#82 Heather Beardsley – Insulin Resistance

Meet Heather Beardsley:

Heather has been writing, coaching, and creating wellness programs over at her health & wellness website, Thrive In Midlife at since 2012. Heather has an unwavering belief in her clients highest potential. She has been able to help hundreds of her clients and readers lose weight and reclaim their vitality, energy and most importantly help her clients feel like themselves again.

At age 41, Heather faced premature menopause, unexplained weight gain, and severe adrenal fatigue. Frustrated at her doctor’s traditional advice to accept debilitating hot-flashes, chronic fatigue, sleepless nights, amenorrhea, and to just eat less and exercise more in order to lose weight, she dove into the latest research on insulin resistance, ketogenic nutrition, and longevity science. Using a holistic approach, she systematically reduced her chronic stress, reversed her menopause, balanced her hormones, lost eighteen pounds, and reduced her fasting blood sugars from 145 to 93 after she began eating a ketogenic diet in 2016.

After sharing her results and knowledge with her community, Heather began coaching her friends and family with incredible results. Soon after, she pursued certifications in fitness nutrition and health coaching, and her professional coaching practice began.

Heather has created her own keto 101 class for beginners, along with her own monthly and individual nutrition coaching programs. She also provides meal planning, food preparation, shopping field tips, and pantry/refrigerator remakes to her local clients.

The mom of two teenage boys, Heather understands the demands of family and professional life.  She works with busy Moms and Dads to help organize their time, and implement systems and structures into their days in order to prioritize healthy eating habits and fitness with demanding work and travel schedules. Heather provides one on one phone coaching to individual clients based anywhere in the United States. She also gives health and wellness talks and presentations to tech, finance, gyms, and organizations in the South Florida area.

Beyond nutrition coaching, Heather also provides her clients with the organizational systems to make meaningful changes in her client’s lives – whether that be as simple as getting their closets organized to helping her clients implement larger goals like committing to lifelong fitness and strength goals or helping her clients with life coaching get back on their A-game in their corporate professional lives. 

Show Notes:

ABOUT HEATHER

• I found keto in early fall of 2016
• Prior to that, I was struggling with unexplained weight gain
• I was completely frustrated because all of the tricks that I used to use to be successful in losing weight were no longer working
• My energy was gone, I had gone into premature menopause, and had a lot of challenges. They were not debilitating, but I definitely did not feel like myself and I knew that there was something going on with me, but I was not sure what it was
• I used my blogging platform, that I started in 2016, to write about these challenges and share what I was figuring out. And that’s what I did with keto when I finally found it
• In my research, in late 2016, I came across insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome and I did not know what those meant but I knew that I resonated a lot with those indicators
• Even as a kid, I had blood sugar dysfunction and because of that, I ended up with hypoglycemia for a year
• I had to have a note in school to allow me to eat every few hours
• And of course, in the late 80’s I would eat terrible things because they made me feel better quickly, the high sugar stuff
• And so in 2016, when I started reading about this, I kind of fell down a rabbit hole of research. But thank goodness there is the internet and I could teach myself, because my doctors could not give me answers that I found with the keto diet
• By the time Halloween rolled around, I decide to try the keto diet
• I started the week before Halloween in 2016 and I did not have a single piece of candy. Within a week, all of my sugar cravings were pretty much gone
• I did not realize that a vegan or vegetarian diet, for people like me who are insulin resistant, can be just as carb spiking as sugar, candy or cakes are to other people
• When I finally bought a dual glucose ketone meter, I discovered that my fasting blood sugar was between 135 and 145 and I was shocked. I was on the road for type 2 diabetes
• So, keto became less of a weight loss priority and more about arresting the development of my blood sugar dysfunction and healing myself from the inside out
• Many people can eat carbs and still be in the “okay” weight range. But what we are not seeing, is that just slightly chronically elevated blood sugar, which is leading to system wide inflammation, and all kinds of other issues that go undetected, can take place for years. I feel like the doctors aren’t really making that a priority
• Chronically elevated blood sugar leads to heart disease and is associated with cancers and all kinds of other diseases
• So, it’s not just the weight loss
• People need help organizing all the information and that’s why we rely on our doctors. Not that we shouldn’t, but ultimately, no one cares about your health more than you
• So, I had several great things happen in the first 3 weeks
• I lost 4 lbs. I am not extremely overweight to begin with, but I probably had 15 lbs. to lose
• My brain fog also lifted, I immediately was able to sleep better, I was not feeling hungry all the time, I was able to go longer without eating
• And then eventually after that, the rate of weight loss decreased, which kind of was messing with my head, because I was seeing all of these huge transformations on Instagram
• And that led to more and more research, but in the end, I was able to figure out that because my blood sugars were so high, that was really the main sign that I was insulin resistant
• When you are insulin resistant, you are not going to lose weight as quickly as someone who is not
• That was the reason why I stopped focusing on the weight loss, and looked more at my fasting blood sugars every day and making sure that I was making steady progress and that I was also healing myself from the inside out
• There are markers for people to know that they are insulin resistant. They are typically fatigued in the afternoon, have weight gain in the mid-section, high fasting blood sugar (anything over a 100), and the inability to lose weight by restricting calories
• We just lose weight less quickly, we have to be more consistent, and we need throw out the scale
• Every time I would do a long term fast, my ketone numbers would increase tremendously, and my blood sugar reading s would decrease
• The first thing I did was a 24-hour fast and I never thought I could do that
• It just felt like it was a miracle so I just kept at it – every 3 months or so
• My longest fast is 5 days and I was just having bone broth and water
• I was able to lose 9 lbs. with two separate fasts
• So, I realized, that for those who have metabolic syndrome or insulin resistance, the longer-term fasting is a really great way to take off the pounds, even if you are doing keto the right way
• I really recommend reading the book by Jimmy Moore and Dr. Jason Fung, Fasting Clarity, because there are a lot of tips in there on how to fast 
• I read that when you get up in the morning, you should let the sunlight hit your eyes, because there’s photo receptors at the back of your eyes and when the sun hits them, it starts the circadian rhythm going
• The primal body wants to feel the sun on itself. If you don’t get out into the sun on a regular basis, the body can’t tell that you are thriving
• For me, I feel like my body got used to it 
• But if you eat  a well formulated keto diet, when you introduce something new to the body, I feel like the body responses almost multiplied
  
  
• My life has completely changed when I started keto
• Some people when they eat keto, some of their cholesterol and triglyceride markers will go up a little bit, but mine did not
• My body loves eating keto and I know for sure that it is right for me
• I have tested for cholesterol particle size in the past, and they have always seemed to be okay, but I would like to compare it now to maybe even 10 years ago, because I think my chemistry right now is spot on
• I think I am the healthiest I have ever been at age 48
• Food has a huge impact on your body and in balancing your hormones
• You need fat to create cholesterol and all of your hormones are made from cholesterol
• We have a lot of healing to do in our generation
• I have never eaten as much food in my life as I do now. Not that I am over eating, but it just feels so good to eat a big plate of yummy keto food
• I eat until I am full. I am not tracking, I am not counting calories, I not doing any of that and I am just going by I feel, and my weight is as stable as it has ever been my whole life
• When I was trying to tweak everything and lose those few pounds that I feel like I wanted to lose, I always like to keep my total carbs below 25
• I have to be quite strict in order to see weight loss
• I am a pretty active and muscular person, so I always felt like I needed more protein. I was eating 140 grams a day and of course, the keto friendly vegetables
• I do eat 2 meals a day. I went almost a year and half not eating after 2:00 PM
• These days, I am eating my first meal around 11:00 AM and a lighter dinner around 6:00 PM or 7:00 PM

KETO MEAL

• I love ribeye with a Caesar salad, with keto croutons – that’s my idea of heaven

ADVICE

• There’s no one right way to do keto
• Figure out what works for yourself in terms of vibrant health
• There’re so many markers that are more important than weight

HOW CAN PEOPLE FIND YOU

• Website: heatherbeardsley.com
• Facebook: Coach Heather Beardsley
• Instagram: thriveinmidlife

HEALTH BENEFITS

• Better sleep
• Healed my high fasting blood sugar
• I lost inches from my mid-section
• I became confident again
• It’s like my brain started working again
• I also have a sense of empowerment

LINKS TO KNOW MORE ABOUT HEATHER:

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