TeamHave you ever wonder why you keep on gaining weight even when you’re working out, putting on a diet here and there? Study shows that lack of sleep messes up your hormones that lead us to make bad decisions.
We need more sleep as we age. Results showed that people who sleep less than seven hours per night were more presumably to have higher body mass indexes (BMI) and show symptoms of obesity than those who slept more.
Here are some of the facts that cause weight gain
Lack of sleep does make you gain weight
Based on my own experience, when I stay up late I go hungry and crave for no reason. I go straight to the fridge or order food past midnight! This is caused by a hormone called Ghrelin, a hunger hormone that stimulates appetite and drives us to keep eating. An there’s Leptin, a hormone from fat cells where it stifles appetite. It only kicks in when you have enough sleep.
It slows down metabolism
The more we age, the more our metabolism slows down. We can’t stop comparing our recent pictures to our younger days, those were the days that even if we eat a lot, we don’t get fat. Lack of sleep causes our metabolism to not function well and plays a huge part in weight gain. We need at least 7-9 hours per night to have a healthy sleep.
Decrease in physical activities
You easily get tired and fatigued at times. No motivation and can’t think clearly.
A study shows that sleep is the fundamental foundation of recovery. With controlling our weight, we observe food consumption, physical activity, locomotion, and recovery, and you have to concentrate on sleep and where it corresponds to this context.
Risk of getting diabetes
When you lack sleep, we forget the healthy stuff and opt for fast food or junk food which are crammed with carbs and sugars. Your body aims for high carb and high sugar foods to get the energy to keep going. But a good sleep schedule helps set the scene for impulse control, a sensible part of proper weight management.
So what can you do about sleeplessness?
In this generation, we have more time to NOT sleep regularly, we have a smart tv, cellphone, gaming consoles, and such. We lack discipline and we lose our health to these things. BUT, once you set a pretty good list and commit to your health, everything will go smoothly. I’m not asking you to give it up all at once, take baby steps.
- First off, work out in the morning, it aids sleep quality. Don’t exercise before bedtime due to the fact that it raises your adrenaline and keeps you awake.
- Build a sleep schedule, pamper yourself, meditate, have a warm bath. You deserve it.
- Watch what you eat. Refrain from eating heavy meals and alcohol before going to bed. It might lead to heartburn and makes falling asleep hard for you.
- Lessen caffeine intake after 2 pm. Caffeine stays in your body for about 5-6 hours which affects sleep.
- Shut down all of your devices an hour before you got to bed. If not, you can place them far away from you and put them on silent mode.
- Turn off the lights. This cues your brain to sleep.
