Too Many Prescription Pills Are Sometimes Prescribed for Weight Loss

Overmedication is a continuing problem for people trying to manage weight loss or dieting. Sometimes there are just too many prescripton bottles lined up on a window sill, when the real reason you're gaining weight could be related to a deficiency of vitamin D or some other nutrient.

People dieting may find that their gums are shrinking. If it's not caused by early gum disease from over-dieting, it also could be because of over-abuse of the gums by a harsh brush, manual or electric, by too forceful jets of water from various types of teeth cleaning machines the person uses daily at home, or other reasons.

Instead of prescribing drugs that cause other side effects, it could be a nutritional problem or the need for something as easy as diluted grapefruit seed extract or COQ10 on the gums. Dieters don't want to hear that they're experiencing physical disintegration when having a problem losing weight because of a slow metabolism.

They want to know whether they have any specific deficiencies in minerals, vitamins, or nutrients that are not being absorbed, perhaps, because of a lack of digestive juices and whether certain digestive enzymes might help more than another bottle of pills lined up on the bathroom window sill.

How is diet related to osteoporosis? Are you getting too much protein? Do you have thin blood, suitable for a high-protein diet? Or is your bone loss being caused by too much protein or heavy consumption of protein powders?

Osteoporosis also can be the result of taking steroids for years for another condition. When you have a situation of overmedication when dieting, sometimes one group of pills causes problems, and then more pills are prescribed for the symptoms resulting from side effects of another medication.

Have you been examined by a weight management specialist? Is the person also trained in nutrition or naturopathy as well as functional, integrated, or internal medicine? Is the doctor trained in preventive medicine or personalized medicine? Or is conventional drugs the only topic your doctor can talk about with you or prescribe for your weight loss (or gain) needs?

It's one thing to get a medical exam to rule out regurgitating valves or other organic problems that can't be fixed with nutrients, vitamins, or minerals and requires intervention. It's another issue to have symptoms created by overmedication when the real problem may be due to an imbalance in nutrition or a vitamin deficiency. One example might be, when your body stops making enough COQ10, are you taking the type of CO10 that's absorbed by older people?

Find out what is causing your weight gain. Is it a tumor on your thyroid or that you're eating large portions of carbohydrates or processed meats when you should be eating more fish or at least meats not processed? Processed meats are lunch meats usually found in delicatessens that have been treated or processed. It's not a fresh steak or a slice of turkey breast that's not already salted and processed as a luncheon meat.

On one hand, you don't want to take every nutraceutical advertised to help you lose weight with various hormones. How do you know whether hormones will work with your body type? For example, you don't want to wolf down solutions of silver that end up wedged between your cells because the molecules were too large to be effective.

On the other hand, you don't want to overmedicate with so many pills that have unfavorable interactions. How do you know whether your weight-loss-related osteporosis is caused by taking steroids for another condition such as joint pain or certain types of arthritis, or whether you are deficient in a vitamin or need vitamin D3 or vitamin K2-MK7?

As you diet, watch for an increase in falls. Check out the study. Or read a May 18, 2010 news article in plain language about the study by Thomas H. Maugh II, published in the Sacramento Bee, "Study: Aging vessels change blood flow, leading to more falls."

Dieters that aren't balancing their portions of proteins to carbs increase the chance that their bodies will be out of balance. The first step in dieting is the find out the cause of your weight problem. When you tailor what you eat and your exercise or walking routine to your body shape and metabolism, you can find out what to target in your weight loss routine.

People with different body types and even blood types need to tailor their foods and activities to the needs of their genetic expression, starting with their metabolism. It's all about how the chemistry of your body reacts to food and activities such as walking or excercise. Tailor your weight management technique to your body's chemistry, shape, and responses. An excellent book is the Genotype Diet to get you started in individualizing and customizing your food and exercise plan to your body's shape and circulatory needs for specific types of nutrition.