Welcome to another episode of The Matter Over Mind Experience
I am your host, Master Trainer & Weight Management Expert, Narado Zeco Powell
This episode is Q & A 2
I will answer 5 questions from listeners & followers who emailed or sent me a DM
If you have questions about health, fitness & fat-loss, feel free to email me @ narado@zecohealth.com or DM on my IG @zecohealth
Let’s begin
Question1-
I have been on a low carb diet for a while, but have been on a plateau and it seems I am not burning carbs well. How do I reintroduce carbs into my diet?
Usually when you are on a low carb diet for a while, your body will downregulate the ability to burn carbs . It seems though your body is good at burning fat, however, if you do not improve your ability to burn carbs you will store them instead.
In your case, as you are reintroducing carbs into your diet I recommend carb cycling. The best time to eat carbs are before an intense workout and a couple hours before bed to feed your brain the glucose it needs.
In addition, outside of pre-workout, you want to eat your carbs after each complete meal of protein & fats with veggies for fiber. This can keep your blood sugar steady which is vital in weight management.
2. Why do women tend to crave more carbs on their periods?
Yeah, some women crave carbs the first week of their cycle where they are estrogen dominant while other women may crave them the week prior when they have low progesterone.
There are usually more sugar cravings with thyroid imbalances.”
If this sounds like it might apply to you, it’s a good idea to talk to an integrative or functional medicine doctor to figure out what else might be going on or to get a personalized dietary and lifestyle plan to combat these cravings and get your hormones back in balance.
Generally speaking, you have much more carbohydrate tolerance AKA, insulin sensitivity in the first half of your cycle, which is called the follicular phase, or days 0 through 14.
It seems that the estrogen helps keep away insulin resistance.
Healthy or even unhealthy carbs are just better tolerated then.”
Even so, I recommend eating more healthy unprocessed, complex carbs, especially with each complete meal.
Simple sugars will cause unnecessary blood sugar spikes
Question3-
Do you think a body could be holding the fat burning stage off if they are sipping a carb-based beverage over several hours?
Say 16oz over 2-3 hours. Even though it’s not a large amount and you have allocated for it, could this slow constant drinking be my downfall?
How long do you give yourself to drink a beverage that has carbs?
The issue here is not carbs vs fat, but the lack of fiber.
To promote fat-burn, you need to keep blood sugar steady.
In case of juice or drinks, the sugar will pick up your blood glucose and as you keep drinking, it will never get a chance to work through it.
Hence, the steady dose of glucose will limit your body’s ability to burn fat stores.
In addition, I recommend that you lose all juices if your goal is weight-loss.
Hence, eat your juice.
Question4-
What oils are better for our health
I posted on Instagram on habits to improve the health of our gut and someone asked this question in a comment
In the post I stated to avoid inflammatory cooking oils
There would be seed oils like vegetable oils, sunflower, corn and sesame oils .
All seed oils are quite high in polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) that can cause inflammation and toxin accumulation in the body
On top of that, when exposed to high heat or reheated multiple times, these oils can turn toxic and cause greater harm to the human body
Think about switching to coconut, olive and avocado oil
I use all three because each provides different benefits for our bodies
Avocado & olive oils benefit heart health due to their similar content of oleic acid, a monounsaturated omega-9 fatty acid.
Additionally, both promote skin health and aid wound healing
Avocado oil has a particularly high smoke point compared with olive oil, so it may be better suited for high-heat cooking methods
The main difference with coconut oil is coconut oil is different from other dietary oils, because it is mainly composed of medium-chain fatty acids (MCFAs), whereas most other oils are almost entirely long-chain fatty acids
Research shows that these fatty acids could promote weight loss by reducing body fat, increase fullness, and potentially improving your gut environment
Question5-
I tried keto for a year, lost 10 pounds. I only ate what was allowed. I tried to balance the carbs, protein & fats, but never figured it out. It seems stressful, what are your thoughts?
Well, my answer may not be too popular among the carnivore or keto community
I am not a fan of always being in ketosis, in fact, I don’t believe that humans are built that way
Humans are born with the most amylase than any other mammals on the planet
Amylase are enzymes to break down carbs
Now, understanding this, leads me to believe we should not be in a constant state of ketosis
Now, it also depends on factors like your geographic location, how you train & ancestral background
Keto is not a bad diet, in fact can be very helpful
However, the issues with being in ketosis all the time is that your body will downregulate it’s ability to burn carbs efficiently
That’s why I cycle ketosis
Twice a year, I go on a keto diet for a month to train my body to run off fat
It may look different for everyone, but for me, a month is enough to train my body to break down fats efficiently, while maintaining my ability to break down carb efficiently
This is why I preach metabolic flexibility
Having the ability to switch between fats & carbs efficiently is a better long term solution & unless you will be in ketosis, the rest of your life, is a better solution
I will end here by saying to look into Lumen
It is a fantastic product
It reads your metabolism and based on if you are a sugar or a carb burner, their nutritionists give you nutrition guidelines to follow
As you follow the nutrition plan, your metabolism will learn to break down fats and carbs more efficiently, making your metabolism flexible
The website is lumen.me & you can use code zecohealth for $50 off
Question6- Do you know the connection between hypothyroidism & asthma?
I am not a medical expert so please do not confuse anything I say as medical advice.
Hypothyroidism & Asthma are a result of autoimmunity.
Experts tell us that when we have an autoimmune disease, we are more likely to develop another
So, in the end, improving the health of your gut whether that’s through getting quality sleep, eating prebiotic and prebiotic foods can be very helpful
You can also listen to any one of my episodes with gut health and/or Hypothyroidism Experts to learn more
Question7- I believe mental health has a larger impact on our gut than gut on our mental health. What are your thoughts?
Well, I believe it is a double edged sword
I do not get into the conversation of which one is more important
We know the gut-brain connection and we cannot have healthy gut health without healthy mental health & vice versa
I will give you an example of each:
- If we are constantly stressed, that leads to oxidative stress and inflammation in our gut
- Most of our serotonin (our feel good nuero-transmitter) is created in our guts
In fact, most mental health prescriptions add designed to increase serotonin
Research tell us that improving the health of our gut can naturally increase serotonin production
This is why I look at it from both sides
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