Longer Studies Are Needed Researchers Say
Tasali says the findings are important for a few reasons: The research was done in a real-world setting, and not in a sleep lab, with participants maintaining their normal eating habits and sleeping in their own beds. The results were also objective, and free from self-reporting wrist sensors recorded sleep duration, and the urine-based tests measured caloric intake.
The study has its caveats, though. For starters, the duration was only two weeks. It also excluded people with sleep disorders, like sleep apnea, and those who work night shifts or rotating shift work. Its unclear if people who are already getting enough sleep would see the same benefit.
We dont know to what extent the habits would have been continued beyond two weeks. Longer-term studies are needed, and with more diverse populations, but its our general hypothesis that this intervention would apply to populations with various baseline weights and sleep duration, she says.
Ways Sleep May Help You Lose Weight
If youre trying to lose weight, the amount of sleep you get may be just as important as your diet and exercise.
Unfortunately, many people arent getting enough sleep.
In fact, about 35% of US adults are sleeping fewer than 7 hours most nights, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention . Getting fewer than 7 hours of sleep at night is considered short sleep .
Interestingly, mounting evidence shows that sleep may be the missing factor for many people who are having difficulty losing weight.
Here are 6 reasons why getting enough sleep may help you lose weight.
Sleep Is Linked To Appetite Hormones Research Suggests Which Could Help With Weight Management
Weight loss comes down to a calorie deficit burning off more calories with activity than you consume in the form of food. Most diets are focused on cutting calories in some form, or adding exercise to burn more energy.
But participants in the sleep study ate less without changing their routine except for bedtime habits.
“We can objectively show that they’re decreasing calories with no other recommendations. All they needed to do was live their usual lives,” Tasali said.
Researchers didn’t collect food journals, so it’s not clear if participants ate less of certain foods or smaller portions overall. But previous research suggests that sleep deprivation can prompt cravings by increasing the hormone ghrelin, linked to appetite.
The most recent study is evidence that the inverse is true, and getting more sleep may help manage appetite, Tasali said, although more studies are needed to test sleep as a weight loss tool, alone or combined with diet.
Don’t Miss: Sleep Number Friends And Family Coupon
Sleep In A Cooler And Darker Environment
According to a small study published in the journal Diabetes, people who keep their bedrooms at a steady temperature of 66 degrees for one month increased the amount of calorie burning brown fat in their bodies by up to 42% and boosted their metabolism by 10%. A room that is too warm can also prevent you from falling or staying asleep. Bogan recommended setting your thermostat to 65 degrees.
To lose weight during sleep, try getting rid of that night light, too. Research suggests that light before bedtime can suppress melatonin and sleeping with a light on appears to affect the circadian regulation of metabolism, increasing the risk of weight gain, according to the Sleep Foundation. So, turn off your TV, phone and any bedside lights, and consider investing in blackout curtains to block light from outside.
Why More Sleep Can Help You Lose Weight
If you want to lose weight, experts say you need to get enough sleep. Specifically, researchers have reported that women who sleep 5 hours or less per night generally weigh more than women who sleep 7 hours per night.
These findings, presented at the 2006 American Thoracic Society International Conference, showed that women who slept 5 hours per night were 32% more likely to experience major weight gain and 15% more likely to become obese over the course of the 16-year study, compared to those who slept 7 hours a night.
Those women who slept 6 hours per night were still 12% more likely to experience major weight gain, and 6% more likely to become obese, compared to women who slept 7 hours a night.
This is the largest study to track the effects of sleep habits on weight gain over time it included nearly 70,000 middle-aged women.
The women were first monitored in 1986, and they reported their weight every 2 years for 16 years. At the start of the study, the women who slept 5 hours or less per night weighed an average of 5.4 pounds more than those sleeping 7 hours. They also gained an additional 1.6 pounds more over the next 10 years. While that doesn’t sound like a significant amount, it adds up. That’s 16 pounds in 10 years, and 32 pounds over a 20-year period.
Recommended Reading: Sleep Number Bed Bangor Maine
Here’s How Much Extra Sleep Can Lead To Weight Loss
The scientists reveal that people could potentially lose an average of 26 pounds over a 3-year period without making any modifications to their daily diet. According to one of the study authors, Dr. Esra Tasali of the Department of Medicine, The University of Chicago, “If healthy sleep habits are maintained over longer duration, this would lead to clinically important weight loss over time.” Tasali added, “Many people are working hard to find ways to decrease their caloric intake to lose weightwell, just by sleeping more, you may be able to reduce it substantially.”6254a4d1642c605c54bf1cab17d50f1e
The study’s results reveal that individuals were able to lose approximately 270 calories each day by sleeping for an additional 1.2 hours. That’s rightthe participants slept more and lost weight.
If You Eat At Night Keep It Small
While you shouldn’t go to bed starving , you also shouldn’t hit the sack completely stuffed. When you eat a large meal before bed, your body is working to digest it long into the nightand if your body is still worked up, so are you. The later you fall asleep, the less rest you’ll get, and you’ll wake up feeling groggy and more likely to reach for calorie-dense items.
Instead of eating a monster meal for dinner, try to keep portions about the same as your breakfast and lunch, especially if you eat dinner on the later side. “You want to eat your last meal at least an hour or two before going to bed,” says Isabel Smith, MS, RD, CDN.
Don’t Miss: Sleep Number Bed Fort Myers Fl
Drink A Casein Protein Shake
Feed your hungry muscles by trading whey for casein in your post-workout shake. This slow-release protein is gradually digested over 8 hours and keeps your metabolic fires burning through the night.
Dutch researchers also say that casein enhances protein synthesis, which helps you cut an extra 35 calories a day for every pound of new muscle gained.
‘overnight Diet’ Promises Weight Loss While You Sleep
Amy Frankel wanted to lose weight, so she tried the Overnight Diet, a new rapid weight-loss plan that claims you can actually lose weight while you sleep.
Frankel, a 42-year-old mother of one from Wayland, Mass., said she literally lost weight overnight, and during the course of the diet went from 174 pounds to 125 pounds.
“You are burning calories and losing weight and you are not starving yourself and you’re not ever feeling deprived. It wasn’t difficult,” said Frankel, who said she went from wearing size 10 and 12 to a size 4 in about a year of doing the diet, which she’s now adopted as a way of life.
Dr. Caroline Apovian, an obesity doctor and the author of the new book, ” The Overnight Diet,” explained the regimen. Users do six days of a high protein diet and one day of a liquid diet. That, combined with sleep, equals weight loss, she claims.
“You can lose up to two pounds overnight. And then for the six days, you can lose up to nine pounds in one week after the first week,” said Apovian, an associate professor of medicine and pediatrics at Boston University School of Medicine and the director of nutrition and weight management at Boston Medical Center.
“That first night, you go to sleep, you sleep your eight hours, you are down two pounds,” she said. “If you continue to get enough sleep every night, you won’t get those hunger pangs. The hunger pangs come from lack of sleep, which induces the hunger hormone to get secreted from your gut.”
Don’t Miss: Sleep Number Bed Gap In Middle
Why You Lose Weight Overnight
While you sleep, your bodys metabolism rate drops about 15%. That means many of your bodys processes that consume energy slows down. While that should technically work against weight loss at night, you might still observe yourself lighter in the morning than the night before.
Here are a few things that cause you to lose weight overnight:
Do You Lose Weight Sleeping
- Score4.3/5
People do lose weight during sleep. However, this is mostly due to water loss through breathing and sweating. While individuals do not burn much fat during sleep, sleep is a fundamental component of well-being, and a lack of it can make maintaining a moderate weight more difficult.Read more
-
The Science Behind Sleep and Weight Loss | Corporis
Watch Youtube video
- What is Code Purple in labor and delivery?+ 37 related questions
Read Also: Sleep Number Bed King Of Prussia
Every Night You Lose More Than A Pound While You’re Asleep
Editor’s Note: Robert has added an update to this post. Scroll down to read it.
Here’s a simple question: Why do you weigh more when you go to sleep than when you wake up? Because you do. In the video below, you’ll see the evidence. You can check this yourself. Somehow, while doing absolutely nothing all night but sleep, you will wake up lighter.
This is not about bathroom stuff. If you awaken and weigh yourself even before going to the toilet, you will still be lighter than when you went to bed. Why?
Where Does The Weight Go?
My first thought was “sweat.” Maybe you sweat when you sleep, so some of your water weight disappears as water vapor. Turns out, that’s true. That’s part of the explanation but not the fascinating part.
Derek Muller, a physics teacher in Perth, Australia, and host of one of my favorite science blogs, Veritasium, came up with the full answer, and it’s so surprising, so simple, it feels like one of those No Fuss, No Muss, Miracle Cures they talk about on late night television.
This is like the Sting song, “Every breath you take … ” All night long, every time you breathe out, a bunch of carbon atoms, formerly inside your body, leave your insides and take off into the night air. You breathe in oxygen, O2. You breathe out carbon dioxide, , so there’s an extra carbon atom leaving in every round trip.
Amazing.
Understanding The Reasons For Weight Gain
The study participants did not identify the specific factors that contribute to weight gain in women who had less sleep.
“We don’t have an answer from this study about why reduced sleep causes weight gain, but there are some possibilities that deserve further study,” Patel says. “Sleeping less may affect changes in a person’s basal metabolic rate . Another contributor to weight regulation that has recently been discovered is called non-exercise associated thermogenesis It may be that if you sleep less, you move around less, too, and therefore burn up fewer calories.”
Another important factor to consider is the impact of sleep on cortisol levels. Insufficient sleep can cause the release of additional cortisolthe stress hormoneand can stimulate hunger.
According to the National Sleep Foundation, the average woman gets only six and a half hours of sleep per night. Chronic sleep deprivation can have a variety of effects on metabolism and overall health.
Inadequate sleep:
- Interferes with the body’s ability to metabolize carbohydrates and causes high blood levels of glucose, which leads to higher insulin levels and greater body-fat storage.
- Drives down leptin levels, which causes the body to crave carbohydrates.
- Reduces levels of growth hormone–a protein that helps regulate the body’s proportions of fat and muscle.
- Can lead to insulin resistance and contribute to increased risk of diabetes
- Can increase blood pressure
- Can increase the risk of heart disease
Recommended Reading: American Sleep Therapy Bed Prices
Sleep Schedule And Weight Loss
While you sleep, you’re also fasting, which may help with weight loss. When experts subjected lab mice to the same diet but imposed different eating cycles, the mice with an enforced fast lost more weight than the animals allowed to eat whenever they wanted. The researchers discovered that the animals began to burn fat only after a few hours of fasting, reported Cell Metabolism in June 2012. More research is needed to prove the same effect happens in people, however.
Lack of sleep is associated with weight gain due to changes in hunger hormones and metabolism. On the flip side, maintaining a regular sleep schedule and getting eight hours of sleep preserves muscle mass, which keeps BMR higher.
In a study exploring the effect of sleep loss on metabolism, two groups of adults followed a calorie-restricted diet, but each group got different amounts of sleep. Everyone lost about the same amount of weight, but the group that got less sleep 5.5 hours each night lost 60 percent more muscle and 55 percent less fat. By comparison, the group that slept 8.5 hours lost more fat than muscle, according to a report in the Annals of Internal Medicine in April 2010.
The researchers concluded that sufficient sleep helps maintain lean muscle, but because the study only included 10 subjects, more research is needed to verify these results.
Read more:The Effects of Sleeping 5 Hours a Night
The Connection Between Sleep And Weight
Over the past several decades, the amount of time that Americans spend sleeping has steadily decreased, as has the self-reported quality of that sleep. For much of the same time period, the average body mass index of Americans increased, reflecting a trend toward higher body weights and elevated rates of obesity.
In response to these trends, many researchers began to hypothesize about potential connections between weight and sleep. Numerous studies have suggested that restricted sleep and poor sleep quality may lead to metabolic disorders, weight gain, and an increased risk of obesity and other chronic health conditions.
While there is continuing debate within the medical community about the exact nature of this relationship, the existing research points to a positive correlation between good sleep and healthy body weight.
There remains much to be discovered about the intricate details of how sleep and weight are connected. Several hypotheses offer paths for additional research with the hope that increasing our understanding of the relationship between weight and sleep will lead to reduced obesity and better weight-loss methods.
Also Check: Sleep Number 360 Limited Edition
If Youre On A Diet Will You Lose More Weight If Youre Getting Eight Hours Sleep
Having spent years studying the relationship between exercise, weight management and health, UCLAs Dr. Christopher B. Cooper, together with a team at the university , carried out research that focused on weight, nutrition, exercise and sleep.
Over 12 weeks, two groups followed the same exercise and nutrition programme, but one also received a behavioural modification programme a major part of which was sleep training. By the end of the study, the group without the additional training had lost on average 1.3 kilograms of fat mass. The group who received the additional training had lost 2.3 kilograms.
Dr. Cooper explains: We were unable to demonstrate that wed improved sleep quality, but intriguingly we improved exercise performance, aerobic quality including oxygen uptake and body composition. We saw significant reductions in the percentage of body fat at the end of the exercise training programme that had incorporated sleep training.
However, says Dr. Cooper, there is still a lot of work to be done in the field. Common sense shows us there has to be a relationship between sleep, weight management, exercise and other aspects of behaviour. Lots of studies in our review articles clearly demonstrate associations, but its a much greater challenge to prove cause and effect. More studies are definitely required.
Do Cold Showers Burn Fat
Cold showers may help boost weight loss Some fat cells, such as brown fat, can generate heat by burning fat. They do this when your body is exposed to cold conditions like in a shower. Gerrit Keferstein, MD, says these cells are mostly situated around the neck and shoulder area. So, perfect for showers!
Read Also: Sleep Number Store Amarillo Tx
Can Sleep Help You Lose Weight
We strive to help you make smarter purchasing decisions. While we adhere to strict editorial integrity, this post may contain references to products from our partners. Heres an explanation for how we make money.
Its no secret that many of us long to lose weight. According to the Centers for Disease Control, almost half of Americans have experienced obesity. If youre among that group, you know how hard it is to find the right combination of exercise, eating right, and more that will put you on a path to a healthier weight.
Of course, the pandemic hasnt made it any easier, as gyms have closed and weve relocated our work life to the dining room table. Two years of burnout have led many of us, understandably, to engage in habits like stress-eating that lead to weight gain. All of this led to what pundits are calling the COVID-15 pandemic-related weight gain that, research shows, happened to many of us. But as youll see if you read on, getting a good nights sleep can put you on the right track if weight loss is your resolution #1 for 2022.
So can our sleep help us lose weight? It would be nice if a solid nights shut-eye shaved off half a pound, but unfortunately, its not that easy. There are, however, some interesting connections between sleep and weight that are worth exploring. In this article, well take a closer look at the question of how your sleep patterns may, in fact, play an important role in your efforts to reach a healthier weight.