Packed with prebiotic, healing and anti-inflammatory spices, these flavour-packed bliss balls make the perfect snack when trying to lose weight. A great source of long-lasting complex carbohydrates to support glycemic control, prebiotics to support healthy flora, healthy fats to boost brain power, plant protein to keep you satisfied until your next meal, fiber to keep you regular as well as an abundance of vitamins, minerals and powerful antioxidants to nourish the body.
Ingredients
½ cup
buckwheat
½ cup
rolled quinoa or oats
¼ cup
almondmeal
1 cup
dates (pitted)
½ teaspoon 1teaspoon
turmeric psyllium husks
1teaspoon
cinnamon
½ teaspoon
ground ginger
½ teaspoon
cloves
add pinch
black pepper
¼ teaspoon
ground cardamom
2tablespoon
vanilla plant-based protein powder (optional)
4tablespoon 1teaspoon
lemon juice vanilla essence chia seeds, coconut or chopped freeze dried pineapple (optional, to roll)
In a mixing bowl combine the dry ingredients
Add wet ingredients to the dry mix and combine with a wooden spoon or with your hands till really well combined.
Give the mixture a good few squeezes/kneads to make sure everything is combined as it should. Adjust for dryness if necessary.
Break off pieces of the dough and form into balls around the size of a 20c piece.
Store in the fridge in an air-tight container to keep them firm.
During menopause, some women find they struggle to lose weight – especially around the mid section. No matter how hard they try, counting calories, cutting the carbs and even exercising 3 times per week, just won’t budge the belly fat kilos. This is because they have weight loss resistance. No matter what they do, the weight won’t shift and no pill, potion or motion will get the scales moving in the right direction. So what do you do when you can’t lose weight during menopause?
Between the ages of 45 and 55, women gain on average half a kilo a year and a total of 2.3 kg during the menopausal transition. #menopauserelief
It isn’t just the weight gain itself; many women find where they lose weight shifts during menopause. Traditionally, women gain weight around their hips and thighs. After menopause, however, that weight gain zones tend to be around the tummy zone. Declining estrogen during menopause increases belly fat, but there are other factors that also cause weight loss resistance such as:
Your microbiome changes
Your metabolic rate slows down, so you burn fewer calories
Your fat cells change, so more fat accumulates as belly fat
Menopause can impact sleep, which can impact other fat-regulating hormones including your stress hormone, cortisol
Inflammation linked to injury triggers fat cell production
You might not be exercising as much
All of these changes plus many more can lead to weight loss resistance during menopause.
Obesity increases in women once they reach the age of 40. About 65 percent of women 40-59 are obese and 73.8 percent of women 60 years older are obese. #midlifecrisis
Abdominal fat in women is a leading cause of cardiovascular disease. Getting assessed for the underlying cause of hidden weight gain is the first step towards living a healthy, long and active life.
For years I tried to lose weight – I’d lose a couple but gain a few. Working with Narelle meant I finally could maintain a healthy body – without shakes or extreme dieting
For years you’ve probably tried diet after diet, eat less, exercise more, count carbs, drink shakes and yet no matter what you do the scales just keep creeping up.
Ironically, most people come to
me for weight loss who already eat healthy and exercise, yet they struggle for
years to maintain a healthy body weight.
Statistics show a dramatic increase in rates of type 2 diabetes, yet we are investing in weight loss more than ever before. This means, we need to get to the biological causes of why our cells are becoming insulin resistant and develop new late life-interventions to slow the process down (4,7,9).
If you are gaining lots of weight or can’t lose weight even with significant changes in diet or exercise routines, fat loss resistance triggered by microbiome may be the culprit
Passionate about helping people
maintain a healthy body weight, I developed MassAttack 20 years ago to
determine the biomarkers of what causes weight gain and provide 100% natural
strategies to stop, reverse and prevent
insulin resistance.
After 20 years of researching, the results are better than what I hoped and everyone who wants to maintain a healthy body weight needs to know this information!
The Facts on Flora
Our guts contain around 100 trillion microbes, collectively known as the gut microbiota. No two people’s microbiomes look exactly the same, and they are a product of what we inherit from our mothers during birth, our diets, environment and lifestyle.
In a pilot study, 26 participants went on a lower-calorie diet high in fruit and vegetables, and some didn’t lose as much weight as others. Analysis of their gut bacteria found participants had different levels of two particular types of bacteria, and one, Dialister, that hindered weight loss.
Many factors can affect your ability to lose weight, including certain health conditions, your dieting and weight loss history, age-related changes and your mother’s diet during pregnancy.
What researchers also found was that some for some people, eating tomatoes can make them fat! This is because tomatoes are one food that spikes insulin levels quite a lot for some people and they need to control the amount they eat. What this means is, the key to long term weight maintenance is to know your microbiome DNA. This is why I’m so excited – these insulin spikes trigger other hormonal problems linked to weight gain it’s a compounded effect and no matter what you do to try to lose weight, your body will fight you all the way. The good news is, you have access to the technology to find out if this is you!
The 3 key steps to turn back the
scales are:
Remove the stimulating factors
Identify genetic causes
Inhibit biological changes
1. Remove stimulating factors
Accelerated weight gain in both
men and women is triggered by over120 hidden factors that are modifiable
– BUT the current structure for managing weight currently does not screen
for these!
Having just one hidden factor can increase body weight by a steady 5kg
per year and 1 in 5 people have at least one hidden factor.
This is why I developed the MassAttack
assessment screen – an affordable, accessible way to put the stops on hidden
factors accelerating biological weight gain.
2. Identify genetic causes
Getting assessed is the first
step to take. Knowing how to fix these problems is next and DNA testing
provides answers.
Perhaps you’ve
already had some genetic testing done through your specialist for genetic
mutations like MTHFR or thyroid conditions. What you are unlikely to have been
tested for is the interaction between your genes, your diet and how this
affects your biological metabolic age.
Microbiome health influences metabolic health in both men and women. It is also implicated in foetal development and impaired diversity is linked to autism spectrum disorder (16). For starters it influences over 30 genes involved in the uptake and metabolism of nutrients needed for the prevention of conditions linked to weight gain like PCOS, endometriosis and thyroid disorders (1). This includes the metabolism of vitamins A, C, D and B12 as well as folate, glutathione and coenzyme Q10 (5).
Other genes play a role in how rapidly your metabolism ages primarily due to their influence on conditions that influence energy conversion like inflammation, mitochondrial function, digestive problems, hormone related conditions and autoimmunity.
In addition,
exciting new microbiome DNA testing identifies the influence of
specific digestive flora on estrogen production, insulin regulation and thyroid
health – all key triggers for accelerated metabolic aging. This means,
depending on your microbiome balance, taking an
over the counter probiotic or eating more fermented foods could potentially be
making things worse.
It also means, whatever you do to improve your metabolism, including dietary choices, taking vitamins or managing your health, can become more effective if you match it to your DNA.
DNA testing is an exciting NEW strategy for rapidly reversing the rate
of metabolic decline. Tailoring your diet to your DNA can literally shed around
5 kg per year without trying.
3. Inhibit cellular changes
damaging your metabolism
Finally, (this is new information
that can make a big difference to conceiving) an amazing researcher at
Princeton University – Coleen Murphy discovered cathepsin B proteases
increase metabolic aging.
The super
exciting part is, advances in genomic herbal therapeutics means you can inhibit,
reverse and slow this process.
If you have been trying to lose
weight, it’s time to take a new approach. My 3 new and exciting discoveries
means you can not only slow metabolic aging but turn back time! It’s
exciting. It’s new. People struggling to lose weight should know this!
Remember, the approaches
currently promoted to people are eat less, exercise more and decrease carbohydrate
intake. It’s far too simplistic and collectively we need to stop thinking this
way. Simply waiting for it to happen naturally, following a healthy lifestyle
or taking over the counter herbs or vitamins is in some cases helpful, but only
skimming the surface and in some cases potentially making things worse.
This approach to improving metabolic outcomes is an absolute game changer. It’s a 100% natural way to stop, reverse and restore the effects of accelerated metabolic aging and if you apply these steps you really can change your path to maintaining a healthy body weight. It’s time to start believing it really is your time to be slim!
Narelle Stegehuis MHSc HM.
Narelle Stegehuis is a leading natural health provider. Helping people be healthy for over 20 years, Narelle is passionate about natural accelerated age reversal and environmental metabolic health. Narelle provides specialised content for Torrens University and media publications such as New Idea, Woman’s Day and Women’s Fitness magazines. Narelle strives to create community awareness and affordable programs for the management of complex health disorders.
Lee CJ, Sears CL, Maruthur N. Ann N Y Gut microbiome and its role in obesity and insulin resistance. Acad Sci. 2019 May 14. doi: 10.1111/nyas.14107. [Epub ahead of print] Review.
Jin Y, Wu S, Zeng Z, Fu Z. Effects of environmental pollutants on gut microbiota. Environ Pollut. 2017 Mar;222:1-9. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2016.11.045. Epub 2017 Jan 11. Review.
