Does it feel as if you're fighting your body to lose even one pound - or just to maintain your current weight? Respected health and wellness expert and bestselling author Jillian Michaels has been there, too. So she consulted top experts in the field of metabolism and discovered that she'd inadvertently been abusing her endocrine system for years. After "fixing" her own metabolism, she decided to share what she learned by devising this simple, 3-phase plan that engages all the weight-loss hormones (including the friendly HGH, testosterone, DHEA; and the not-so-friendly: insulin, cortisol, and excess estrogen).

In Master Your Metabolism, discover how to:

• REMOVE "anti-nutrients" from your diet

• RESTORE foods that speak directly to fat-burning genes

• REBALANCE energy and your hormones for effortless weight loss

Michaels offers a wealth of information throughout, including: shopping lists and online shopping resources, hormone-trigger food charts, how to eat "power nutrient" foods on a budget, smart strategies for eating out, quick and easy recipes, as well as mini-programs for addressing PMS, andropause, metabolic syndrome, PCOS, and menopause.

I could have called this book The Evolution of a Health and Fitness Guru. Why? Because after seventeen years of work in I the fitness field - seventeen years of studying with the world's top doctors in sports medicine, nutrition, endocrinology, and antiaging - this is everything I've learned. Yes, this is what it has all been leading up to: Master Your Metabolism, my total approach to optimal weight and optimal health.

This book is the distillation of my entire journey in health, from childhood binge eater to weight-loss guru. I've been at this for almost two decades, but what I've learned in the past few years completely changed my body and my life.

My first book, Winning by Losing, centered on the psychological and behavioral aspects of losing weight. In that book, I focused on how to get yourself into a frame of mind so you'd be ready to lose weight. (If you're just getting started with an exercise program, and want an approachable plan, you might want to check it out, too.)

My second book, Making the Cut, was my ode to fitness. It is a physical fitness regimen designed to get rid of those last ten pounds - the hard way! It is ruthless, but very effective (insert evil laugh here). It gets you shredded, blasts the problem areas, like muffin tops and saddlebags, and helps you prep for that big event or party where you want to look your best. (If you have only a few pounds to lose and want to get lit fast, its thirty-day plan will work for you.)

This book however, has nothing to do with exercise.

Surprised?

I know, that's not what you expect to hear from me. I've gone on and on in the past about the benefits of exercise. And you and everyone else know it's good for you. So that's not the purpose of this book.

And it's not a calorie-counting book cither.

I know what you're thinking: that after being such a tyrant about exercise and watching calories, I've finally gone soft, right? Wrong!

Master your Metabolism is, first and foremost, a diet book. My very first diet book. And let me tell you - if you practice what I'm preaching here, it will change your life, in more ways than just being skinny. I'm talking about adding years of quality to your life.

We all know that fad diets are a thing of the past, and that the no-carb, no-fat crazes of the eighties and nineties are scientific laughingstocks and pop-culture dinosaurs. Welcome to the future - this is the era of genome mapping, stem-cell research, and nutrigenomics (the study of how food communicates with our genes). Yes, calorie counting and exercise are very important, but they are not the whole story. Underneath the dieting and workout programs are the little messengers that carry information from your body to your brain and vice versa. These "little messengers" are your hormones.

What do hormones have to do with anything? Let me explain. If I were to ask you what your metabolism is, what would you say? I bet you would answer, "The way my body burns calories."

If so, you would be wrong. That's one of the key things your metabolism does. But do you know what it is?

The answer is hormones! Your metabolism is your biochemistry.

Some hormones tell you you're hungry, some tell you you're full. When you eat, hormones tell your body what to do with that food, whether to store it or burn it as fuel. And when you exercise, hormones tell the body how to move and consume energy stores, and how to boost or shut down different parts of the body. Hormones control almost every aspect of how we gain weight - and how we can lose it.

© 2009 by Jillian Michaels.

Tags: Diets and Weight Loss, Hormones

About the Author

Jillian Michaels is best known as a strength trainer and life coach for NBC's hit series The Biggest Loser. The competitive weight-loss reality TV show is seen by nearly 8 million viewers every week. Her passion for fitness training originates from 17 years of martial arts practice in Muay Thai and Akarui-Do, in which she holds a black belt. Since 1993 Jillian has held two personal training certificates from the leading certification programs in the country, the National Endurance and Strength Training Association (NESTA) and the American Fitness Association of America (AFAA). Visit her online at www.jillianmichaels.com.

About the Author

Mariska Aalst, best known as a strength trainer and life coach for the NBC hit series The Biggest Loser, is the author of the bestselling Making the Cut and Winning by Losing.