Many patients ask me why it is so difficult to control their weight or maintain a normal blood sugar. Many find it is much more difficult than it used to be. As a society, we know that much of this is due to increased caloric intake along with a sedentary lifestyle. But it is not always as simple as calories in-calories out. There is something else going on which is affecting metabolism and contributing to these medical conditions.

When most of us think about diabetes, we instantly think about sugar and foods that contain sugar as being the source or culprit of the condition. When we think about obesity, we think about too many calories and too little exercise. However, new research believes that exposure to certain chemicals, called endocrine-disrupting compounds (EDCs), could also contribute to the prevalence of not only diabetes, but also obesity — both of which are often linked together.