My name is Dr. Laura Ruby. I am an Endocrinology Nurse Practitioner with a clinical doctorate and a specialist interest in women with metabolic disorders. I live in Westminster, Maryland with my husband and 4 children, ages 8 – 21 years.
I have struggled with my weight my entire life. Over the past 35 years I have tried almost every “diet plan” on the market. Like many women I was always looking for that magic weight loss pill or food plan to lose that quick 10 – 20 lbs. There were times that I was successful but as soon as I would return to my “normal” way of eating, the weight would come back in a very short period of time.
Like many women I was always looking for that magic weight loss pill or food plan to lose that quick 10 – 20 lbs.
Over the years, it became a daily battle between the scale and my self esteem as I held myself to the unrealistic standard in our society that all women need to look like runway models or movie stars. Like many women from my generation I never learned the value of “believing in ourselves from the inside out” until much later in life.
As an endocrinology nurse practitioner I see women struggling with similar weight related issues on a daily basis. It is often assumed that if you are overweight you are constantly “pigging out” and you sit on the couch all day! Many women are progressively gaining weight despite the fact that they are not eating enough calories to maintain their current weight. In my personal & professional experience I have found that many of us are gaining weight because of insulin resistance, which is when our bodies make too much insulin in response to dietary, environmental and sometimes genetic factors. The more insulin resistant you are, the harder it is to lose weight and the easier to gain. I can’t tell you how many times I have either read or heard some nutritional expert say “it’s all about calories in versus calories out”. That not completely true for women who are insulin resistant. Insulin resistance reprograms our bodies to store fat in our belly and puts our metabolism into a “famine mode”.
The more insulin resistant you are, the harder it is to lose weight and the easier to gain.
So, having said all of that I have been looking at anything and everything to help women with insulin resistance return to their healthy weight. Clearly, long term lifestyle changes, including exercise and decreasing the simple sugars and processed foods in our diets are imperative. From a personal standpoint, it has taken aggressive lifestyle changes for me to slowly lose weight overtime, BUT if I get off track, even for a short time, I would gain everything back…..at least until I found Lifeplus.
I have been using Slenderlean with meals and Phase O’ Lean when I get a little off track with my carbs. What I love about the Slenderlean is that it also has all of the natural ingredients that may improve insulin resistance such as cinnamon, chromiun and dark cocoa extracts. The Phase O’Lean allows me to “be human” and occasionally enjoy some of the foods that I don’t typically eat on a daily basis without gaining the weight back. I have lost about 13 lbs over the past few months but more importantly, have not gained back anything over the past 3 – 4 weeks with vacation & traveling (typically i would have gained all of that back in that short of time). I also take the core products, Biobasics, Proanthenols & Omegold as I truly believe that most of us are not getting the proper nutrients, vitamins and minerals in our diet, which in turn negatively impacts our health status, energy level and ability to maintain a healthy weight. So please, share this with anyone that you think would benefit from this information.
Laura
