There are all kinds of weight loss tips and healthy eating guidelines for you to follow. There is a new healthy weight loss diet coming out almost every week. Now many of these healthy eating guidelines and weight loss tips are valid points and should be followed if you want to achieve permanent weight loss.
You may be overlooking a major component to successful weight loss. This has nothing to do with healthy eating guidelines or exercise intervals. It has to do with recovery and your downtime.
How much sleep do you get each and every night?
The amount of sleep you get could be the make or break tip to you weight loss success. Research studies are showing that those who are sleep deprived have higher levels of bodyfat compared to those who get adequate sleep each night.
Studies have also linked a lack of sleep to hypertension and Type 2 diabetes. A study in the American Journal of Epidemiology followed 68,000 Americans for 16 years and found that those who got five hours or less of sleep per night were one third more likely to gain 30 plus pounds over the course of the study than those who slept seven hours or longer.
Another study Stanford University reported that subjects who slept the least had higher levels of bodyfat than those who slept 8 hours or more.
The commonalities that both studies have are that the participants who lacked sleep had lower levels of the hormone leptin and higher levels of the hormone ghrelin. Leptin is produced primarily by the fat cells and this hormone works to decrease hunger and increase your metabolic rate. The hormone Ghrelin is produced by the gastrointestinal tract and increases your hunger. This is an imbalance of two key hormones that affect your body type and whether you gain weight or not.
The simple answer to correct this is to obviously sleep more. There are other things you can and should be doing to keep your leptin level elevated and your ghrelin level low, but the most often overlooked weight loss tip is sleep. We are all very busy and sleep is something we wish we could do more of and just never seem to get it.
If you are one who struggles with losing weight. You have tried healthy weight loss diet after diet and you still seem to struggle with your weight loss than I suggest this. Record how much sleep you get each night for one week. Before you go to bed each night evaluate how your day was. Were you tired? Did you wake up refreshed? Did you feel that you needed more sleep?
After this one week of recording your sleep look at how many hours on average you slept each night. If it wasn’t 7 hours then make it a goal to average 7 hours of sleep a night. If you did average 7 hours and you still felt tired every morning then work to increase that average to 8 hours and see how you feel. Every person is a little different when it comes to required restful sleep. You may need to experiment with this a little.
If you are serious about permanently losing weight though I suggest you make increasing your sleep a priority or everything else you do to lose weight may be for nothing.
Yours in health,
Jayson Hunter RD, CSCS
America’s Trusted Weight Loss Expert
For more healthy weight loss tips check out this book below.
Tags: healthy weight loss diets, lose weight fast, weight loss tips
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I dont sleep very well at all I did know about the connection between lack of sleep and weight gain but am very stressed at the moment so need more help with the area of lack of sleep
Thanks
Fiona
Hi Jason, you just hit me over the head with that comment, i had realised that it was possibly contributing to my struggle with fat loss, but i am one who has hypertension( medicated) and finds it hard to go to bed early and get 7 or 8 hours so the next day i am running ( sometimes =literally) on empty. I am a light sleeper since since developing hypertension during my last pregnancy 16 years ago, still unresolved. so from now on get off the computer and go to bed…:)
Christine
Awesome advice — very helpful!!! Keep it up
Hi Jason,
Wow! I didn’t know that about sleep and will definitely take up your suggestion about writing down how much sleep I get over a week period. My hubby has always been a night owl so consequently I stay up with him. It is a rare day that I wake up feeling full of energy, 99% of the time I feel like my head is full of lead weights and I have to drag myself out of bed, it has been like that as long as I can remember – not the best for keeping up with 6 children! I have managed to lose 12 kg with a complete change to the way I eat and work out but the last 10kg are sticking like glue! Definitely going to try more sleep – I’ll let you know how I go.
Deborah.
I am 51yrs old I have been living on the max 5hrs sleep every day for years. I try so hard to sleep longer but my body clock always gets me up after 5hrs. I am not tired, I work out 2x with weights, 1x kickboxing for the past 22 mos. Went from a size 10 to a size 4 but can’t get my stomach tight, I guess after 4 kids it is tough. I am so tired of people telling me I look tired but I have more energy then them. I wish I can sleep but I can’t, I wish I wasn’t a carb closet eater, I have been on a low glymeic? way of eating since last April but I can’t drop anymore weight. I will try this week your suggestion of loggin my sleep and see what happens.
I know it is important to go to bed early and get enough sleep, but when I go to bed it takes me very long before I actually am sleeping, my mind is still busy with everything.
Please, do you have any tips to get to sleep quickly?
Oh Jayson, How I would love to sleep more deeply, more evenly – and just more. I average around 5-6 hours sleep a night, usually broken into 2 or 3 periods and could write a book on all the different recommendations out there for improving sleep. I have gradually put on 3 stone in weight since this sleep problem started some 19 years ago, having up till then been very slim, and like Fiona know of this weight-sleep connection. I am sure that until I can crack the sleep problem, I will always have problems with my weight, so if you have any recommendations re sleep, they will be most welcome.
I am not a sleep expert, but from what I have read and have tried myself is to avoid reading in bed or watching tv for any length of time because from what I understand your body will get used to you lying in bed and reading or watching tv rather then focusing on going to sleep.
When I stopped reading in bed and I started to fall asleep easier because now when I get into bed I attempt to to straight to sleep rather than watch TV, etc.
If anyone has any other tips they do to get to sleep quickly please leave them here because what works for me may not work for someone else.
Jayson Hunter RD, CSCS
anything for sleep hot flashes.thanks
I don’t know about this – maybe I’m the exception to the rule – but I get adequate sleep every night (8-9 hours usually) and I’m still hanging onto the fat!!!!
This is very true. Speaking from personal experience. I’ve been on both sides of the fat-loss story, up over 30% body fat and down to 7%. From years of dealing with losing weight, I can strongly support the findings at least for endomorphs like myself. Every time I have a good sleep pattern, it’s much easier for my body to lose weight and build muscle.
YES YES YES! I am forwarding this to a few of my clients right now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks for posting!
Funny I was chatting with a friend about this just the other day, we share the same views.