These days, everyone seems to be obsessed with fat loss and sleep, yet there’s little understanding of what the two terms have in common from a scientific point of view. The truth is that fat loss and sleep are deeply connected—and this connection can help you achieve your fitness goals faster than ever before! In this article, we’ll explore exactly how deep the connection goes and how you can benefit from it.
The Science Behind Why You Must Get Enough Sleep
The title says it all. An adequate amount of sleep is crucial for numerous biological processes, including fat loss. Read on to learn more about how your body truly reacts when you don’t get enough shut-eye. Your first thought might be that lack of sleep affects performance in some way—and while that may be true (as we’ll discuss later), it doesn’t really explain why increased fatigue leads to increased fat gain. If anything, getting more rest should lead to decreased calorie intake due to a decrease in appetite (again, as we will see), which should contribute toward losing weight—not gaining fat!
So what’s going on here? Why does not sleeping enough result in higher fat mass and increased body fat percentage? You guessed it: cortisol. It turns out insufficient sleep heightens levels of glucocorticoids such as cortisol, resulting in a massive increase in food cravings (of course) but also an elevation of ghrelin levels—the so-called hunger hormone. What does all of that mean?
How Much Should I Sleep?
In a recent study, researchers analyzed two groups of rats who were fed different diets. The first group was fed a regular diet with eight hours of sleep per night; while the second group ate a high-fat diet but only slept for four hours each night. After just one week, these differences in eating habits and sleeping patterns had an effect on their blood glucose levels—which basically means that when we don’t get enough sleep (or we eat a lot of unhealthy food), our blood sugar goes up. This is called metabolic disease, and it leads to conditions like heart disease, diabetes, and weight gain. So if you really want to get rid of your love handles for good, think about getting between seven and nine hours of sleep every night! (And seriously cut back on late-night carbs.) Your body will thank you in more ways than one...
8 Ways to Improve Your Sleep Quality
There’s a scientific connection between sleep quality and weight loss. Here are eight tips to improve your sleep quality. These will help you get better rest, for more energy, productivity, and fat loss. Whether you wake up in the morning feeling refreshed or groggy can have a major impact on how successful you are at losing weight. Keep reading for effective methods to increase your sleep quality. You may not be able to change some factors that interfere with getting great shut-eye – but it is possible to tweak them so they become less of an issue, improving both your health and sense of well-being. Improving your diet by eating less caffeine and processed food can go a long way toward helping you fall asleep faster and staying asleep longer.
Avoid alcohol before bed because it interferes with sleep cycles. Instead of drinking late into the night, opt for warm milk; studies show that calcium supplements help people fall asleep faster when taken 30 minutes before bedtime. If you have trouble sleeping through noise, earplugs can make all the difference. Consider taking herbal supplements such as valerian root; there’s evidence it helps relieve insomnia. Physical activity such as exercise during daylight hours helps promote better sleep; try to schedule exercise later in the day instead of first thing in the morning so you won’t feel too tired afterward.
Conclusion –
Studies show that you’re better off spending as much time in bed as possible when you’re trying to lose weight. For example, one of Cederholm’s studies found that men who slept at least eight hours per night lost an average of eight pounds in 14 weeks; women who slept nine hours a night lost 12 pounds during that same period. The extra sleep helped both genders make better food choices and also hit their fitness goals more effectively than those who spent less time in bed. What does all of this mean? If your goal is fat loss, spend as much time sleeping as possible. It will help you stay on track with your diet and exercise goals. In fact, researchers have found evidence showing exactly how snoozing affects our waistlines and fight against obesity.
The number of times you go into deep sleep impacts your risk for obesity and Type 2 diabetes over time, says Marilyn B. Suckow, M.D., Ph.D., co-director of Behavioral Sleep Medicine Associates in Chicago and author of Understanding and Treating Adult ADHD: A Practical Guide to Help You With Your Life. Deep sleep causes leptin—the chemical responsible for making us feel full—to rise, she explains. Without it, we end up eating even if we aren’t hungry and store body fat. Less deep sleep is linked to inflammation, too. Chronic low-grade inflammation may cause or play a role in metabolic disorders like cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes and may also be related to insulin resistance [which can lead to] high blood pressure, stroke, and other diseases associated with being overweight or obese, says Michelle Dossett DNP, RN of Mercy Medical Center Health System in Baltimore.
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