As we continue to explore hormones let's focus on leptin and how it plays a role in maintaining a healthy weight.
Causing quite a stir with scientists, leptin was first discovered in 1994. It’s a hormone produced in the fat stores of your body. Its job is to signal to our brain when we’re full, triggering us to stop eating. Leptin also supports efficient metabolism. Its role in weight loss, weight gain, and obesity has been studied in animals and humans. Leptin travels through our blood, via our circulatory system, to the appetite centre of our brain. There, it binds to receptors that are responsible for making us feel hungry. This helps tamp down our appetite, curbing our desire to eat. Leptin also travels through our nervous system, stimulating fatty tissue to burn off fat and calories. Scientists therefore became very excited on the discovery of leptin and its role in weight gain and loss.
For some people that have a leptin deficiency it can help to understand why they always feel hungry.
A simple leptin hormone test may indicate why we seem to feel more hungry than others and have problems achieving or maintaining a healthy weight. Though multifactorial, if we lose and gain weight only to revert to the same size, it may be due to your leptin levels.
I believe it's also worth noting we don't always eat because we are hungry. Eating can be driven by mood, habit and I don't think we have a festival or celebration that doesn't involve delicious food and it's not hunger that is driving me to have a slice of birthday cake!
If you like to arrange a simple leptin hormone test or would like help losing or gaining weight please message me or contact me for a no-obligation chat to see if my nutrition services my help you.
Happy eating,
Nina Thomas
Registered Associate Nutritionist & Food Scientist
07958 765337
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