Similarly to most of our ageing population, you probably want to lose body fat. It seems to me that this concept has been over-dramatised and over-complicated within the past 50 years, shown through the addition of more pharmaceutical companies, food industries and leisure activities, alongside our ever-enlarging waists. Either it is a weird coincidence, or our lifestyle is making us sicker, which, in my opinion, is way more likely.

So, this made me think, that if the over-complication of thermodynamical law has caused adipose tissue to become our number one issue, then we need to go back to basics.

Put in its most simple, non-biochemical formation, adding fat cells to your body comes from excess energy, not from carbohydrates, or fat specifically. Whilst it may be easier to store fatty acids directly into fat cells, excess glucose (carbs) and dietary protein are only a few steps away from being stored in the same area. This means that the law of thermodynamics is king. If you want to stop storing excess energy in your body, then you need to stop having excess energy.

Now, whilst this is a complete oversimplification of thousands of biochemical research papers, this individual rule is the easiest to remember, and simplest to understand. If you want to gather a further understanding, reading into the amino acid breakdown, triglyceride formation and gluconeogenesis is a great starting point.

However, for the purpose of this article, I want to explain my thinking behind the law of thermodynamics. Essentially, the energy content in food (measured in calories) is converted during digestion into a usable energy source. There are three types of energy sources, protein, fat and carbohydrates. Protein, mostly used for muscle mass regeneration and organ function, serves as our builder. Fats, which offer more than double the energy per gram, are needed to absorb vitamins, and to provide long-term energy, which serve as our storehouse. Finally, we have carbohydrates, the most abundant source of quick neurological and muscular energy, serving as our jack-of-all-trades efficiency queen. These three separate nutrients, whilst having many non-molecular similarities, have different intentions, all of which provide the means to become metabolically healthy.

This is where some people may disagree with me. Most of us want to lose body fat and get “healthy” by dropping our calories. As I have mentioned, this follows the first law and sounds like the correct scenario to put yourself in. But what if we could lose body fat without decreasing our calories exponentially, by just increasing the heat production from our body? As you may assume, this sounds preposterous. The idea of increasing your metabolism doesn’t make sense, because we are typically convinced that we have a “slow” one and that’s aided the fat gain.

Essentially, our metabolism is governed by our thyroid gland, which acts as the central regulator of our body’s energy mechanism. This gland produces two primary hormones: triiodothyronine (T3) and thyroxine (T4). Put simply, T4 is the precursor to T3 and T3 influences how cells use energy. Someone’s cells without any T3 (hypothyroidism) would still use energy, but they would shift towards glycolysis instead of oxidative phosphorylation. Within this energy system, our body would produce 2 ATP molecules per glucose instead of 35, causing a 96% reduction in its efficiency. In other words, our body would have the calories, but be unable to turn them into energy effectively, leading to more hunger hormones to be produced, and a higher likelihood of overeating, and therefore, no fat mass reduction.

So, there are simple switches you can do to improve your thyroid’s function, which in doing so, contributes to a metabolic increase. For example, swapping out all unsaturated fats for saturated would do your thyroid wonders. Specifically speaking, when we consume unsaturated fats, especially in the PUFA form, there is a deep interference with the thyroid hormone secretion. Due to unsaturated fat’s ability to inhibit iodine enzymes, the thyroid cannot properly produce T3 and T4. Without these hormones, there is a shift away from efficient oxidative metabolism towards glycolysis, a far less efficient process that produces lactic acid instead of ATP. On the other hand, saturated fats enhance the thyroid’s ability to utilise iodine, which keeps its hormone production stable, and metabolic rate high.

Some examples of high saturated fat foods, that I consume daily, are coconut oil, minced beef, beef tallow, and butter, all of which also contain a huge vitamin and mineral profile.

Another way to increase metabolism, and inadvertently increase caloric expenditure, is to reduce oestrogen levels. As a result of our current environmental situation, we are all, in my opinion, infected with excessive oestrogen, which is one of the reasons we have become extremely unhealthy. Oestrogen increases the production of thyroid-binding globulin in the liver, and TBG binds to thyroid hormones in the blood, making them unavailable for the body’s cells. Thus, mimicking the symptoms of hypothyroidism, leading to incorrect diagnoses across the medical world. So, some ways to counteract this phenomenon is to limit phytoestrogen intake, like soy, flaxseeds, legumes and ultra-processed foods due to their oestrogen-mimicking capabilities. Also, reducing the usage of fast fashion and other plastic-containing … due to them containing PFAS and other oestrogen-dominated structures.

In addition, we have the theory behind cellular oxidation and the damage that oxidative stress has on our mitochondrial function. To produce T3 and T4, our thyroid gland uses several oxidative processes. However, during the synthesis of these hormones, an imbalance of free radical production and the body’s ability to counteract them can occur. Put simply, during our ATP production, electrons move through their transport chain. But, for reasons we don’t fully understand, some electrons “leak” from this chain, interacting with molecular oxygen to form different ROS species. Such enzymes are necessary for cellular signalling and immune defence, but in high moderation, cause DNA damage, lipid peroxidation, and enzyme inhibition.

So, we need to ensure that during our ATP production, we don’t end up skewing our ROS numbers and damaging our thyroid gland’s ability to regulate metabolism. As a result, this is where antioxidants come into play. These enzymes convert ROS species into hydrogen peroxide, where it can be broken down into water and oxygen. To make life easier, we can look at something called the Ferric Reducing Ability of Plasma (FRAP) assay, which measures total antioxidant capacity in millimoles per 100 grams, and use this to determine the best foods to eat for our thyroid and ROS reductive health. Weirdly enough, most of the highest-list foods are seasonings, which make them easy to consume. For example, in the top 20 list, are oregano, rosemary, thyme, sage, mint, cinnamon, turmeric, parsley, basil and ginger. But, if you wanted foods, these would be walnuts, hazelnuts, blueberries, blackberries, dried dates, strawberries and raspberries.

Finally, certain supplements can help increase your thyroid hormone production. For example, tyrosine can help as this enzyme is the precursor to your thyroid hormones. Simply supplementing this enables your body to create more thyroid hormones, allowing a more readily available substance for your cells to uptake. This, on its own, can increase the rate at which your thyroid works, and therefore, the number of calories you expend. Also, progesterone cream has been found to have a similar effect due to its balancing effect on thyroid-inhibiting enzymes and hormones, such as oestrogen. As this hormone can modulate the immune system, it reduces thyroid-binding globulin, which can lead to more free thyroid hormones available in the bloodstream. However, when starting at-home hormone treatments, whether the source is naturally occurring or not, I would recommend hormonal blood tests to check whether you have a metabolic condition before use.

Unfortunately, sometimes it is not as simple as just increasing your metabolism through dietary methods. Of course, it may provide some benefit, but if there’s a possibility to completely reverse any issues, then all should jump at the opportunity.

There are many people with metabolic disorders and millions live without knowing so. For individuals such as this, usually, those who struggle to lose body fat, always feel tired and do not exercise enough, simple nutritional swaps are the first step to regaining control of your metabolism. However, increasing your thyroid activity through dietary means is not the only method. Alongside this, increasing expenditure correctly should be conducted if you mean to retake your metabolic health, specifically in the form of resistance training.

Many believe that immense cardio is the key to losing body fat as calories in vs calories out are king. However, high levels of cardiovascular training impair your thyroid’s ability to produce T3 and T4, therefore reducing your metabolic rate. In other words, high-intensity cardio will stunt your fat loss. Sounds crazy, I know. As we know, the basic principle of fat loss is that your body needs to burn more calories than you consume. We also know that high-intensity cardio can significantly increase calorie expenditure, aiding in this deficit. But, due to T3 and T4’s cruciality for regulating metabolism, and how excessive levels of exercise decrease thyroid hormone production, specifically in the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, we can conclude that there is no need for it.

Overall, the journey towards effective fat loss and metabolic health fundamentally revolves around the principles of thermodynamics, where energy balance dictates weight management. However, as we’ve explored, this principle is merely the entry point into a delicate system involving diet, hormonal balance, glandular function, and cellular health. Therefore, we might enhance our metabolic rate by focusing on dietary choices that bolster thyroid effectiveness, such as prioritising saturated fat and minimising oestrogen-mimicking foods.

Moreover, the role of oxidative stress and how we manage it through diet and potential supplementation is crucial in optimising our body’s energy use, especially concerning the “over-leaking” electron risk that our standard Western diets encourage. For this reason, it is vital that enable our thyroid to properly balance our metabolism through the effective creation of its hormones so we can steer away from a glycolysis-lead ship.

Ultimately, while the concept of increasing metabolism without drastically reducing calories may seem unconventional, the fact that we have the unhealthiest human population in the world, alongside most individuals reporting that they’d like to lose body fat, shows the need for a new wave of thinking. I propose to not ignore the law of thermodynamics, but instead, understand that the simplicity of calories in-calories out equation should not be encouraged, and instead be recognised as metabolically destructive (stay tuned for a future article on exactly this). Alternatively, individuals who want to lose body fat should be informed about how they can increase their metabolism through thyroid-enhancing dietary choices, effective resistance training, and understanding the negatives of our standard dietary choices.

In the end, this would lead us away from our current anti-metabolic diet, and into a pro-metabolic era.