Weight Loss & Sleep – The Connection

Who would have thought that weight loss & sleep could be connected?  With so much to do and so little time to do it in, it can be easy to begin to see sleep as a forced pause between periods of productivity. But, if fitness is on your list of priorities, then it’s time to recognize your nightly slumber for the useful activity it is. As it turns out, not getting every one of those 40 winks may set the stage for overeating and weight gain.

In studies conducted at Stanford University and the University of Chicago, researchers found that lack of sleep altered the levels of hormones that influence appetite and satiety. Study subjects who were deprived of sleep experienced stronger appetites and a 45% increase in their cravings for calorie-heavy foods high in carbohydrates.

Weightloss & Sleep - Not Getting Enough Sleep May Lead To Weight Gain!

Weightloss & Sleep - Not Getting Enough Sleep May Lead To Weight Gain!

Researchers also found that subjects who reportedly got less than eight hours of sleep each night had higher levels of body fat than their more rested counterparts did. In fact, those who slept the least, tended to weigh the most.

The chemicals that seem to be involved in sleep’s connection to weight loss are called leptin and ghrelin. Ghrelin affects your appetite and leptin alters feelings of fullness and satiety. When you aren’t getting enough sleep, the balance of these two hormones is thrown and you can find yourself feeling hungrier than you normally would. As a double whammy, when you do eat, you don’t feel as satisfied or as full and you are more likely to overeat.

Sometimes people who are trying to lose weight find that they are faced with increased feelings of hunger when they first begin altering their eating habits (a problem we will look at in my next post). How much more difficult would it be to keep your mind off food (and out of the sugary snack cupboard) or to stay on track with your brand new habits if you were compounding that with increased cravings due to lack of sleep? And who can drag themselves through their workout when they don’t feel they have enough energy to get through their day as it is?

So how much sleep do you need? For most, seven to nine hours of sleep is enough, but the best way to find out exactly how much you need is to continue going to bed earlier and earlier (5 to 10 minutes every two to three nights) until you regularly wake up 15 to 20 minutes before your alarm clock goes off. Because your body is used to its routine, you may find that you wake before your alarm clock after only a few days, only to begin to sleep until the alarm rings again after a few more. If that happens, just go back to setting your bed time earlier and earlier until you can maintain the same bed time for over a week, while still waking, feeling well-rested, before your alarm sounds.

In order to fall asleep quickly and sleep more soundly, turn most lights in your home down or off twenty to thirty minutes before you settle into bed and avoid television, computers, work, or any other mentally stimulating activity.

In addition to stabilizing hormones, getting enough sleep will improve your mood and your productivity and can, paradoxically, make you feel as though you have more hours in your day because you are more alert and efficient. So, while you may not literally be losing weight in your sleep, getting enough rest is one of the easiest tools to help you get fit fast. Make it part of your fitness program and cover up, settle in, and dream your way to fitness.