Hormones are chemical messengers that quietly dictate everything from how well you sleep to how alert you feel, how easily you burn fat, and even how long you live. What you eat every day isn’t just fuel—it’s instruction.
For instance, you feel fine in the morning, but by 3 pm, you’re crashing. You’re not really hungry, but you’re reaching for a snack or another coffee to push through. Your brain says you need energy, but what you actually need is better instructions for your hormones.
As Dr. Peter Attia says, “You can’t supplement or out-exercise your way out of a bad diet.”
And increasingly, science is showing: you can’t out-hack your hormones, either.
But many of us may be accidentally sending our hormones the wrong instructions. According to the CDC, over 1 in 3 American adults are already insulin resistant — many without knowing it.
Meanwhile, rates of metabolic dysfunction, hormonal imbalances, and fertility struggles are rising sharply even in people who appear outwardly healthy.
As Dr. Robert Lustig, pediatric endocrinologist and author of Metabolical, puts it:
“It’s not about calories in, calories out. It’s about hormones. Fix the hormones, and the weight takes care of itself.”
Hormone-Food Feedback Loop
Think of your hormones like text messages from your brain and organs: fast, direct, and highly responsive. The food you eat is the keyboard. Every bite is a message you send.
Consider this situation: Emily is a busy professional in her 30s, works out regularly, has a normal BMI and tries to “eat clean.” But her day starts with coffee on an empty stomach, she grabs a protein bar for lunch between meetings, and finishes her day with late-night takeout after working late.
She struggles with energy crashes, mood swings, and creeping anxiety. Her doctor says her labs are “normal.” But her hormones tell a different story: erratic cortisol, early insulin resistance, and disrupted hunger signaling.
Emily’s eating habits are probably not too dissimilar from many of ours. In fact, today’s food landscape is actively working against your hormones:
- Over 70% of U.S. calories now come from foods that don’t fortify our bodies (BMJ Global Health, 2024).
- The average American eats 17 times per day if you count “micro-snacks” (NIH observational data).
- Stress, remote work patterns, and social media culture promote irregular eating windows.
As Dr. Rhonda Patrick notes: “We’ve never lived in a more hormone-hostile environment, where hyper-palatable foods and chronic stress are normalized. Diet may be our last controllable lever.
When you eat, your body launches a hormonal cascade. Insulin rises to shuttle glucose into cells. Leptin and ghrelin toggle your sense of fullness and hunger. Cortisol and dopamine modulate your energy and mood. Over time, the quality and timing of your meals shape how these signals behave—and whether they begin to misfire.
Dr. Andrew Huberman describes it like this:
“Food is one of the most powerful levers we have over our brain’s reward systems. When you eat processed sugar, you’re essentially pulling the dopamine slot machine — again and again.”
Hormone #1: Insulin as Gatekeeper of Energy
Produced by the pancreas, it responds to carbohydrates by clearing sugar from the blood and directing it to be stored or used for energy.
But here’s the catch: chronically high insulin — often the result of frequent snacking, sugary breakfasts, and late-night carbs — can lead to insulin resistance. This is when the body stops responding effectively to insulin.
This contributes to everything from weight gain and fatigue to prediabetes and Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome.
Insulin is like a delivery truck. If you keep sending too many packages to your cells too often, they stop answering the door. The boxes pile up, but in your bloodstream.
Peter Attia calls insulin resistance “the most underappreciated threat to long-term health,” noting that its effects ripple out into cardiovascular disease, cognitive decline, and even cancer risk.
Nutrition Strategy:
- Prioritize whole foods rich in fiber, protein, and healthy fats.
- Reduce meal frequency (avoid constant grazing).
- Time carbohydrates earlier in the day to support circadian rhythms.
- Eat only 24 grams for women and 36 for men of sugar a day.
Hormone #2: Leptin and Ghrelin as Satiety Detectors
Leptin tells your brain you’re full. Ghrelin tells it you’re hungry. Ideally, they operate like a thermostat. But processed foods—especially those loaded with sugar and refined carbs—can blunt leptin’s signals and keep ghrelin artificially elevated.
It’s like having a broken thermostat that keeps telling your house it’s freezing — even in summer. Your brain thinks you need more energy, so you keep eating.
Dr. David Ludwig of Harvard explains: “Highly processed carbohydrates hijack the body’s natural satiety systems, making it much harder to regulate intake—even at a healthy weight.” Huberman adds that poor sleep further disrupts ghrelin: “When you’re sleep-deprived, your brain literally tells you to eat more — and specifically craves sugar and highly palatable foods.”
Nutrition Strategy:
- Focus on protein-forward meals (~30g per meal).
- Eat real, unprocessed foods that naturally activate fullness signals.
- Avoid foods that don’t fortify your body, which can override these hormones.
Hormone #3: Cortisol as the Stress Trigger
Cortisol helps regulate blood sugar during stress.
But when stress is chronic — and combined with erratic eating patterns — cortisol becomes a hormonal arsonist, destabilizing energy, mood, and fat storage.
Huberman recommends anchoring cortisol by eating a protein-based breakfast within 30-60 minutes of waking.
He states that “early protein intake signals safety to the nervous system. It’s one of the most underrated ways to stabilize mood and focus throughout the day.”
Cortisol is like your home’s fire alarm. It’s essential in an emergency—but if it keeps going off, the system becomes desensitized, and damage builds up quietly.
Nutrition Strategy:
- Front-load protein early in the day.
- Limit caffeine on an empty stomach.
- Pair stress management (light exposure, breathwork) with consistent meals.
How Does Your Body Feel?
If you’re worried you might be negatively impacting your hormonal health via your diet, consider the below, and if you check two or more or these, your body might be sending you warning signals that your diet isn’t giving it clear instructions:
Do any of these sound familiar?
- You hit an energy wall most afternoons
- You crave sugar, salty snacks, or caffeine to “push through”
- You feel full but still hungry after meals
- You wake up wired, anxious, or not fully rested
- You feel foggy or irritable after carb-heavy meals
- Your weight feels harder to manage, even with effort
Why this Matters Now More Than Ever
Every bite you take sends a message. Is it one of clarity, balance, and support? Or one of chaos and confusion? Reframing meals not just as fuel—but as conversations with your hormones—can change the game. But before altering your diet, consult with your doctor as there may be other concerns that need to be addressed first.
Because as both Attia and Huberman would argue, no supplement, wearable, or ‘hack’ will outperform the basic, consistent signals you send your body every day.
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Good news for you, most people already consume more than double the recommended amount, typically 900-1000 milligrams daily as part of their regular diets. Some tryptophan-dense foods are cod, spirulina, nuts and seeds, and legumes.
Not sure how to tell the difference between a complex carb and a simple carb? Here’s a good trick: most whole, unprocessed foods contain complex carbs. Avoid processed foods and “white” foods, which are mostly comprised of simple carbs.
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In simple terms, it’s a diet rich in protein and low in carbohydrates. Meat and seafood, certainly, but also a lot of nuts, fruits, vegetables, and even eggs, I suppose.
But I also have incisors that do more than make me look like an adolescent or excessively-aged Dracula. They are there to tear and rip things like meat.
And don’t forget something else my body tells me. Diet and exercise go hand in hand. It’s remarkable how much better I feel when I’m physically active, and especially so when I have the discipline to combine intellect and physicality with appetite in reasonable balance. I bet our culinary caveman also spent a good deal of time running – either chasing down food or trying not to become food. There’s a valuable lesson there, I suspect.
As usual, the academic community quibbles over the exact percentage with the fervor of a religious zealot. But I’m prepared to accept the general principle that a caveman diet entails a good deal less meat than my insatiable youthful cravings for bacon cheeseburgers, wings, and corn dogs.
If my brain and the rest of my body all work together on this thing we call diet and health, we might just be on to something important here. In the absence of absolute truth, perhaps a reasonable approach might rest in simple moderation. If you can find the science or authority figure you need to give you complete certainty in any single dietary approach, then by all means go for it (and share it with us for that matter!). But until you find that certainty, balance what all parts of your body are telling you with simple moderation.
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When I look back at pictures of the 1960s, everyone looks thin and fit. Yet, as a society, we know more about health, wellness, and food than ever. We know that sugar is bad for us. We know to eat healthy fats with omega-3s and limit processed saturated fats, like sausage and bacon. We even have the FDA-mandated Nutrition Labeling and Education Act. 
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But I suppose that is neither here nor there. Take lemon water as an example. Infusing water with lemon raises the amount of Vitamin C and antioxidants – but only produces a very, very small change in its nutritional content.
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Fermented foods
Alternatively, chronic inflammation, or inflammation that lasts for too long like heart disease, and obesity, can be harmful. Cortisol works the same way! When the levels of your stress hormone do not regulate, and don’t decrease after a stressful event has occurred, they remain too high. And if this happens for too long, it can be damaging and stressful on the body.
