Weight loss is often a part of our care plans here at Olive Branch Wellness Center. Of course, it depends on the person, but excess weight is often a part of why our patients don’t feel as well as they could.
Naturopathy seeks to unlock your body’s natural, innate power to be fit and well. It’s about taking a systematic, gentle, personalized approach with the goal of empowering you to attain the highest level of vitality possible. If weight loss is part of that for you, this article should help you understand how we would approach it. Here are the topics we’ll go over:
- What are the most effective weight loss techniques?
- Naturopathy and the therapeutic order
- Why are you having trouble managing weight?
- Dietary changes that might help
- What to expect at a naturopath’s office
- Lifestyle changes and naturopathic weight loss techniques
Thank you for reading! Please remember that you can also call 630-370-7290 at any time to set up an appointment.
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What Are the Most Effective Weight Loss Techniques?
Everyone seems to always be looking for a weight miracle. However, if you’ve tried a few fad diets, then you know about things that seem too good to be true — they often are. There’s really no easy way to lose weight and keep it off, but the process can feel natural and even fun.
As naturopaths, we believe in caring for the whole person — and everyone is different. That means that our most effective weight loss techniques are the ones that fit exactly with each person’s life. A person with joint problems might have trouble with some exercise plans, for example. Someone suffering from depression might not be able to stick to a meal preparation schedule.
In other words, sometimes people have barriers to weight loss that go beyond just diet, lifestyle, and exercise. We take this into account when developing our recommendations.
Naturopathy and the Therapeutic Order
Naturopathy is different from conventional medicine, so you won’t find us recommending synthetic medicines or invasive surgeries. Instead, we focus on gentle, natural, sustainable wellness that comes from your body’s natural tendency to seek its own maximum level of vitality.
To guide this type of care, we follow something called the therapeutic order. It’s a set of priorities that starts with establishing a good foundation and works up to treating discomfort if necessary. Instead of working around your body and applying invasive or synthetic treatments, we try to work with it naturally to get you where you need to be with your weight loss plans.
Why Are You Having Trouble Managing Weight?
Too much weight is like many challenges to wellness: it often doesn’t stand alone. Rather than simply trying to reduce the symptom, naturopaths seek to understand and remove the root cause of the problem.
Rather than get bogged down in what works for most people, we try to figure out what will work for your specific situation. To do this, we need to know why you’re putting on weight in the first place — or why you’re having trouble keeping it off. There are many possible reasons:
- Physical injuries or illnesses
- The body’s natural aging processes
- Mental wellbeing
- Diet
- Activity levels and exercise
- Work behaviors
Sometimes, you don’t even realize what’s holding you back from attaining a level of weight that will let you feel a higher level of vitality. That’s why we look at everything from a holistic, personalized perspective before we suggest any type of care or plan.
Dietary Changes That Might Help
Diet is nobody’s favorite word when it comes to weight loss, but it’s really just a general term for what you eat. Diets don’t always have to be overly restrictive, bland, or even significantly cut back for them to help you lose weight. They can be fun, sumptuous, and satisfying.
As naturopaths, we might recommend some foods that you haven’t tried before. We might suggest different approaches to snacking, mealtime, and other food behavior. The goal isn’t to starve you with fads or deny you the foods you love — it’s to help you develop a diet that leads to a sustainable level of wellness and vitality at a weight you can live with.
Lifestyle Changes and Naturopathic Weight Loss Techniques
Along with dietary planning, lifestyle and exercise recommendations are also often parts of naturopathic weight loss care plans. Again, this is something people often balk at.
If you hate exercising, you’re not alone. Many people associate it with gyms, jogging, or other types of sporty pastimes. Not everybody’s interested in those things, and some people don’t feel empowered to do them. Believe it or not, there are plenty of ways to get active in a productive, constructive way that doesn’t involve anything stereotypically athletic.
One of our jobs as naturopaths is to understand you as a whole person. That means we really listen to the types of things you like to do. This helps us uncover opportunities for small changes you can make in your current lifestyle to introduce more physical activity.
These small changes would still take work — but they would be customized to fit into your life. As you put them into action, they should help build towards your overall weight loss goals.
What To Expect at a Naturopath’s Office
Personalized consultation and planning are core parts of naturopathic care. That means your first visit might be a little disarming. The big difference you’ll notice is that we will actually listen to what you’re saying.
That first conversation will take time, usually about an hour. Most people say the time flies by, and your next appointments should be quicker. By that time, we’ve already gotten to know each other — we’re simply keeping up with your progress and making new recommendations as necessary.
Scheduling Your Visit
Olive Branch Wellness Center in South Elgin serves St. Charles, Bartlett, Geneva, and all of the surrounding communities. Please give us a call at 630-370-7290 to schedule your weight loss consultation today.
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