Pain, Fatigue, and Weight Gain: The Hidden Root Cause 

February 23, 2026

Pain, fatigue, and weight gain often feel like three separate problems. 

One affects your joints. One drains your energy. One shows up on the scale. 

Naturally, you treat them separately. You take anti-inflammatories for the pain, chug coffee for fatigue, and try endless diets for the weight gain.  

But what if all three symptoms aren’t separate? What if they share a common root cause? 

At Hotze Health & Wellness Center, we see this pattern every day. Guests (we call our patients guests) come in frustrated because no one has connected the dots. Their labs are labeled normal. They are told they just need to eat less and move more. Something inside (that “gut feeling”) tells them there has to be more to the story, and there often is.  

If you zoom out, understanding that the body works as a system, the picture becomes much clearer.  

One Root Cause, Many Symptoms 

Your body is not a collection of isolated parts. It is an interconnected network. 

• Inflammation affects hormones. 
• Hormones affect metabolism. 
• Metabolism affects energy. 
• Energy affects movement. 
• Movement affects weight. 

When one system goes off track, the ripple effect begins and spreads everywhere. 

The most common shared drivers behind pain, fatigue, and weight gain include: 

• Chronic inflammation 
• Insulin resistance 
• Thyroid dysfunction 
• Sex hormone imbalance 
• Cortisol dysregulation 

Different symptoms. Same pathways. 

Inflammation: The Silent Amplifier 

Inflammation is not always dramatic. It does not always show up as redness or swelling. Often, it is quiet and persistent. 

Low-grade inflammation can: 

• Trigger joint and muscle pain 
• Slow metabolism 
• Disrupt hormone signaling 
• Interfere with thyroid function 
• Increase fatigue 

Inflammatory markers such as CRP and interleukin-6 have been linked in research to both metabolic dysfunction and chronic pain states.¹ 

When inflammation rises, energy drops. Your body shifts from repair mode into survival mode. 

And when the body feels threatened, it holds on to fat. 

Insulin Resistance: The Metabolic Roadblock 

Insulin is the hormone that moves sugar from your bloodstream into your cells so it can be used for energy. When cells stop responding well to insulin, the pancreas produces more of it. This is called insulin resistance. 

Elevated insulin levels do more than affect blood sugar. They: 

• Promote fat storage, especially around the abdomen 
• Increase inflammatory signaling 
• Create energy crashes after meals 
• Make weight loss feel resistant 
• Influence pain sensitivity 

High insulin also interferes with proper thyroid hormone conversion and sex hormone balance.² 

If you feel tired, inflamed, and unable to lose weight despite your efforts, insulin resistance may be part of the hidden root cause. 

Thyroid Function: The Energy Regulator 

Your thyroid gland regulates metabolic rate. It influences nearly every cell in your body. 

When thyroid hormone activity is suboptimal, even if TSH looks “normal,” you may experience: 

• Weight gain or difficulty losing weight 
• Fatigue 
• Brain fog 
• Constipation 
• Muscle and joint pain 
• Hair thinning 
• Cold sensitivity 

Thyroid hormone affects mitochondrial function.³ Mitochondria are the energy factories inside your cells. When they slow down, everything slows down. 

When cellular energy production slows, fatigue increases. Metabolism slows. Inflammatory markers may rise. 

Pain, fatigue, and weight gain can begin to stack on top of each other. 

Hormone Imbalance: More Than Mood Swings 

Hormone imbalance is often known for hot flashes and mood swings. It often wreaks much more havoc than those two symptoms.  

Estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone affect far more than reproductive health. 

They influence: 

• Body composition 
• Inflammation levels 
• Insulin sensitivity 
• Pain perception 
• Energy regulation 

For women, declining progesterone in perimenopause can affect sleep, mood, and cortisol regulation. For men and women, lower testosterone can shift body composition toward increased fat mass and reduced muscle mass.⁴ 

Both shifts can increase fatigue and worsen joint discomfort. 

Again, one root cause. Multiple outcomes. 

Cortisol Patterns: Stress and Metabolic Strain 

Cortisol is often misunderstood as just the “stress hormone.” In reality, it helps regulate blood sugar, inflammation, and energy rhythms. 

When cortisol is chronically elevated due to stress, poor sleep, or trauma, it can: 

• Increase abdominal fat 
• Worsen insulin resistance 
• Raise inflammatory markers 
• Disrupt thyroid signaling 
• Fragment sleep 

Over time, cortisol patterns can flatten or become erratic, leaving you feeling wired at night and exhausted during the day. 

That pattern fuels both fatigue and weight gain, while amplifying pain sensitivity.⁵ 

Why No One Has Connected the Dots 

Conventional medicine often treats symptoms in isolation. 

Pain? Anti-inflammatory. 
Weight gain? Diet advice. 
Fatigue? Antidepressant or stimulant. 

The body doesn’t operate in compartments. It is a complex, intertwined system. 

When inflammation, insulin resistance, thyroid function, cortisol, and hormone balance are evaluated together, patterns often emerge. 

At Hotze Health & Wellness Center, we approach symptoms differently. We do not look at individual symptoms; we treat the entire body. We gather your full medical history. We listen to your clinical symptoms and evaluate comprehensive bloodwork that we administer in our office, digging deep to get to the root cause of your fatigue, weight gain, and pain.  

When you look at the whole system, patterns emerge. 

How We Identify the Hidden Root Cause 

You cannot fix what you do not measure. 

That is why a comprehensive evaluation matters. It may include: 

• Fasting insulin and glucose 
• Hemoglobin A1c 
• High-sensitivity CRP 
• Full thyroid panel 
• Sex hormone levels 
• Cortisol assessment 
• Listening to your clinical symptoms 

This is not about chasing numbers. It is about understanding how your body is functioning as a system. 

Many guests are surprised to learn that their “normal” labs are not necessarily optimal. 

Normal does not always mean thriving. What most people do not realize is that lab results are based on a “range” of how people in your age group are feeling. Particularly as we get older, this becomes an issue. It is well known that hormones begin to decline as early as 30 years old.  Well, if you are 40 or 50 and your blood work results are “normal” because they are in a range of every other 40- or 50-year-old, what do you think the “normal” results are going to feel like? Fatigue? Low energy? Low drive? Not yourself? Why should anyone accept this when there is, in most cases, a simple answer? Replenish what is missing! 

What to Do Next 

If you are living with pain, fatigue, mood swings, weight gain, and more, do not assume they are separate problems. Start asking whether they share a hidden root cause. 

Nutrition, sleep, and movement matter. However, they are far more effective when aligned with your physiology. 

A comprehensive plan may include: 

• Targeted nutrition to improve insulin sensitivity 
• Anti-inflammatory dietary strategies 
• Thyroid optimization 
• Bioidentical hormone balancing, when indicated 
• Stress regulation support 
• Strategic supplementation 

The goal is not to mask symptoms, which occurs far too often in conventional medicine. An individual symptom is discussed with your provider, and a pharmaceutical drug is prescribed. Your body is not lacking pharmaceutical drugs; your body is lacking something it makes. Think about nutrients, hormones, muscle mass, and more as the possible answer, not a pharmaceutical drug that will mask an isolated symptom and not get to the root cause. The goal is to restore balance within the system. 

When we can get to the root cause of the issue, and replenish what is missing or needed in your body, then: 

Energy increases. 
Pain decreases. 
Weight becomes more responsive. 

That is not luck. It is physiology working the way it was designed to work. 

You Are Not Failing. Your Body Is Signaling. 

If you feel like your body is fighting you, it probably is. 

But your body is not your enemy. It is responding to internal signals. 

Pain, fatigue, and weight gain are messages. They are clues. At Hotze Health & Wellness Center, we have spent 36 years helping our guests to uncover the root cause of their symptoms. We help our guests with the prevention of illness and treatment of illness, with an alternative and integrative approach. 

If you are wondering whether your symptoms are connected, start with our online Symptom Checker. Click HERE to schedule your free phone consultation with one of our Wellness Consultants. It is a pressure-free conversation where you can ask questions, share your concerns, and discover whether our natural, root-cause approach is the right fit for you. It would be our privilege to serve you. 

References 

1. Calder, Philip C., et al. “Inflammation and Chronic Disease.” Nature Medicine, vol. 23, 2017, pp. 291–301. 
2. Reaven, Gerald M. “Insulin Resistance and Its Consequences.” Diabetes Care, vol. 31, suppl. 2, 2008. 
3. Mullur, Ramkumar, et al. “Thyroid Hormone Regulation of Metabolism.” Physiological Reviews, vol. 94, no. 2, 2014. 
4. Kelly, Daniel M., and T. Hugh Jones. “Testosterone and Obesity.” Obesity Reviews, vol. 16, 2015. 
5. Charmandari, Evangelia, et al. “Endocrinology of the Stress Response.” Annual Review of Physiology, vol. 67, 2005. 

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