All of us know that losing weight isn’t easy. There are more fad diets than you can count or keep track of. So why don’t they work? One answer may lie in our sleep habits.

Recent scientific studies show a strong relationship between sleep deprivation and weight gain, even though we don’t know exactly why this occurs. Here are some findings:

·    People who slept less than six hours a night experienced an increase in their body mass index (height-to-weight ratio). This was comparably more than those who slept seven to eight hours.

·    According to a 16 year study, women who slept five hours a day or less gained more weight than those who slept seven hours a day.

·    People who slept less than eight hours a day had larger increases in body fat than those who slept more.

Since our bodies’ major activities, including temperature regulation, hormone secretion and brain chemistry production, run on a 24-hour cycle, when we mess with that cycle by depriving our body of regular sleep, hormones that regulate whether we feel full or hungry get out of whack, so all of our normal cues for eating are altered. When we’re tired or feeling fatigued we don’t always make the healthy food choices and that leads to snacking, over-eating and eating comfort foods that are high in calories and/or fat.

Because we live in a hectic world with busy schedules and demands on our time and choices, building a daily sleep schedule is as important to successful weight loss as an eating schedule. This is especially difficult for most of us with high stress lives, but is a real double whammy for weight loss: we eat to relieve stress, but also can’t sleep because we’re too stressed out! So what is a dieter to do? While the obvious solution is to sleep eight hours each night, the real-life answer is not so easy. Here some steps you can take to help regain some control and minimize the likelihood that lack of sleep will sabotage your weight-loss efforts:

·    Try to set a regular schedule. Eat regularly — at least three to four times each day. Aim for seven hours of sleep. Creating some structure in your life. And make sleep a priority.

·    Don’t use food to “wake you up.” Take a power nap between 15 and 20 minutes instead. Always think before you eat and make a healthy choice. Avoid junk food, which may be comforting, but it won’t give you a metabolic pick-me-up. If you feel like you need an energy boost, eat a piece of fresh fruit, a half a sandwich made with lean protein (such as turkey, chicken or tuna), some low-fat cheese or low-fat yogurt, a 100-calorie protein bar, or a 100-calorie pack of crackers.

·    Address your stress. Separate mental fatigue (stress) from physical fatigue. Try to reduce your stress levels by taking a 20-minute walk, and increasing your activity of daily living. This can help promote a more restful sleep. Wear a pedometer and monitor your activity. Aim for 10,000 steps daily for optimal weight management. In the beginning, set a more realistic goal of at least 5,000 steps a day.

·    See your doctor to rule out any medical illnesses contributing to lack of sleep and weight gain.

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