How many times have you heard that good sleep is important for fat loss, muscle gain, improved performance, and world peace? Ok, I admit I added on the world peace part because I am an optimist. But the fact remains, good sleep could possibly cure just about anything.
A study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal took two groups, one sleep-deprived and one non-sleep-deprived. The non-sleep-deprived group lost on average 4 more pounds than the sleep-deprived group. That is significant! Another study from the University of Chicago had two group on a calorically restricted diet. In phase one, participants had 5.5 hours of sleep, in phase two, they had 8.5 hours of sleep. This group lost 55% more body fat in phase two than in phase one.
Sleep deprivation also makes you a dumber human being. Briefly, the prefrontal cortex is responsible for higher-level decision-making. When it is partially shut down (say from lack of sleep), you make stupid decisions. (Irrelevant, but funny: teenagers have underdeveloped pre-frontal cortices, so if you are wondering why they make so many stupid decisions…this part of the brain is still under constructions. Are you thinking about your stupid teenage years now?)
You probably know all this already. But did you know that it is the quality of sleep that matters? You can get less sleep, but if that sleep is of higher quality, you feel, perform, and shed fat like someone who sleeps more. What is higher quality sleep and how can you get it? Hint, it is not on Amazon.
A full sleep cycle is 90 minutes and includes the following four stages:
- Light
- Slow wave (also called deep sleep)
- REM
- Wake
If most of your sleep is not slow-wave and REM sleep, you wake up feeling like crap and not well rested. So higher quality sleep is effectively going through all stages of a 90-minute sleep cycle.
*Of note for my fitness audience (especially bodybuilders), the FIRST 90-minute sleep cycle is the most important because this is when your body produces the most growth hormone (GH). GH helps with everything from anti-aging and fat loss to muscle gain. It also helps preserve muscle. Getting to sleep between 10pm and midnight is key because that is when the most HGH is secreted. *
How does poor sleep lead to fat gain?
This is a big question, and the response could take several volumes of books to fully answer. I will attempt to simplify and spare you much of the boring science. It all starts with the cortisol-melatonin cycle.
When you have a healthy sleep rhythm, your cortisol levels are highest in the morning and taper off throughout the day. Melatonin is the exact opposite; levels are highest prior to bed and taper off when you wake up. Now, if you have an unhealthy sleep rhythm, you likely have higher cortisol levels prior to bed and higher melatonin levels when you wake up (tired in the morning and wired at night).
In serious, chronic instances, an out-of-whack- sleep hormone cycle causes people to turn to stimulants in the morning to get out of bed, and sedatives to wind down. If you need excessive caffeine to function in the morning and exogenous melatonin to fall asleep, your quality of sleep will suffer until and so will your health (long-term).
Now to tie this into fat gain. When cortisol is elevated at the wrong time, it leads to an effect known as gluconeogenesis, which is a super fancy way of saying your body breaks down muscle for energy. Also, elevated cortisol at night limits your body’s production of growth hormone. Poor sleep also messes with the main hormones responsible for managing hunger: leptin and ghrelin.
Leptin is the satiating hormone – it makes you feel full. Ghrelin is the hormone that makes you hungry. A single night of poor sleep will cause ghrelin to increase, leptin to decrease – leading people to eat more calories the next day. In this insatiable state, most people do not reach for healthy foods. Instead, they eat mostly junk or whole jars of peanut butter or whatever is handy. These hormonal factors are why sleep is so important for fat loss.
Final Thoughts on Improving Sleep
Basically, poor sleep is bad news all the way around. Hopefully, you have a better understanding of why you need to get quality sleep. None of this matters unless you actually have new strategies you can use to improve the quality of sleep without making your sleep schedule control your life.
I like simple. If routines are complex, people will not follow them. Here is a general recommendation to help improve your pre-bedtime routine: Three hours before bed should be your last heavy meal (snacking is fine). Two hours before bed you should stop all work (if possible). One hour before bed you should turn off all screens (read, have sex, meditate – anything other than look at a screen).
To reiterate the simple approach – make one change at a time. From all the possible options, choose one that you feel you can implement without disrupting your routine too much. Over time, you can integrate one habit at a time, until you are sleeping like a pro. Notice, I did not say you need to sleep 8 hours. Sleep quantity is important, but if you can take the quantity, you are getting right now, and just improve the quality, your performance, muscles, mindset, brain, and other areas of your life will improve.
What are your thoughts? Drop me a comment below!