A short YouTube discussion (by Shilpa Sayana, MD) arguing that stubborn weight gain often has underlying hormonal causes rather than simply diet/exercise failures. Speakers emphasize specific hormones (testosterone, estrogen, cortisol, thyroid), environmental/toxic and gut-related contributors, life-stage hormonal transitions, and recommend partnering with a knowledgeable clinician (functional medicine MD or thyroid specialist) to identify root causes.
Chapters
So the most important thing is to figure out why. As you know, as a regular internist, we're not taught so much about the why. It's like you have the disease process and let's treat it. And a lot of patients come to me and said, I've gone to my primary care doctor and said, I'm kind of gaining weight or nothing is working. And they're like, you know, exercise harder, eat less. But the question is, why is this happening? And the most common reason that these three groups have is hormonal imbalances. So if your hormones aren't balanced, it is on just your testosterone, estrogen, but things like cortisol, things like your thyroid, if those are not balanced because of toxic burden, gut can't process stuff, or you're just in this current phase of life where your hormones are naturally transitioning. Weight's going to be very stubborn and hard to lose, especially on your belly.
Yeah, I remember the day where I was like seven days a week religiously in the gym. I could not move the needle. But, man, as soon as I got my hormones balanced, found the right thyroid doctor, which was very difficult to do, and got and started to detox a lot of the things that you know, from different foods, the weight just started dripping off.
That's exactly right. It's about finding the right team and the right doctor to partner with. So having a good functional medicine MD in your local area to partner with and really looking clearly, as you know, if you're doing everything in terms of diet, exercise, supplements, medications, and still nothing's working for you, I think then it's really important to look as to why, what's your root cause.
