Sleep more, weight less?

su7kids

Fri, Nov 24 2006, 11:54 am

It is something to do with a hormonal balance.

from a holistic/natural healing website called www.mercola.com:

How Obesity and Sleep Debt Are Linked

It's no coincidence those who suffer from lack of sleep (insomnia) often struggle with obesity as well. Research has found that the less people sleep, the more likely they are to gain weight, as the lack of sleep triggers hormone imbalances that boost the desire to eat.

In a study involving mice and human cells, researchers traced the link between sleep debt and obesity to the hypocretin/orexin cells in the hypothalamus region of the brain -- which includes vital autonomic regulatory centers (as for the control of food intake) -- that are easily excited and sensitive to stress. These specialized brain cells are particularly vulnerable to over-stimulation and lack the ability of most other neurons to filter out signals from other regions of the brain that aren't meant for them.

What does this mean? If the hypocretin/orexin cells are over-stimulated by either environmental or mental stress in daily situations, they may support sustained arousal, generating sleeplessness and leading to overeating.

Finding ways to moderate this wiring may aid researchers in discovering new treatment methods for insomnia and other sleep disorders.

Revealing the Link

Researchers conducted experiments using lab mice and human brain slices to study how the cells are organized and connected to the rest of the brain. They found:

Each brain cell has 10 times more nerve junctions that excite them than inhibitory contacts, with humans and mice.
Overnight food deprivation encouraged the formation of even more "excitatory" inputs.
Once the mice were fed, the inputs reversed, showing the responsiveness of the hypocretin system to current conditions.
Therefore, those suffering from weight and sleep problems would benefit from reducing stressful aspects in their lives.

Dr. Mercola's Comment:

It was previously thought that the connection between lack of sleep and obesity was due to insulin impairment.

However, it now appears that insulin may have just been a marker and that the more important hormonal dysfunction may be due to the "new kid on the health block," leptin.

Dr. Ron Rosedale is one of the leading experts in the country on leptin, and he is convinced its appreciation is where insulin's was 10 years ago. Earlier this month, he was kind enough to expand on the new appreciation of insulin. The original draft of his book, The Rosedale Diet, had the best explanation of leptin written, but his publisher forced him to drop it and convert his book to more of a diet book to increase sales.

Not to worry, though. I was able to convince him to share on these pages what his publisher forced him to remove. The brief summary is that leptin is more important than insulin, and I have switched to measuring leptin, not insulin, on all my patients.

But getting back to the topic, the results of this study provide further support to the connection between lack of sleep and obesity and suggest that it may be even deeper and more complicated than we originally believed.

If you do not have the tools to transform chronic stress, it can have a powerful negative effect on your health.

In regard to sleep deprivation and obesity, it seems stress can create an especially vicious cycle where daily exposure leads to lack of sleep, which leads to more stress, but also leads to an increased risk for weight gain. Weight gain will, of course, add even more stress to your life, contributing to the original stress that caused the poor sleep in the first place!