How Sleeping Less is Linked To Gain Weight Fast

When you are eating healthy and still gaining extra pounds, you get confused! You try to find every possible reason behind this. But every time, you end up being unsuccessful to find the exact reason.

You also start applying weight loss management strategies, but again, unsuccessful. This is because you are unable to target and work on the exact reason of weight gain.

You will be surprised to know this hidden reason behind gaining weight, which cannot be easily recognized by the affecting individual. It is ‘sleep deprivation’. Yes! Sleep deprivation is a major reason behind weight gain. It is also scientifically proved that a mere 30 minutes of less sleep than the regular one can take you towards weight gain or obesity.

Besides weight gain, sleep deprivation also leads to many other diseases such as stress, concentration problem, memory problem, decision-making capability, risk of diabetes, etc. Moreover, sound sleep helps to make your brain and body fresh for the next day.

What are the mechanisms involved in gaining weight due to sleep deprivation?

As it has been told that the weight gain is due to sleep deprivation also, there are scientific mechanisms behind this. Some of them are listed below:

Decreased food metabolism

Metabolism is the process of converting food that you eat into energy. This metabolism cycle to digest and excrete food inside human body is disturbed due to lack of sleep.

When the food is not metabolized well and not converted to energy, it starts accumulating inside food pipes or other locations inside body causing the formation of fat and carbohydrate deposits. These deposits lead to weight gain and increase the risk of obesity.

Stress hormone production

There is a stress hormone present inside every human body known as cortisol. The levels of this stress hormone are increased, if you sleep less. Stress acts as a booster for hunger.

More is the hunger, more the food you will eat. You are not left with choosing healthy food or unhealthy food. You choose any kind of food item when you are hungry. This overeating ultimately leads to weight gain. So, less sleep means more stress and more stress means more body weight.

Endocannabinoid system

Endocannabinoid system is situated in brain, which participates in many brain activities. Appetite control is one of those activities. In a scientific study, it has been observed that endocannabinoid levels become high in sleep-deprived patients, which resulted in increase in appetite.

When these patients were given their meals including healthy as well as unhealthy food items, it was found that patients with sound sleep chose food items wisely and not opted for unhealthy food whereas sleep deprived patients choose food items ignoring whether they are choosing healthy one or unhealthy one. When these patients were tested, the body weight as well as endocannabinoid levels were high in sleep-deprived patients.

These listed mechanisms clearly indicate that sleep deprivation contributes in gaining body weight.

This does not mean that one should sleep unnecessarily to manage body weight.

Sleeping more can also lead to weight gain. It just means that you should sleep atleast 7-8 hours in a day to make your body attentive and healthy.

How to fix this problem of sleep deprivation?

If you are unable to sleep for 7-8 hours in a day, you can try following ways to fix your sleep problem:

Never sleep in-between the day
Never eat food just before going to sleep. There should be a gap of atleast 1-1 and half hour between dinner and sleeping.
Add some physical activity to your daily routine.
Avoid consuming caffeine products or alcohol near bedtime.
Fix your time of sleeping and go to bed exactly at that time.

More the healthy sleep you get, more the healthy body you will have!

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]