This book was written specifically for frustrated dieters, people who have been trying and trying to lose weight but no diet works for them. They have suffered through embarrassment and humiliation and have given up.This is a new day for people suffering from obesity. It really is your metabolism! We have inadvertently overlooked and left out a key hormone in our quest for weight loss. You will learn how to have your body produce and use this hormone so you can finally lose the weight. We will dispel the myths that are holding you back and give you the techniques to move you forward on your weight loss journey. It will become manageable and natural for you to lose weight. You have been taught that we are human and as such we are the same in many ways, but we are also each very different. There lies the clue for your success.

The Little Hormone That Can

By Norma Jeanne Ceresia

AuthorHouse

TCopyright © 2011 Norma Jeanne Ceresia
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4678-5359-0

Contents

Introduction..............................................xvChapter One We Are Doing it All Wrong.....................1Chapter Two Voyage of Discovery...........................9Chapter Three Myths.......................................21Chapter Four The Shakes...................................31Chapter Five The Natural World............................39Chapter Six Metabolic Syndrome............................43Chapter Seven Your Experiment.............................55Chapter Eight Tricks and Techniques.......................63Chapter Nine What Do You Weigh?...........................69Chapter Ten Prepare for Success...........................71Endnotes..................................................73

Chapter One

We Are Doing it All Wrong

Nowhere is it more important to take an objective look at how we view something than with obesity. For all the hype and all the research, we still haven't found out how to solve the problem. Actually, the answer is all around us and we keep hiding from "it," which is actually the problem. "The answer" is the sun. Think about it: obesity rates have skyrocketed in all age groups, even in our young children. Osteoporosis is a menace for older people and has crippling effects. Type 2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome are looming at our door.

We can detect, diagnose, and use Band-Aid treatments for these health issues, but identifying the causes and prevention remain elusive. To solve the problem, we must look at ourselves as an integral part of our environment. We influence our environment and it influences us. To almost completely block a major environmental factor out of our lives is most definitely going to have a dramatic effect on our well-being. By this I mean hiding from the rays of the sun.

Humans have evolved on earth under the rays of the sun for millions of years. We are dependent on the sun to provide heat, food, daylight, and oxygen, yet we ignore the fact that there are health benefits that we derive from exposure. It's true that people can get melanoma from the sun, but don't ignore the fact that some melanomas occur where the sun does not usually shine, such as the bottoms of the feet, in between toes, and in armpits.

Exposure to the sun causes humans to produce MSH, melanocyte stimulating hormone. (1) This is the hormone that causes us to tan. It protects us, and like most other hormones, performs other functions as well.

If we view humans as creatures that have evolved over time, we can understand where and how these functions assist in our survival. We consume calories for energy when they are available, use what we need at the moment, and store the rest in different forms, one of which is fat, for later use when food is less available. Therefore, there must be a signal for us to store excess calories as well as a signal that tells us to utilize our fat stores for energy. Melanocyte stimulating hormone serves as the signal that alerts the body that there is fat available to utilize.

Up until now we have limited our understanding of fat utilization to creating a caloric deficit by dieting and utilizing energy by exercising. In a perfect world, that makes sense. But what if your body's signal is turned off? What if your body is crying for calories and it doesn't get the signal that there is available fat to use? The result is that your body's survival instinct activates. You get hungry, and if you are dieting and do not act on that signal, you get very hungry, even ravenous, and you may begin to tremble as a result of lowered blood sugar levels. This is a basic survival instinct, and when in this condition it is almost impossible to avoid eating. Even worse is that now you need calories that can be quickly digested and enter into your bloodstream fast. The choice is carbohydrates.

It is almost guaranteed that you will consume far more calories than you actually need, and so you will store the excess as fat. It is virtually impossible to eat exactly the number of calories that your body needs at each moment, twenty-four hours a day, and so with this lack of a fat-burning signal to your body, you are now on the fast track to weight gain, metabolic syndrome, and if you continue on this path, to type 2 diabetes.

I wrote this book to teach you how to provide for your metabolic needs so you can function properly. The sun is an integral part of this process because it causes your body to produce melanocyte stimulating hormone. Weight loss can be achieved by maintaining your metabolism so it can burn the calories you need and also enabling your body to produce the hormones that drive your signaling system. This way you will burn the available calories stored in your fat reserves instead of causing you to go into the starvation mode, which will make you consume an overabundance of calories which will in turn be stored as fat.

This is an all too familiar scenario. You have an important social engagement, so you restrict your calories so you can fit into those new clothes. You take off a few pounds, which all too often is mostly water weight and intestinal contents. You can control yourself until after the event, at which time you go into starvation mode. This forces you to consume so many calories that you end up back where you started or worse. This can be a never ending scenario. I will teach you how to get off of this not-so-merry go round.

I will share my voyage of discovery including the unique situations that made me aware of the process happening in my own body. I will dismiss current myths of weight loss. You will learn how to choose a doctor who is willing to listen to you (there are many that won't). You will decide what factors you need to track to accumulate the information you will use to make successful weight loss decisions. Each person is a unique individual, so each person should have his or her own unique program. This will enable you to care for your metabolism and provide everything it needs to function well. You will also learn about the systems of the human body. There is a chapter on tricks and techniques of weight loss, and I describe physiological conditions that you probably already encounter and teach you how to deal with them.

Currently, obesity is viewed as an epidemic. All you have to do is look around. Everywhere I go I see people dealing with the very severe effects of obesity, which not only impacts their health, but limits their everyday mobility. My concern is that our children are going to be dealing with these problems for a lifetime. As you apply the principles in this book to your own health and diet issues, do not forget that children are being affected by obesity at an alarming rate. This is happening for the same reasons that obesity is happening to adults.

When our children play indoors, they do not get the benefits of minimal sun exposure. They become hungrier and more sedentary, which is exacerbated by low levels of MSH, and thus the cycle repeats itself, bringing us to the crisis stage that we have now in this country.

Have a serious conversation with your children's pediatrician about limited sun exposure; follow the doctor's instructions on how to have your children go outside for a short time on a limited schedule. Let them get a small amount of sun for a few minutes and then apply photoprotection. Again, follow your doctor's guidelines. Your children will gradually become more active and less hungry as their levels of MSH increase. Make sure you provide healthy snacks and plenty of liquids. Participate with them in fun activities like hiking, swimming, bike riding, or playing ball. Whatever interests them and keeps the whole family moving together is a good thing. Adopt your new healthier lifestyle and enjoy sharing with each other. Chart your child's progress and let them participate in the process so it becomes a habit that they will continue on their own later on. You will be teaching them healthy habits that will last a lifetime.

As you read this book, make a decision that this is a new day and a better way to accomplish your goals, reduce your stress, and get lasting results utilizing the functions that your body already has in place.

Chapter Two

Voyage of Discovery

My personal story will show how I came to the information that eventually changed my life. Through a very unique set of circumstances I was thrust into the position of making this monumental discovery.

As a child I was naturally thin. It didn't take much effort. I ate what I wanted, which was, of course, candy. I had energy to burn and a slim, tall frame. Even so, I was extremely focused on my body and my weight. I think it was because both of my parents were overweight and I saw how they struggled. At that young age I knew that I was looking at my future, so I became very careful. My parents were on board also because they didn't want me to have to deal with obesity. My mother helped by giving me goals to achieve. The most helpful goal that I remember was to remain under one hundred pounds until my thirteenth birthday, which was about ten months away. If I made the goal, I would get money for a new outfit. No specific diet or rules had to be followed; that was up to me. Simple, yet this kept me on track for ten months. I learned to control my diet, and I achieved my goal. It was important to me to monitor my weight on a daily basis. Support of family and friends was very important and helped in my success. I can actually remember what I weighed at certain points in my life, even when I was thin.

It is important to mention here that we lived in Connecticut, a state where it was sunny, though not always hot, most of the time. We spent a lot of time at the beach during the summer months. Then I went to college in an area that was cloudy and overcast most of the time. It didn't matter much to me; I studied most of the time and therefore wasn't outside anyway.

College years are typically harder for weight control. Everyone talks about the freshman fifteen. Usually people attribute it to all the time spent studying and a change in available food choices. I assumed it would come off during the summer, and it usually did. However, during this period I gradually had to restrict my calories more and more, I did so and graduated tall and thin.

Then I became employed and I had to deal with another change in life and routine. I lived in the same geographic area as the college that I attended. This time I found that it was not only more difficult to lose weight but much easier to gain weight. Feeling frustrated and becoming fearful that I was losing control, I went to a doctor. It was a great advantage to have observed myself over the years. I could accurately describe my problem. He went right for the thyroid and he was correct. I had Hashimoto's disease. My own body was producing antibodies that were destroying my thyroid. The thyroid produces hormones that control metabolism. That was why I was gaining weight. However, he said that taking a little hormone pill every day would replace what I didn't make anymore and that things would be back in balance.

Things were never the same. The weight went on and it didn't come off. That isn't to say that it didn't fluctuate, a celebration would come along and I would gain a pound, so I would restrict my calories and lose the pound. The weight would come back so much more quickly than before, and it would become a permanent resident. Now I know that this happened because the weight I lost wasn't fat. It was probably a combination of water and bowel contents from my dieting efforts. Looking back I can say that this is what was happening but at the time as my weight fluctuated it wasn't that obvious. On a good day I retained less fluid, so I lost a little weight. I would declare victory, only to have those nasty pounds creep back on. This was a sure sign of an internal signaling problem. The best way to describe it is a person can try to eat correctly for a day and fat would not build up or be lost. However, on a long term basis I could not maintain this balancing act.

On those occasional special days, such as Thanksgiving or Christmas, when typical people overindulge, the next day they adjust their caloric intake for a few days and the extra weight comes off. In my case I would lose water weight and the fat would still be there after I had erroneously declared victory. Whenever I ate too much, the excess would be stored as fat, but when I restricted my calories I didn't lose the fat. With this scenario you can see that over time, even being as careful as you can, the weight is going to gradually build up. You can also see that it was a very confusing situation for me, being able to take off some weight but never as much as I gained. Each time this happened the scale kept creeping up.

I got married, and with each pregnancy came more pounds. All of these scenarios are easily accounted for—college, pregnancy, thyroid disease. I gradually found myself at 248 pounds, unbelievable, how could this be? I went from in control to being helpless.

Then I looked at my children. They were beginning to have the same weight problem that I was struggling with. My weight problem was one thing, but my children were a different story. I became obsessed—was I creating this? There is nothing more motivating than dealing with a problem that affects your own children. I had to figure this out.

I tried every diet known to man. I got packaged meals once a week. I didn't lose weight, and they had the nerve to tell me that I was wasting my time if I was going to cheat! I wasn't cheating; I just wasn't losing! I went to weekly diet meetings and joined aerobic dance classes, but nothing worked for me.

Finally, with the encouragement of his doctor, my twenty-one year old son and I started the Atkins Diet. Protein was king, and the more we ate the more we lost. It was great. After six weeks I had lost sixteen pounds, and my son was even more successful. We kept going, comparing victories, and he continued to have them, but I did not. Sixteen was it. I still had eighty to go, so for the next six months I kept the faith and followed the diet to the letter. My son's weight was plummeting down, and I was watching from the sidelines.

One of the great advantages of Atkins is that you can test for ketones and actually see if the diet affects your metabolism to help you lose weight. My son thought this was great; his test strip was deep purple, and mine was light pink. I did the ramped-up version of the diet to jump start my losses, and still nothing. No matter what I did, my body would not go into ketosis. When ketones are detected in your urine, it is proof that your body is burning fat. My son was; I wasn't. He lost sixty five pounds and I lost sixteen and I suspect that it was sixteen pounds of muscle and water not fat!

For the first time, I had inadvertently proven that people are different. Not all diets work for everybody. Now what? My fat wouldn't come off with a blow torch. I kept looking for an answer. Of course, I could still blame it on my thyroid, but my hormones were in balance. Then one day I was watching TV and saw a news piece about a new discovery from researchers at the Eleanor Roosevelt Institute at the University of Colorado. They showed obese mice that lacked the gene that produces MSH and when the mice were administered MSH they lost weight.

Being at the end of my frazzled rope, I called the two scientists to ask about the compound. I found out that it was many years and much experimentation away from human use. All I could do was wait. At a dead end and at the end of my wits, I conceded. No doctor, no scientist, no drug, nothing could help me at this point. Thank goodness that my son seemed to be successful on his diet.

My husband and I decided to take a road trip down south. Before we left I had an appointment with my general practitioner, who was patient with me and considered all I had to say. He said he would try a test for adrenal function, which involved an injection. I got it and left for vacation.

If you have ever been on a road trip, you know that it is sit and ride, stop to eat, and then keep on riding. This amount of inactivity is not exactly conducive to weight loss. But that first night as I lay in bed, I felt something I hadn't felt in years. When I had lost weight in my younger years, I had always felt emptiness in my stomach at night, almost like a gentle vacuum. I call this sensation, "feeling the burn." I told my husband about it and then went to sleep.

I haven't mentioned that my husband has always been in control of his weight, thin and in shape. While we were traveling, we ate basically the same things. When we got home, I had lost five pounds, and he was still the same weight. Wait a minute—something had just happened here. It had to have been caused by the injection of adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) I got for the test. I now had undeniable results, cause and effect. I started to read about ACTH and MSH. In my research I discovered that the first thirteen amino acids of the ACTH and MSH molecules are exactly the same. This meant they could have similar effects, and I had inadvertently proven that they did. However, there was no way to get MSH, and ACTH is very powerful and not proven for nor prescribed for losing weight. I was so close and yet so far away.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from The Little Hormone That Canby Norma Jeanne Ceresia Copyright © 2011 by Norma Jeanne Ceresia. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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