Memory lapses, continuous tiredness, exhaustion, difficulty in facing the days with energy. But problems with weight loss and visceral fat accumulation could also be caused by a common factor, lack of sleep. Lack of sleep is still very much underestimated today. Sometimes, in fact, sleep is almost considered a luxury.
In reality, sleep represents one of the fundamental factors for the psychophysical well-being of man. And its deficiency could create numerous damages and affect other processes, including hormonal ones.
Memory problems, fatigue and difficulty losing weight could be due to the lack of this very important factor that many underestimate
Often many people sacrifice hours of sleep to try not to miss anything during the day: time for work, for the family, for training and finally time for leisure, which very often is reduced to night hours. The same goes for shift workers, who often work at night depriving themselves of sleep.
Getting adequate sleep is essential for our health. In fact, not getting enough sleep would be one of the main causes of weight gain and the development of diseases, such as obesity and cardiovascular problems.
The experiment
To highlight the harmful effects of lack of sleep there is a recent study conducted on 20 healthy and normal weight people. These were divided into 2 groups. One group experienced 4 hours of sleep deprivation per night for 14 days. The other group, on the other hand, got the classic 8 hours of sleep a night.
During the experiment, the sleep deprivation group was found to have increased calorie intake by about 300 kcal per day. And after 14 days the same people had gained about 1 kg in weight and above all the fat mass had increased. That mass linked to the development of diseases such as diabetes, insulin resistance and cardiovascular disease.
In contrast, the other group did not experience any weight or fat gain.
Lack of sleep, in fact, would cause an increase in the sense of hunger and would lead to an increase in the desire for hyper-processed foods with a consequent increase in visceral fat mass. Furthermore, it could generate problems such as lack of attention, short temper and memory problems. This would result from the alteration of hormones such as ghrelin, cortisol and leptin, all hormones capable of controlling hunger.
Here, then, why memory problems, fatigue and difficulty losing weight could be caused by a lack of sleep.
The advice is to sleep at least 7 hours a night and to avoid sleep deprivation as much as possible.
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