Sleep’s effect on weight is remarkable. Moreover, there are full books written on the subject. A very useful book is Sleep Away the Pounds by Cherie Calbom with John Calbom. Additionally, much of the information in this lesson comes from their book.
Our Sleep Affects the Hormones
This is where the whole hormone scene comes into play.
Additionally, our sleep affects the hormones that govern metabolism and fat use.
If we sleep well, our hormones will work well. However, if we sleep poorly, hormones go out of sync and can’t function.
There are several key hormones affecting weight that sleep or lack of sleep influences.
This outline will oversimplify their effects, yet our bodies are an integrated whole.
Sleep is an important ingredient in health, just as exercise and wholesome food are.
Appetite-Suppressing Hormone
Leptin, discovered in 1994, is produced in fat cells and suppresses appetite. When it works properly, it tells your brain when you are hungry and when to begin fat storage. It has important metabolism and weight functions. It also helps regulate reproduction. In studies, sleep deprivation lowered leptin levels and this matched a reduction of about 1000 calories per day. You might think, give me some leptin and my hunger will be suppressed, but the situation is more complex. Leptin resistance can develop, and when this happens you may crave sugar or other carbohydrates, feel tired, and gain weight around your waist.
Insulin links to diabetes and helps regulate blood sugar, which can affect weight. Additionally, the pancreas makes this hormone, guiding whether cells use sugar now or store it as fat. Moreover, sleep loss disrupts insulin production, reducing carbohydrate metabolism and increasing insulin resistance. As blood sugar stays high, cells resist it and levels rise. Over time, the pancreas issues more insulin, but can tire, leading to diabetes. Insulin resistance appears quickly in sleep-deprived people, sometimes within a week.
An appetite-stimulating hormone made in the stomach and upper intestine is ghrelin.
Additionally, it can cause eating binges and cravings for fattening foods.
Moreover, these include ice-cream, candy, and salty snacks like pretzels or chips.
It also suppresses fat utilization.
Additionally, too little sleep can cause ghrelin production to spike.
Finally, this hormone works in conjunction with growth hormone, insulin and leptin.
Cortisol, the Stress Hormone
It is released by the brain at various times during the day and night.
It is part of the fight-or-flight response that kept our early ancestors alive.
If we are sleep deprived, cortisol release will make us feel hungry.
Additionally, it will raise insulin levels.
The effects were noted above.
It also causes many problems, such as fluid retention, muscle weakness, memory loss, and high blood pressure.
If we sleep correctly, cortisol should peak in the early morning.
This allows us to start the day energized.
However, many of us have too-high levels throughout the day and night.
This causes us to sleep fitfully or wake often.
Growth Hormone
This hormone is produced in the pituitary gland in the brain.
It builds tissue, repairs damage, uses fat, counters some cortisol effects, and raises metabolism.
It is secreted in small amounts at various times of the day.
Additionally, the largest amount is released during deep sleep.
If we don’t get enough deep sleep, growth hormone decreases.
We will develop changes that are associated with aging.
Thus, it can be seen that sleep is very important to our health in regulating hormones that affect our weight.
To Do
To counter the above-mentioned negative effects, we should adopt lifestyle changes. Additionally, we should get enough sleep. In addition, we should get enough exercise and eat healthily. This means these changes.
- Try new foods or a new way of eating. A cookbook I found particularly helpful because it talked about different types of food and encouraged creativity in cooking/eating was The Yeast Connection Cookbook. Although it was written with a particular problem in mind, I found it generally useful.
- Perhaps try something like a raw diet. If not full time, try it for snacks or for one meal per day. Groups that advocate unusual diets like this can give you a lot of information and they also provide forums for support and education.2
- Avoid refined carbs like pasta, bread, sweets and alcohol.
- Avoid saturated fats like those in meat.
- Avoid trans fats like those in margarine, fried foods and snack foods.
- Avoid polyunsaturated fats like those in corn oil, soy, sunflower oil, safflower oil.
- Increase foods rich in omega-3 fatty acids like salmon, mackerel, trout, cod-liver oil.
- Increase leafy green vegetables. A good way to do this is to make green smoothies sweetened with fruit. Vary the greens you use. We use spinach, mixed salad greens, romaine lettuce, or whatever looks freshest in the grocery store when we shop. We usually sweeten with apple and pear although we’ve tried banana and mango and several other combinations. Wash the greens, cut up the fruit and mix in a good strong blender. At first, my daughters ate only a spoonful but they gradually increased their intake so that they now eat a cupful at a time. One daughter suffers from asthma and she remarked one day that since eating green smoothies, she uses her puffers a lot less.
- Eat nuts, especially walnuts, and seeds, especially flax seeds.
- Increase fruit and vegetables with bright colors.
- Increase beans.
- Avoid artificial sugars, flavors and fats.
- Try taking magnesium as a supplement as most of us in North America are magnesium deficient. I’ve seen 400 mg as a suggested dose before bed with an acid-rich juice like tomato juice for a sedating effect. You might want a calcium supplement, too. You can ask your doctor about these.
- Don’t eat after 6 pm. Someone I know tried this simple idea and found that she no longer had to get up to the bathroom in the night. Getting up had been disrupting her sleep so that she couldn’t get back to sleep again and she was relieved to find such a simple solution to her problem.
Use these dietary suggestions with the ideas from previous lessons to support a good night’s sleep.
Additionally, you’ll notice a real improvement in your sleep soon.
Can weight loss improve sleep apnea?
We always encourage our patients to lose weight while they are on CPAP therapy to treat their sleep apnea. For patients with sleep apnea, weight loss sometimes, but not always, results in a complete resolution of the disorder. However, even though a patient’s sleep apnea probably won’t go away entirely, it can lead to lower pressure settings, which can make CPAP therapy much more tolerable.
On the other side of the coin, increased weight gain can lead to higher pressure settings.
Additionally, the more tissues in the throat impede airflow, the higher the pressure needed to prevent collapse.
Many patients abandon CPAP therapy because high pressure settings harm their overall health.
Sleep apnea and obesity share many health risks, including high blood pressure, coronary heart disease, stroke, and diabetes.
They also increase the risk of heart attack and heart failure.
Losing weight not only improves tolerable pressure of a CPAP device, but also reduces patient risk for severe health conditions.
However, individuals with untreated sleep apnea often find themselves in a vicious cycle.
- Poor sleep caused by sleep apnea, leads to decreased energy during the day, which in turn leads to a more sedentary lifestyle devoid of healthy activities and exercise.
- Decreased quality of sleep also contributes to unhealthy food cravings for sugary foods and foods high in carbohydrates.
- Untreated OSA decreases metabolism making weight loss more difficult.
Patients who find themselves using CPAP therapy to treat sleep apnea get better quality sleep at night.
This in turn leads to higher energy levels during the day.
As a result, it makes exercise to reduce their weight much easier to perform.
Patients who continue to maintain healthy lifestyle choices can end up with fewer apnea events each night.
It may allow lower CPAP pressure settings or qualify them for dental appliances for mild to moderate sleep apnea.
Should you believe you may have sleep apnea, take a proactive step today.
Additionally, contact The Alaska Sleep Clinic by clicking the link below.
A sleep educator will call you for a free 10-minute phone consultation to discuss your symptoms.
This call will determine if a sleep study is right for you.
