5 Ways Sleep Can Ruin Your Weight Loss
Trying to Lose Weight?
Sleeping well at night will help you to lose weight, and not getting the right amount of sleep can ruin all your good intentions.
Those cravings and irresistible urges you’re fighting during the day might be linked to a hormonal imbalance that can be corrected with a week of good rest. It’s not as simple as knowing that being exhausted weakens your resolve to eat the good stuff, although that’s definitely what it feels like when your diving into the ice cream.
Take a look at the 5 Ways that your HORMONES might be influencing you without you knowing it. It’s enough to make us all go running for our pillows!
1) Ghrelin, a hormone that tells your brain to eat now, increases when you sleep poorly, so your hormones tell you to eat way too often.
2) Leptin, the hormone that helps to slow down the eating process, doesn’t work quite as well when you miss your zzz’s. As a result, you power right through your food without the “stop” button.
3) Long-term sleep deprivation or sleep quality can make your cells insulin-resistant which leads to higher insulin levels. Higher insulin levels impair your fat burning capabilities. If you can’t burn your fat efficiently, you’ll have trouble losing that weight.
4) Missing your sleep, (even an hour!) creates stress for the body, and when you’re under stress, your body can secrete more cortisol and adrenaline. Higher cortisol levels makes it easier to store fat and raises the set point for burning fat-and will also impair your digestion. High cortisol also lowers your serotonin, the feel-good hormone that enables you to stick to your good intentions.
5) Your body needs time to repair. So even with extra workout time, your body needs the sleep time to repair the muscle damage or you’ll be feeling tired all day long.. Feeling tired leads to loss of resolve, and once again you can repeat that vicioius cycle.
How much is enough? New studies show that at least 8 hours are needed for adults. It might be time to reset that alarm clock and lose a few pounds.
