Happy Sunday purples!
I hope you have all been keeping cool over the weekend. It sure has been hot hot hot!! Today I was talking to some people about the importance of sleep and so I thought that it would be a good topic for my blog today. I may have blogged about it in the past, but it never hurts to be reminded of these things, because sometimes we just get so busy with life that we forget.
We all know that sleep is important and that our bodies need a certain amount of sleep in order to function at its best. Not all of us may be aware that one of the biggest reasons we need to make sure we get enough sleep is to do with our weight and that is what I am going to be talking about today.
Lack of sleep affects our hormones and there are 3 in particular that I want to talk about. The first one is called Grehlin. Grehlin is the hormone that tells our brain that we are hungry and that it’s time to eat. Lack of sleep causes the body to produce more Grehlin, so we feel hungrier. The second one is called Leptin. Leptin is the hormone that tells our brain that we are full. Sleep deprivation causes Leptin levels to drop massively and so our brain doesn’t get the signal that we have had enough to eat. The effect of these 2 hormones means that our brain keeps thinking it’s hungry and we never feel full so we eat more and more and more. Added to that, the third hormone that comes into play is called Cortisol. Cortisol is a stress hormone. Sleep deprivation causes a spike in Cortisol which basically tells our body to conserve our energy to fuel our waking hours, which means we hang onto fat. Can you see why lack of sleep can be a huge contributor for those who have a weight problem?
The amount of sleep we need to get varies from person to person between 7 and 9 hours of sleep per night, but the bare minimum is 6 hours. Any less than that, and all of the above comes into play. If you have a weight problem and regularly get less than 6 hours of sleep per night, do yourself a favour and find a way to get more sleep it you can. It will benefit you in so many ways!
Sweet dreams & have a great week everyone!
Shari
Xoxo