Sleep Your Way to Good Health

   The importance of sleep is often overlooked by so many in the midst of these busy, hectic lives we lead. Work, kids, household chores and everything else take first priority and sleep gets put on the back burner. Yet everyone feels the effects from lack of sleep in their everyday life, so why are so few of us actually making an effort to get those 8 hours of sleep every night?
   Lack of sleep obviously leaves you feeling drained all day long and reaching for that morning coffee, or energy drink that gives you a quick boost and then drops you back down again. So many people wake up and MUST have that drink in their system or they can't start their day off on the right foot, something 8 hours of sleep can cure right away.
   Other than being tired, which is fairly obvious, what else can lack of sleep do to our bodies? Studies have shown that people getting considerably less sleep (5.5 hours per night) lose and average of 1.3 pounds of fat in their weight loss goals. Where as people who got more sleep (8.5) hours lost 3.3 pounds of fat. The biggest difference being that 75% of the weight lost by the people with less sleep was muscle.
  Lack of sleep can also do significant damage to the body's metabolism (which burns fat). Lack of sleep can decrease the body's calorie expenditure and in turn drastically slow down your metabolism. In addition to our bodies metabolism being slowed down due to the decreased calorie expenditure there is another biological reason sleep affects our weight loss. Cortisol levels in the body increase as a result of sleep deprivation and as a result even further slow down metabolism. Have you ever woken up after a short nights sleep and felt hungrier then ever? So you eat a big breakfast only to feel just as hungry later in the day? That's because sleep deprivation increases appetite which has obvious importance in your wellness plan.
   We all know the importance of staying active for a healthy lifestyle, but how many of us feel like getting to the gym early in the morning after 6 hours of sleep? Or going after work after being drained from the everyday grind on that same nights sleep? Not many. Not having the energy to get to the gym is going to be a challenge if day after day your not fully rested. For those days when you do get to the gym, sleeping is when your body recovers from exercise and recharges for the next day.
   7.5-9 hours per day is recommended for the average adult. The National Sleep Foundation reports that 40 million adults suffer from 70 different sleep disorders, and 60% of adults report having sleep problems 2x per week or more. That's a lot of stressed out people sabotaging themselves on their way to a successful and healthy wellness plan, so get some sleep!