Understand Your Hormones and Know Your Numbers

Focusing on your body's regulatory hormones —like Glucagon-Like Peptide 1 (GLP-1) —can be a powerful tool for weight management, particularly in controlling appetite. Eriocitrin, the hero compound behind GlucoFocus, is nature's GLP-1 activator.

The GLP-1 pathway is a critical component of the body's natural system for regulating blood sugar and appetite. GLP-1 is a hormone secreted by the L-cells in the gut in response to eating. Its primary functions are to stimulate the pancreas to release insulin in a glucose-dependent manner (meaning it only works when blood sugar is high) and to inhibit the release of glucagon. Crucially for weight management, GLP-1 also acts on the brain to enhance feelings of satiety (fullness) and slow gastric emptying, which collectively reduces appetite and food intake. Medications or supplements that mimic or enhance the action of GLP-1 leverage this powerful pathway to improve glucose metabolism and promote sustainable weight loss. Clinical studies show that the eriocitrin in GlucoFocus mimics the action of GLP-1 hormones — promoting satiety, regulating insulin, and improving glucose metabolism.

🔑 The Hormone Balance: Insulin vs. Glucagon

Your primary goal for fat loss should be to reduce insulin levels and increase glucagon levels.

- Insulin is your fat storage hormone. When insulin is high, your body is in storage mode.

- Glucagon is your fat loss hormone. When insulin is low, glucagon can get to work, signalling your body to release stored energy.

However, to lose weight, you still need to be in a calorie deficit—eating fewer calories than your body needs to sustain itself. This forces your body to use that stored energy (fat) to fuel itself.

📊 Know Your Numbers: Burning Energy

Understanding how your body burns calories is crucial:

- Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) / Just Existing: This burns the most calories (sleeping, breathing, organ function). The simplest and most effective way to increase this number is simply to build more muscle. The more muscle you have, the more calories your body is burning by just existing.

- Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis (NEAT): Burns around 20% of your overall calories. This is all the energy burned from moving around, including walking, fidgeting, and pacing.

- Thermic Effect of Food (TEF): Burns about 10% of your total calories. This is the energy your body uses to digest, absorb, and metabolize the food you eat.

- Exercise: Burns only around 5% of calories. While critical for health, it's a smaller piece of the daily calorie burn puzzle than many people think!

A simple way to calculate how many calories to consume to to achieve weight loss is to take your goal weight in pounds (to convert to kilograms multiply by 2.2) and multiply this by 10 if you are on the shorter side and 12 if you are taller. For example, if your goal weight is 75 multiply this by 2.2 - this will give you 165 - multiply 165 by 10 or 12. This would make your calorie goal 1650 or 1980. Eating in a range of 100 calories either side of this until you goal weight has been reached is what you should aim.

Important Note: Do not create a deficit that places your daily calorie target below 1,200 for women or 1,500 for men unless strictly monitored by a healthcare professional. Severely restrictive diets can lead to nutrient deficiencies and loss of muscle mass.

🥗 Understand Your Macronutrients

You should never cut out whole groups of food. Instead, learn to incorporate all food groups in appropriate amounts. To optimize for fat loss and hormone balance, you must adjust your macronutrient ratio to activate fat burning.

The key is to reduce the amount of refined carbohydrates consumed. Carbs raise our blood glucose, which triggers insulin secretion. If those excess calories aren't used, the result is fat storage. By lowering blood glucose, your insulin levels drop, which helps reduce sugar and carb cravings and your appetite.

We need most of our calories to come from protein and healthy fats.