Weight Loss and Effective Sleep

There are many associations that can be made between lack of sleep, the quality of sleep or the time of sleep (day or night). There is no direct link between weight gain and poor sleep, but we can make many indirect links linking sleep deprivation to your health.

Many studies demonstrate that there is a significant relationship between sleep deprivation and obesity. Studies showed that the lower the number of hours of sleep, the higher the body mass index (BMI).

At night, our body is designed not to eat because we sleep. As a result, this is the time when our body produces large amounts of growth hormone, a hormone that helps with nerve and muscle recovery but also gives our body the order to use the fats to provide the ‘energy. As a result, good quality, long sleep is synonymous with longer production of growth hormone, which helps to burn fat and therefore lose weight.

In the long run, having several bad nights of sleep can interfere with almost all the vital functions of our body. This can start with the skin and can reach the immune system, also through our ability to maintain weight.

Sleep deprivation affects our ability to perform regular physical activity. And it is easier for us to order food than to prepare our food at home.

The bad sleep and weight loss connection is therefore very narrow.

In fact, a lack of sleep can easily lead to weight gain. Enjoying a good sleep, both in terms of quantity and quality, is essential to regulate our hormones, our hunger index, as well as our physical abilities.

If this state of lack occurs rarely during a year for example, there is no problem.

But if this is recurrence and occurs frequently, it can cause a lot of health problems. Experts even say that the role of sleep in a comprehensive approach to weight loss is as important as that of diet or exercise.

Can sleeping too much make you fat?

As we’ve seen that too much sleep can make you fat, now what about too much sleep?

The answer is no, as long as you do not consume more calories than your body burns. Because it is obvious that if you sleep 24 hours a day and consume three huge meals a day (I know, it’s impossible, but it’s just to illustrate), your body will store most of that energy as fat, because he will not need it.

Because when it comes to weight gain, it’s all about calories consumed / calories burned. As we have seen above, sleeping well will lead you to eat less. So the more you sleep, the less you want to eat. Too much sleep will not make you fat.

Did you know that your body continues to burn fat while you sleep?

For some people, burning fat is even higher during sleep than when their body is simply inactive (eg sitting or lying down, without sleeping).

Improve Your Sleep Regime

The problem is that during a diet, especially if it is followed for a long time or if it is very restrictive, the quality and duration of sleep decrease. To counter this phenomenon we can:

Take a complete multivitamin supplement to limit the appearance of deficits that disturb sleep (zinc, vitamin B, vitamin C, etc.).

Add extra magnesium, especially in the evening.

Take a soothing herbal tea or plants with an effect on sleep: valerian, passionflower, verbena, lavender, etc.