Could This Be The Missing Link in your Weight Loss Journey?

When trying to lose weight, many of us are focusing on nutrition and movement, but what if we are missing something really important in our quest to achieve a healthy weight?  In my opinion, sleep is as important to weight loss as nutrition and movement because it has an important role to play in controlling our appetite hormones and food cravings.

A recent study suggested that 37% of New Zealanders have less than 7 hours sleep per night, and although there is no exact scientific test to tell how much sleep a person needs, most need between 7 and 9 hours per night for optimal health.  Lack of sleep is a major problem and has been implicated in many chronic health issues including obesity, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, increased risk of heart attacks, and depression as well as some cancers (breast, endometrial, prostate and bowel).

So how exactly does a lack of sleep affect us?

Poor sleep increases a stress hormone in the body called cortisol. The hormone cortisol, is needed for stressful situations but is also elevated with a lack of sleep.  It causes our blood sugar to be higher (useful to give our legs extra energy if we are running away from a tiger) which then increases insulin levels – the fat storage hormone. In turn, we end up storing more fat in our bodies, especially around the abdomen.  Lack of sleep also affects two other hormones called ghrelin and leptin. Ghrelin is the hormone that tells you you’re hungry and leptin sends signals to let you know when you are full. Unfortunately lack of sleep causes lower leptin and higher ghrelin levels, and has been shown in multiple studies to cause people to eat more carbohydrates throughout the day.

What then can we do to improve our sleep?

There are many ways to improve sleep quality and duration, however one of the most important things you can do is to manage your daily light exposure.  It is ideal to increase natural sunlight during the day, particularly first thing in the morning and decrease exposure to artificial light in the evening, especially blue light from electronic screens in the last hour before bed. For many, this is a difficult ask, so a more practical solution may be to consider installing an app on your iphone to filter blue wavelength light at night.

What else can be done to help sleep?  Here’s a list of my top tips.

1.      Be regular with bed time and have a wind down routine. The brain loves regularity and so having a regular routine is likely to mean its easier for you to drop off to sleep quickly.

2.      Optimise your melatonin levels. Melatonin is the hormone in your brain that makes you feel sleepy.  It doesn’t reach high levels when there is lot of light (particularly artificial light in the evenings) so if you can switch on the dimmers half an hour to an hour before bed time this could definitely help. Also, if you are going to use a night light, using a red / amber night light rather than a blue light, because blue is the wavelength that lowers melatonin levels the most.

3.      Don’t stay in the bed if you can’t fall asleep within 20 mins. If you aren’t asleep by then, staying in bed will make you more frustrated and then even less likely to fall asleep. Instead get up sit in a warm room and consider writing down your thoughts in a journal for a while and then go back to bed later.

4.      Avoid alcohol and avoid caffeine after lunch. Many people think that alcohol will help them sleep and it may initially help you drift off but it results in a poorer quality of sleep and more waking throughout the night, and caffeine is designed to keep you awake, so avoiding coffee or energy drinks after lunch will result in better sleep.

5.      Think about when you eat – if you eat in the last 3 hours before you go to bed, this tells your gut that you are still consuming energy and should still be awake to use this energy.  Fasting in the hours before you go to bed is good for sleep and good for your overall health. The body can then move its attention to rest and repair instead of digestion. 

6.      Try to avoid strenuous physical activity in the last hour before bed as this can raise core body temperature and adrenaline levels making it harder to fall asleep.

7.      Keep your bedroom nice and cool – around 18 degrees is optimal. A cooler bedroom helps your body drop its core temperature which results in a deeper more restorative sleep.

So, whilst what we eat and how we move is important for a healthy weight, it is certainly by no means the full story.  Sleep is critical not only for our weight but our overall health and it could be the missing link if you feel you’re doing everything else by the book.

Can you do one percent more by not taking your iphone to bedroom at night?

Happy Sleeping!!!

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2352721819301202?via%3Dihub

https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/does-exercising-at-night-affect-sleep

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2084401/