Losing weight is challenging and requires a few significant lifestyle changes that greatly impact and affect a person's health and life. A majority of people think of diet and exercise as the only important factors affecting weight loss.
However, there is one more crucial element that we often forget about, which is proper sleep; yes, you read it right. Having a good night's sleep and proper rest after a long day is as essential for the body to lose weight as a healthy diet and an active lifestyle.
Sleep is the body's way of resting after working all day. Like every other person and living thing in the universe, our bodies and minds also need some time off to rest and reset. Sleep is essential and crucial for the body and mind to function properly, develop immunity, fight diseases, and ensure proper metabolism.
Sleep is interconnected to each part, organ, and aspect of our body and life, while greatly impacting our health and well-being. Surprisingly our body has an internal clock known as the 'circadian rhythm' that operates according to a 24-hour cycle.
This circadian rhythm notices and manages our body and energy levels when we get tired, sleepy, refreshed or alert. The circadian rhythm is also responsible for predicting and impacting our moods when we get enough sleep and don't get enough sleep, leading us to irritation, stress, lack of concentration, and so on.
Sleep quality depends on how well you have slept and how restful and restorative you feel afterward. Your quality of sleep differs from the quantity of sleep you have got. For example, you may have slept for ten hours but with disruption and wakefulness.
While on the other hand, you sleep only for five hours without disruption and feel energized and calm like never before. The latter experience happens due to the quality of your sleep. The quality of sleep can be measured by four factors, which are discussed below:
Sleep hygiene is simply the environment you create, and your routine for sleep. Maintaining a healthy and peaceful environment in your bedroom, and a calm and relaxing routine contributes to good sleep hygiene.
Sleep hygiene also depends on a few factors, and you can follow effective sleep hygiene by working on the following things:
An adequate amount of rest and sleep is essential for a properly working body and mind, as it is the body and mind's way to energize itself and get going. Adults aged 24 to 65 years require almost 7 to 9 hours of sleep each night to function properly.
Following are the issues that you can incur if you don’t get enough sleep or rest at night:
Many factors can impact a person's body weight, including medical conditions, lifestyle factors, gender, working routine, eating habits and genes. Some of the most important factors that impact your body weight are:
If you have had a history or family background of weight gain, you are also most likely to end up gaining weight, as genes can greatly impact a person's weight.
Some ethnicities are more prone to obesity and weight gain than others, such as Americans and African-Americans; they have the highest rate of prevalent obesity, followed by Hispanics and Latinos. At the same time, Asian-American men and women have the lowest rate of obesity.
People with a normal BMI are more prone to gain weight during their adulthood until they reach 60 to 65 years.
In some ethnicities, obesity is associated with a certain gender. On the other hand, factors like hormonal changes, pregnancy, irregular menstrual cycles, or menopause can also cause women to gain weight more than men.
Consuming a carbohydrate and fat-prone diet also increases the chances of a person gaining weight. In order to lose weight, a person should consume a diet full of protein, minerals, and healthy options such as grains and legumes.
Leading an active lifestyle is equally important to losing weight, as having no activity at all can greatly cause weight gain. Daily exercise, walking and running can effectively help in weight loss.
Not having enough sleep also contributes greatly to improper functions of body organs, especially the metabolism process. This, again, greatly affects a person's weight and obesity.
Medical ailments such as excessive cholesterol and lipid levels, female reproductive disorders, and thyroid and hormonal imbalances are also leading causes of weight gain and obesity.
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