If I ever want the answer to any sort of Canadian/Scottish/Irish history question, she is the first person I would turn to.

Whenever I ask her why she likes history so much she would always say, “you have to know where you were to know where you are going”.

To me, this was just another one of those standard cliché’s that you hear all the time…like ‘you gotta spend money to make money’, or ‘no pain, no gain’.

Turns out when it comes to history – I was wrong, she was right..(of course once she reads this I will NEVER hear the end of it).

Just like in life, in order to move forward in science we need to know where we were in order to know where we are going. This is why science is in desperate need of a history lesson.

Science – especially weight loss science – needs to take a good hard a look at it’s history.

Science is constantly disregarding known scientific facts for newer and ‘sexier’ explanations.
In my opinion this is mostly the media’s fault but nevertheless, science is letting it happen.

Take this example…

I took some time over my vacation to really dig backwards through the scientific literature on weight loss. I made it my mission to find the research that isn’t available on-line – the kind of research that takes a lot of pleading and begging to get access from the kind librarian at the university.

My mission was accomplished when I walked out of the library with a collection of papers dating from the late 1800’s and early 1900’s.

After reviewing some very impressive work that I will be touching on in a new audio file, I came across some rather shocking research that was published in 1936.

Back in 1936 two researchers by the names of Best and Campbell suggested that a protein like substance secreted from the pituitary acts on the adipose tissue causing it to release stored fat.

While this doesn’t seem overly impressive, remember that growth hormone is a protein like substance that is synthesized, stored, and secreted by the anterior pituitary.

So more than 7o YEARS AGO we had a pretty good idea that growth hormone plays a very important role in fat burning.

Yet somewhere in those 70 years we disregarded the potent fat burning effect of GH and instead started examining things like leptin and grehlin for the answers to our fat burning questions.

So now 70 years later we are finally realizing (for the second time) that growth hormone may be the driving force behind fat loss.

Interestingly, the 3 main things that cause GH secretion are fasting, exercise and sleep.

Sound familiar?

By following the Eat Stop Eat lifestyle of flexible intermittent fasting, weight training and proper recovery we take advantage of GH’s ability to cause our body to burn fat when we are in a caloric deficit (remember – EATING LESS is still ESSENTIAL for fat loss).

Imagine where we would be today if back in the 30’s people had the foresight to build on the findings of Best and Campbell and start recommending flexible intermittent fasting and weight training as a way to prevent body fat gain…

Instead of the never-ending search for the sexiest scientific answer to weight loss, we simply focused on helping people apply what we know works…I wonder..would we even have an obesity epidemic today?

The moral of the story is stick with what works.

These days it seems like everybody is ignoring what we already know about weight loss and instead is pushing their own super complicated explanation on how you should eat.

Find a way to eat less that you find enjoyable and that you can do long term, and stick with it.

BP

In case it wasn’t obvious, abusing drugs can damage cells in the brain. The cool thing is that Growth Hormone has the ability to help new cells grow in that area (neurogenesis).

Now here is the interesting part, the area in the brain that opiates disrupt is in the hippocampus, which is tied to memory.

So an interesting hypothesis that doesn’t involve drug use would be that while you are young growth hormone keeps neurogenesis moving smoothly and thus your memory working smoothly. Once old age hits and GH levels drop, this leads to less neurogenesis and memory starts to decline.

So based on this hypothesis, GH could be related to age associated memory loss.

This theory seems to hold some weight too. Elderly patients treated with synthetic growth hormones have experienced improved memory.

My thought is this: Rather than immediately turning to injecting synthetic drugs, we could look to more natural ways of increasing Growth Hormone and thus preventing age associated memory loss.

Fasting for instance.

If you’ve read Eat Stop Eat then you know that even short periods of fasting can increase GH levels.

So yet another possible benefit of incorporating flexible intermittent fasting into your life may be improved memory.

Fasting – It’s not just for weight loss.

BP

Now I know what you are thinking…Brad couldn’t possibly be talking about growth hormone..the same hormone that Hollywood celeb’s (guys and girls) are rumoured to pay thousands of dollars for in an attempt to lose fat and stay young looking? The same GH that all the home run slugglin’ baseball players are getting caught using?

Yep, it’s that GH!

Now, before you get ready to turn me into the authorities, let me explain…

Anybody who has read Eat Stop Eat knows my opinion on the connection between fasting and growth hormone. And since I follow the Eat Stop Eat lifestyle, my GH levels are normally pretty high.

The interesting thing about GH is that many other fitness pros are abusing GH and they don’t even know it!

There is an important and often underestimated relationship between exercise and GH release. As little as ten minutes of intense exercise can have profound effects on increasing GH levels!

Hmmm, ten minutes of super intense exercise…sound familiar? Anyone who has ever done ten minutes of interval training knows just how intense this can be.

That’s right, turns out intervals and fasting share some similar benefits…they are both great fat loss tools and they both cause rapid increases in GH release.

So, why should you care?

Well, GH is being studied for a lot of cool things, like its ability to increase fat burning, to increase muscle mass and for its ability to make your skin look younger by improving its hydration. While this research is still ongoing, it is starting to show an interesting relationship between GH levels, body composition and aging.

So my advice is simple. Whether you are following the Eat Stop Eat lifestyle or not, try doing ten minutes of intense exercise every single day. I’d suggest getting it done right before your morning shower (It could be a bodyweight circuit of Y-squats, push-ups, lunges, stick-ups). This way, your GH will be elevated at some point during every day of the week.

Every little bit helps,

BP

Fasting and growth hormone