re getting more pesticides which slow down the metabolism, not to mention cause high insulin levels and glucose intolerance.  

Our environment, food and water are all tainted with chemicals. More than 85,000 chemicals are used in the US and it is almost double that globally. At this point we can’t escape it…we just need to minimize our exposure to the best of our abilities and vote with our dollars so that we can influence a change in practices.

These chemicals are hormone disruptors – they can mimic estrogen – and they destroy your microbiome – the beneficial bacteria living in your gut that help to digest your food.

Organic produce is so readily available now that it isn’t outrageously more expensive than conventional items.  Take a look at the 2020 Clean Fifteen/Dirty Dozen list to see the items you should always buy organic, and the ones you can opt to buy conventionally with minimal risk.

6. Granola

It seems like a healthy choice, but the granola you find in your supermarket often contains hidden sugars and added ingredients that don’t do you any favors. When you take in more sugar than you think, you cause a hormonal imbalance known as leptin resistance. This makes you hungrier while slowing your metabolism to a crawl.

Leptin is a hormone predominantly made by fat cells that helps to regulate energy balance by inhibiting hunger. This, in turn, decreases fat storage.

In leptin resistance, your leptin is high, which means you’re fat, but your brain doesn’t recognize it….so you stay hungry. Your hunger isn’t turned off.  Not only is leptin part of the hunger system, it’s also part of the reward system

Leptin resistance causes a metabolic gap whereas fat cells are starving for energy.

If you love granola, you can make your own by selecting fresh seeds, nuts, and oats to enjoy the taste and get true health benefits.

Now that you know what foods might be sabotaging your metabolism, cut them from your diet. 

Here Are 4 Strategies To Re-Boot Your Metabolism:

1.     Your high food reward fix is to eat only whole-unprocessed food to break the addiction. Get back in tune with eating for biological need…not reward based.

2.     You need to lower your food variety – eat simple meals. Keep food preparation simple, limit sauces and gourmet food.

I talk a lot about eating a diverse diet – eating the rainbow every day. When I say lower your food variety it relates to the complexity of your meals.

It is important to eat a wide variety of vegetables and fruit so that you supply your body with the antioxidants and phytonutrients it needs to heal and repair itself and combat disease and infection.

3.     Now that you have cut out or significantly reduced processed high reward food – make sure to eat enough protein 50-70 grams per day on average  – depending on your muscle mass you may need to increase it to 1 g per day per pound of lean muscle mass

4.     Eliminate metabolically toxic foods. In addition to those identified above, consider the elimination of  gluten, dairy and other food sensitivities or intolerances. Seek to get those nutrients from more optimal sources.

Dairy products

To avoid further metabolic damage that has already occurred, eat per your biological need. Don’t be a cardio junkie or severely restrict calories.

It may take some time to reverse damage from your dieting habits –give yourself some grace. There is no one size that fits all and certainly as your body changes your food strategy should be changing and evolving with it.

Work with your body rather than against it. Making your health a priority is the greatest gift of self-love that you can give yourself. Don’t forget to get your workout in and build your muscle to increase the burn…. even if it’s just working on the garden. 

If you haven’t read my previous article how to look younger 9 anti-aging foods that will make you look younger. 

 

Interested in working with Dr Nancy? Her Health Continuum Masterclass Starts February 2021

Finally crack the code on losing weight, managing stress and feeling energized. This 10 week journey of self-discovery gives you the knowledge, resources, and skills to assess yourself so that you can optimize your health and empower long-term wellness.

Schedule your FREE breakthrough call here to learn more: https://calendly.com/drnancymiggins/breakthrough

Similar Posts