How you sleep has a major effect on how you can maintain a healthy weight. Your body consumes energy to metabolize the things you eat, allowing you to keep doing what you need to do daily. The body converts your fat to energy that you can use, and this is how you start to lose weight.
For the body to efficiently undergo the processes necessary to keep you functional and aid in weight loss, you require enough energy and rest. Your sleeping habits dictate much of your journey, and we break down how it does that.
Lack of Energy and Increased Appetite
In some circumstances, you can lose weight at the beginning of the diet because you cut the calories in your diet. You can improve your weight loss success by working out and losing some water weight. However, if you are constantly tired and lack energy, it can be hard to lose weight.
If you don’t get enough sleep, you aren’t obtaining the energy you need to go about your day. It can directly lead to an increase in how much you eat, especially when it comes to junk food.
You are also more likely to get cravings as your body seeks out sources of energy to keep itself fueled. Ghrelin is the hormone that is related to hunger, and leptin is the hormone that is tied to feeling full. When you lack sleep, this increases the levels of ghrelin and decreases the levels of leptin as a way of your body trying to increase its fuel intake.
Bad Moods and Low Motivation
Sleep directly affects your mood. If you don’t have enough hours of rest or good quality of sleep, you can wake up feeling irritable, tired, and not in the mood to do anything.
When you’re out of energy, and you’re in a bad mood, your motivation levels tend to hit a dip. This can directly affect your weight loss when you end up skipping exercise or you stop caring about the good eating habits you’ve put in place.
Metabolism and Your Sleep Schedule
Let’s break down the relationship between your metabolism and sleep schedule. If you lack a consistent sleep schedule, your circadian rhythm gets out of sorts, and your body doesn’t metabolize food properly.
Your body is more likely to slow down metabolism because it perceives that you need to keep your energy resources longer. Even a consistent sleep schedule will have this consequence if it’s always composed of too few hours of sleep.
When you are sleep-deprived, you also experience metabolic dysregulation. That means your body stores more glucose, and you tend to develop insulin sensitivity.
Creating Quality Sleep
You must actively make changes and start shifting them to fix your sleep habits. Otherwise, you’ll only keep hindering your journey to a healthy and strong body.
If you generally have trouble sleeping, it may help you to visit a sleep centre and find a program or solution that works for your specific situation.
Conclusion
Once you recognize that your sleep is affecting your ability to lose weight, you can make changes to find the right routine. If you think you have issues, sleep testing can help you figure out what you need to do. We also have a sleep nutritionist that specializes in helping people with balancing sleep and healthy heating. When you sleep better, you live better!
If you’re looking for a sleep clinic in North Vancouver, Surrey or Victoria visit Sleep Better Live Better. Our qualified team has helped thousands of patients find healthy sleep solutions.
