AAWC: Ann Arbor’s Dr. Wine gives 10 reasons why you can’t lose weight

By Dr. Sara Wine, D.O.

  1. You don’t eat breakfast – Sometimes in some of my patients ahem, I mean my life, ironically, I always make sure the kids have a healthy breakfast, but me? I’m too busy to eat in the mornings, which means my metabolism is sluggish throughout the day until lunch and by then I’m famished and overeat throughout the rest of the day to catch up on my calories. Anyone else like this? One solution is to prep your breakfast for the week with healthy options like high protein smoothies, hard boiled eggs, apple slices and nut butter, and paleo friendly bars.
  2. Overeating healthy foods. I love that you’re eating almonds, avocados, fruit, salads, but they all still have calories. Make sure you are eating an actual healthy portion of your healthy snack and not eating the whole bag of trail mix in one setting. See #4. Don’t even get me started on the sneaky hidden sugars in foods. Hidden calories – hidden sugars are everywhere – salad dressings, cereals, peanut butter, granola bars, ketchup, mayo, fruit juices, flavored waters, most sauces and condiments.  All these “hidden’ calories add up in a day and studies have shown that sugar is more damaging to your body than big sugar binges!
  3. Underactive Thyroid (Hypothyroidism) – it controls your metabolism and contributes to most of your biochemistry. Did you know that 20-305 of people are walking around with undiagnosed thyroid disorders? Maybe that’s why you are cold all the time, can’t lose weight, feel puffy, and bloated. When was the last time you had a full thyroid panel? (TSH, Free T3, Free T4, Reverse T3, and more).
  4. Portion sizes – slowly over the past few decades the American serving size has nearly doubled, if not tripled, in comparison to our counterparts in Europe and Latin America. We are being served larger and larger portions in restaurants and changing our perception of what an actual “normal” size of food should be on your plate. Take a look – https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/educational/wecan/eat-right/distortion.htm
  5. Insulin Resistance and Type 2 diabetes- When you eat a diet high in carbs (bread, pasta, sweets) your body will overproduce insulin to try and keep your blood sugar normalized. Overtime your body becomes resistant to your own insulin, blood sugar goes up, and fat synthesis increases. Many of our patients are screened for insulin resistance which can occur up to a decade before any overt signs of diabetes. Luckily insulin resistance is reversible and treatable.
  1. Hormonal Imbalance – when your hormones are out of whack, it’s harder for you to lose weight and easier for you to gain weight. In premenopausal women, too much estrogen or estrogen dominance, causes adipose or fat gain, water retention, and bloating, along with a long list of other health issues. In Men loss of Testosterone also leads to weight gain.
  2. Chronic Sleep Deprivation – Let’s face it, when you’re tired your less physically active and more apt to eat high carb foods that give you temporary energy. However recent studies have also shown that chronic sleep deprivation can actually mess up your hormones that help with weight metabolism. https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evidence-based-living/201611/the-link-between-sleep-deprivation-and-weight-gain 
  3. Stress and Adrenal Imbalance – One of the most common causes of not being able to lose weight is due to our fight-or-flight stress hormone Cortisol.  “Over time, high cortisol, when sustained, is linking to high blood pressure, diabetes, increased belly fat, brain changes… depression, insomnia, and poor wound healing. In fact, fat cells in the belly have four times more cortisol receptors compared to fat cells elsewhere, so you just keep reinforcing the muffin top as your cortisol climbs and stays high. It’s not pretty.” http://www.saragottfriedmd.com/cortisol-switcharoo/
  4. Medications – Did you know many medicines are known to have weight gain associated with them? Antidepressants, diabetes medications, antipsychotics, epilepsy drugs, and certain blood pressure medications. If you need to take medications, you have choices that do not cause so much weight gain.
  5. Vitamin Deficiencies – low vitamin D, low B vitamins, low amino acids, minerals, and other nutrients cause a slow cellular metabolism. Unfortunately, most people do not realize that they aren’t getting enough optimal levels of vitamins from their foods.  99% of most Americans are known to have vitamin deficiencies.

The Wine Holistic Health Center was built and created by Sara Wine, D.O.  Dr. Wine is a board certified Family Physician who trained at Munson Medical Center in Traverse City.  After her training completion, Dr. Wine went on to serve as a National Health Scholar Physician for rural Family medicine doctor and Hospitalist for West Shore Medical Center and  Alpena Regional Medical Center.  She later went on to do Family Medicine in Northern Michigan.  Dr. Sara Wine, a board-certified family practice doctor and a member of the Ann Arbor Wellness Coalition, has teamed up with Faye Voorman, a holistic and nutritional health coach, to provide our patients with a weight loss program focusing on individual well-being and overall wellness while encouraging you to reach your weight loss goal. For more information, log onto www.wineholistichealthcenter.com/

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