How to Increase Leptin in Your Diet

So there is a lot of talk about how leptin can help with weight loss. High protein low carb diets could help increase leptin but finding the basics on how this works are hard to find. I’ve done a little research on the subject and put together this post that breaks it all down.

Let’s start off by learning what leptin is.

Leptin is a type of protein, released from fatty tissues. It’s most notably recognized for being capable of regulating the body’s process of storing body fat. The leptin hormone plays an important role in the human body and can prove problematic if an individual experiences a deficit for an extended period of time.

You should respect leptin as one of the most essential hormones in the body. It really has ties to just about every bodily function there is, from bodily processes in the reproductive organs to its central nervous system. A leptin deficit or sufficiency can influence health changes in an individual. As such, it is essential to make sure that leptin levels are always sufficient, or else you may be at risk of various health issues, such as stress, thyroid problems, and reproduction issues.

So How Can You Increase Leptin?

If you know you have a leptin deficit, then immediately make changes to your lifestyle to accommodate a sufficient level of leptin at all times. The easiest way to do this is by making changes to your diet that will influence higher leptin levels.

This simply requires changing your daily intake to be more leptin-friendly, which means you need to focus on only consuming foods that promote leptin sensitivity, as this can improve the efficiency of any leptin produced naturally in your body. The food itself will not lift leptin levels, though, as leptin is indigestible in the intestines. However, these leptin-friendly foods do wonders with making the most out of the body’s naturally produced leptin and with triggering the leptin production signals in the brain.

Leptin Rich Foods

Foods high in protein are usually a safe bet when trying to increase leptin-heavy food intake. It’s often suggested to take in a fair amount of protein in the morning to get leptin levels up. Fish is another effective source of leptin-friendly food to consume for the purpose of regulating leptin levels.

Sometimes it’s the foods that you don’t eat that are just as important as the foods that you do eat. A few different types of foods can weaken leptin sensitivity. As such, these foods should be avoided. Some examples of foods that don’t mesh well with leptin production include candy and potato chips. Anything high in carbohydrates, especially sugar and simple starch foods, will do nothing but reduce the body’s leptin sensitivity and further worsen the problem.

Benefits and Downfalls of Increasing Leptin

It may not seem to be a big deal to make changes to your leptin levels, but it can have some serious effects on the body. Quality leptin levels will give the body the best position to function without any major complications. Low leptin levels will put the body at risk of many leptin-related health issues. If you eat foods that are known to reduce leptin sensitivity, you may inadvertently end up with medical problems associated with the hormone.

For the most part, leptin is beneficial. It may be a little less appealing for those that are obese and looking to lose weight. These individuals may use leptin as a central point of their diet. Their intake changes to support a heightened sensitivity to the hormone. In the end, they end up craving the bad foods they always ate and then return back to their habit and probably end up weighing even more than when they started their weight loss attempt.

Of course, an individual with optimal leptin levels will not have any leptin-related problems. This means there will not be any leptin-induced issues with their functionality in any areas that a leptin deficit can impact. Therefore, regulating your leptin levels will inherently promote optimal health.

The list of benefits and downfalls may be a little different if you are using leptin supplements to help regulate leptin levels in your body. These supplements all work a little differently and may provide different results. In fact, some may be completely useless and will offer nothing more than a placebo effect. You can still get the leptin sensitivity enhancement benefits through leptin supplementation.

Also, leptin supplementation is not an effective method for weight loss. Even those that are severely obese are often producing a sufficient amount of leptin each day. While weight loss may occur and can serve as an added benefit, there is only a good chance of it happening if the individual was born with a genetic leptin deficiency.

Is it Worth Increasing Leptin

This is really a subject that people have to draw their own conclusion on due to the controversy behind it. There is no way for an individual to specifically say leptin does this or that or causes this or that. While most parts of leptin’s functionality are understood, the effects of a leptin deficit are not easily evaluated. As such, one should be weary of the value of leptin supplements and should only focus on leptin-friendly dieting if there is reason to believe that their leptin levels are problematic.