Why Fat Is the Most Misunderstood — and Most Critical — Macronutrient for Women
Paige Elizabeth
Founder and Coach
For decades, women have been sold a lie: eating fat makes you fat.
That lie hijacked female biology, tanked hormones, and created an entire generation of women running on fumes — over-caffeinated, underfed, and living in chronic survival mode.
The truth is the opposite. Fat is the single most essential macronutrient for women’s health and nervous system regulation.
It fuels the brain, stabilizes mood, anchors hormones, and — here’s the part no one tells you — teaches your body how to burn its own fat for fuel again.
When fat is low, your metabolism forgets how to access stored energy. When fat is sufficient, the body relaxes, hormones stabilize, and energy becomes consistent again.
The Fat-Phobic Lie That Broke Women’s Biology
In the 1990s, women were told to cut fat and eat more carbs in the name of “heart health.” Food companies replaced fat with sugar, starch, and chemicals — and women paid the price.
The results?
Skyrocketing anxiety
Blood sugar crashes
PMS, PCOS, infertility
Sleep disorders and burnout
We called it progress. It was actually mass hormonal collapse.
The female body is not built to thrive on deprivation.
When fat intake drops, progesterone, estrogen, and thyroid output follow. And without adequate hormonal support, every system — including your nervous system — begins to fray.
Fat Is Hormonal Architecture
Let’s strip it down to biochemistry:
Every hormone that keeps you balanced, fertile, and calm is made from cholesterol.
Cholesterol → Pregnenolone → Progesterone, Estrogen, Testosterone, Cortisol.
Starve the system of dietary fat, and you starve this entire hormonal pathway.
No progesterone = anxiety, sleeplessness, irritability, and irregular cycles.
Low estrogen = fatigue, dryness, poor mood, and loss of libido.
The body doesn’t “malfunction.” It adapts.
It starts prioritizing survival over fertility, burning muscle instead of fat, and creating the illusion of “aging” — when what’s really happening is malnourishment.
Fat and the Nervous System
Your brain is 60% fat. Every nerve in your body is sheathed in a fatty layer called myelin, which allows signals to travel calmly and cleanly. Without enough dietary fat, that insulation breaks down — like a wire sparking without a coating.
You feel that degradation as:
Emotional volatility
Sleep disruption
Overthinking
Hyper-reactivity to stress
Anxiety that feels unprovoked
You can’t breathe, meditate, or mindset your way out of a dysregulated system that’s underfed.
Your nervous system cannot relax if it doesn’t feel materially safe — and that safety starts with nourishment.
The Metabolic Reframe: Fat Teaches the Body to Burn Fat
Here’s what few women understand: the body’s ability to burn stored fat is dependent on dietary fat intake.
When you eat fat, you send a powerful message to your metabolism:
“We’re not in famine anymore. You can use fat for fuel safely.”
Low-fat diets signal scarcity. The body clings to stored fat, suppresses thyroid activity, and raises cortisol — because it believes famine is coming.
High-quality fat signals abundance. The body opens up, increases mitochondrial efficiency, and learns to partition stored fat for fuel.
That’s why so many women paradoxically get leaner when they eat more fat.
They’re not “tricking” their metabolism; they’re teaching it safety.
When the body trusts it will be fed, it stops hoarding.
Why Keto Works — Until It Doesn’t
Keto became popular because it reintroduced fat to a fat-starved world — but for many women, it created another extreme.
Long-term carb restriction becomes its own stressor, especially for women with active lifestyles, adrenal fatigue, or thyroid sensitivity.
Fat is the stabilizer. Carbs are the modulator.
Women need both to maintain hormonal rhythm.
When carbs are chronically too low, cortisol rises, thyroid conversion drops, and cycles can disappear.
The solution isn’t to swing between “low-fat” and “no-carb.”
It’s to eat in a way that teaches the body metabolic flexibility — the ability to switch between using fat and glucose without triggering a stress response.
How to Rebuild a Healthy Relationship with Fat
Let’s be clear: this isn’t permission to binge bacon and cheese.
It’s an invitation to reclaim fat as nourishment, not rebellion.
1. Ditch Industrial Oils
Seed oils (canola, soybean, corn, sunflower, safflower) oxidize easily and drive inflammation. They confuse your metabolism and damage your cell membranes.
2. Choose Ancestral Fats
Your body recognizes real food. Grass-fed butter, ghee, olive oil, avocado, tallow, lard, and pasture-raised eggs deliver the fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K that hormones depend on.
3. Eat Enough to Signal Safety
The difference between a woman who burns fat and one who stores it often comes down to caloric trust.
If you chronically under-eat, your body shifts into conservation. When you eat enough — especially fat — it relaxes, metabolically and emotionally.
4. Start the Day with Fat
Breakfast sets your cortisol rhythm.
A fat-inclusive meal stabilizes blood sugar, grounds your nervous system, and tells your adrenals, “We’re safe.”
Skipping it does the opposite — it tells your body to run on stress hormones until lunch.
Nervous System Healing Begins with Fat
Your nervous system is not separate from your metabolism — it is your metabolism.
If your brain and nerves are starving for fat, no amount of “self-care” will override the biological stress signal.
When women reintroduce real fat, they report:
Deep, unbroken sleep
A calmer mood baseline
Stable energy all day
Less anxiety and mental noise
Regular cycles and easier PMS
It’s not magic. It’s myelin. It’s hormone synthesis. It’s safety at the cellular level.
Healing Means Safety, Not Restriction
Fat doesn’t make you fat. Fear does.
Restriction does. Self-distrust does.
When you give your body what it needs, it stops fighting you.
When you feed yourself generously, your nervous system stops bracing for loss.
When you reintroduce fat, you reintroduce faith — in your own biology.
The Truth
Fat is not indulgent. It’s intelligent.
It’s what your hormones, brain, and nervous system have been begging for since you started starving them in the name of control.
Relearn to trust fat, and you relearn to trust yourself.
Because safety — metabolic, emotional, and spiritual — always begins with nourishment.
Ready to rebuild energy, hormones, and nervous system safety?
Join The Reset Program, my 90-day process for women ready to restore their metabolism, balance hormones, and rewire their nervous systems for calm, not chaos.