There Are No Shortcuts - The Schwarzbein Principle

Excerpted from
The Schwarzbein Principle II, The Transition: A Regeneration Program to Prevent and Reverse Accelerated Aging
By Diana Schwarzbein, M.D.

As stated in chapter 8, the path your transition takes will depend upon your initial starting point and how easy it is for you to incorporate the SPII program into your life. Remember that this program is a process, and you will not be able to heal a damaged metabolism overnight, nor will you be able to make all the necessary changes in your nutrition and lifestyle habits at once.

By educating yourself about what you can expect, you should be able to keep yourself on your journey to optimum health.

What to Expect: Insulin-Sensitive with Healthy Adrenal Glands

If you are starting with a good metabolism but have poor nutrition and lifestyle habits, you still have to go through a transition process. However, your transition will be much easier for you than for other metabolism types because you will not experience a healing phase. If you do not carry excess fat weight, you will go directly into your healed state after you improve your nutrition and lifestyle habits.

Since you do not have to feel worse before you feel better, it should be easier for you to make the necessary permanent changes in your habits to ensure you maintain a good metabolism and your ideal body composition.

A word of caution: If you are following the SPII program with a friend or loved one and you breeze through the transition, remember not to sabotage those people who are having a more difficult time. Just because you were able to change your habits immediately and lose fat weight easily, do not think that they are eating too much or eating the wrong things just because they are gaining fat weight.

Their transition will be different from yours because they are starting from a different initial starting point. Because they will be having a more difficult time than you did, be sure to encourage them. Do not discourage them-it may cause them to quit.

Summary: Insulin-Sensitive with Healthy Adrenal Glands

If you are insulin-sensitive with healthy adrenal glands, the following summarizes your initial starting point and what you may expect:

The Goal

You already have the best metabolism type. However, if you have poor nutrition and lifestyle habits, you may be in the process of damaging it.

The Ability to Regenerate

With this metabolism type you can still use up and rebuild your functional and structural biochemicals at the same rate.

Body Composition

You may or may not be overweight depending on your habits.

Weight Changes

You are already primed to lose fat weight by improving your habits.

Habits

If your nutrition and lifestyle habits cause your insulin levels to be higher than your adrenaline/Cortisol levels, you will gain weight. If your adrenal/cortisol levels are higher than your insulin levels, you will lose weight. If all three hormone levels are equally high or low, you will stay the same weight. None of these scenarios is healthy. You may have a healthy metabolism now, but if any one of the hormonal imbalances just mentioned continues over time, your metabolism will become damaged.

Symptoms

The fluctuations of your hormones in response to your poor habits may be causing a myriad of symptoms.

Transition Phases

You will not experience a healing phase because you do not have to heal your metabolism. As you begin following the SPII program, you will immediately enter the fat-burning phase or healed state, and all your symptoms will go away.

Transition Time

Your transition will take the least amount of time of any of the current metabolism types because you do not have to repair a damaged metabolism. You only have to change your habits to balance your hormones.

What to Expect: Insulin-Sensitive
with Burned-Out Adrenal Glands

Because you are starting with a damaged metabolism, you will have to go through a transition process. You will need to heal your adrenal glands and therefore will experience a healing phase. Since you can experience withdrawal symptoms from tapering off your high adrenaline and/or Cortisol habits, you may need to self-medicate. However, if you do not carry excess fat weight, you will go directly into your healed state after you have healed your metabolism. Since you probably will feel worse before you feel better, it will take time for you to make the necessary permanent changes to ensure that you heal your metabolism and achieve your ideal body composition. Do not get discouraged-this is the only way your body knows how to heal.