Weight and Sleep Patterns
My last post showed that increased weight had negative effects on one's sexual health and that the best way to counter these effects was to lose weight. Along those lines another finding published in the Archives of Internal Medicine has found an association between increased Body Mass Index (BMI) and lesser amounts of sleep.The study tracked 990 people and found that for each hour of sleep less that the person got the BMI of those people were .42 higher, or approximately 3 pounds of weight.
Diminishing Returns
These findings can be extrapolated out to some basic assumptions. If you sleep 5 1/2 hours a night you probably are carrying on average an extra 5-7 pounds than you otherwise would be carrying if you slept the ideal amount nightly. You can also make further assumptions which are likely untrue due to the basic law of diminishing returns. You likely cannot sleep as a weight loss tool alone. Sure getting a full nights sleep helps but sleeping 14 hours a night will probably not make you lose an extra 21 pounds without further extreme practices such as significant exercise. Besides the body is just not made to run on so much sleep.Thoughts on Calorie Intake
My thoughts on this are really based on nothing whatsoever other than good old fashioned deduction. If you are sleeping 8 hours rather than five hours you have a three hour longer window of opportunity to indulge in extra calories each and every day. If I get up after five hours of sleep I will have some breakfast. Three hours later when an eight hour sleeper gets up they will have breakfast and I am already starting to think about a snack or my second meal of the day already. In my opinion this is why the association likely exists. It could likely be snuffed out through simple discipline in portion control but then again I could be wrong. Maybe it has to do with something different altogether. What do you think?Source
Archives of Internal Medicine, Sep. 2006
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