You Snooze, You Lose | How To Improve Your Sleep And Lose More Weight

Losing weight is challenging, and keeping weight off can be just as difficult. Although the medical community is still unraveling the complex relationship between sleep and body weight, numerous studies already show that if you’re trying to lose weight, the amount of sleep you get may be just as important as your diet and exercise!!

There have been more than fifty studies following more than three million people for up to thirty-four years. Sleeping too little and for too long are both associated with cutting one’s life short, with the apparent sweet spot at seven hours a night. Seven hours may seem short, but that may actually be what’s natural and best for our species.

Unfortunately, many people aren’t getting even seven hours of sleep.

In fact, about 35% of US adults are sleeping fewer than 7 hours most nights, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Getting fewer than 7 hours of sleep at night is considered short sleep.

Now let’s understand how insufficient sleep is causing weight gain. Population studies have found that inadequate sleep duration is associated with obesity in both children and adults.

Moreover, sleep deprivation tends to lead people to overeat by about 180–560 calories a day!

This is a lot, especially if someone has inadequate sleep on a consistent basis. 

So how does sleep deprivation increases your appetite?

While we often think of appetite as simply a matter of stomach grumbling, it’s actually controlled by neurotransmitters, which are chemical messengers that allow neurons to communicate with each other.

The neurotransmitters ghrelin and leptin are responsible for our appetite. When we lack sleep It affects hunger hormone levels, increasing ghrelin, which makes you feel hungry, and decreasing leptin, which makes you feel full.

This is why when people are deprived of sleep, they also start craving unhealthier choices: more snacks and more sugary and fatty foods.

Moreover, poor sleep can decrease your self-control and decision-making abilities, as well as increase your brain’s reaction to food. This is why it’s so hard to resist cravings when we are tired!

Sleep More, Move More

The second reason sleep is crucial for weight loss is because sleep can enhance physical activity.

A lack of sleep can cause daytime fatigue, making you less motivated to exercise and more likely to be sedentary, thus burning even fewer calories. 

Numerous studies have shown that regular exercise can decrease the time it takes you to fall asleep and increase the overall quality of sleep across all age groups.

How to Get a Good Night’s Sleep ✔

First and foremost, aim for at least seven hours of regular sleep a night.

Important- even if you already get 7 hours of sleep a day, those recommendations will help you to improve your sleep quality, which is as important as your sleep duration.

There are many ways to improve sleep. Here are a few research-based recommendations for sleeping better:

1. Go to bed only when you’re sleepy. Only use the bed for sleep (and sex). No reading, eating, or screen time.
2. Keep a regular sleep schedule - Get up at the same time every morning no matter how little sleep you have had.
3. Exercise regularly - The best time to exercise to improve sleep appears to be four to eight hours before bedtime. You don't have to go through exhausting gym sessions- high-pace walking or cycling is good enough.
4. Avoid caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol before bedtime. It’s clear that hefty caffeine doses up to six hours before bedtime interferes with sleep. Late-afternoon alcohol consumption (six hours before bedtime) may also impair sleep.
5. Sleep hygiene: make the bedroom dark, cool, comfortable, and quiet.
6. Reduce Stress: As we’ve discussed in our last article, chronic stress may lead to poor sleep and weight gain in several ways, including eating to cope with negative emotions, therefore establishing a relaxing bedtime routine is crucial.
7. Relaxation techniques, such as massage, mindfulness meditation, and calming music, will help. So, too, may take a relaxing hot bath or shower.
8. Regulate your circadian clock - View sunlight by going outside within 30-60 minutes of walking for 10 minutes. Do that again in the late afternoon, prior to sunset.
9. Perhaps the winning tip is to avoid viewing bright lights, especially bright overhead lights between 10 pm and 4 am. Here is a simple rule: only use as much artificial lighting as is necessary for you to remain and move about safely at night. Candlelight and moonlight are fine. This is crucial because it will release sleep hormones at the right times, therefore will make it much easier for you to fall asleep.

What’s more, nonpharmacological methods as the above, have been found to work as well or even better than famous sleeping drugs.

On a personal note:

I know how frustrating it is to have poor sleep. During my army service, I had serious sleeping problems. It would make me feel really bad, leading me to make poor decisions the day after and even worse, I felt truly agitated by other commanders (And this is really not good in an army dynamic).

Fortunately, there was a sleep expert that came for a lecture in our unit, and he taught us the importance of sleep and how to improve our sleeping habits...

Life has truly changed since that talk, and I have now the privilege to share the same tips with you!

✅ The bottom line:

I always teach our clients about the "downward spiral of weight loss" principle. Let me explain. When we gain weight, we tend to exercise and move less ⏩ have less healthy habits ⏩ our sleep duration and quality suffer.

Because our sleep is bad ⏩ we will have less energy for exercise ⏩ we move less ⏩ we will make poor decisions about food ⏩ have less willpower for healthy habits ⏩ We gain more weight.

This downward spiral principle is probably the reason why losing weight is so challenging...

And as you've noticed, improving sleep is the best way to escape this vicious cycle!

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