[Sleeping baby. Awww.]
Sleep your way to fat loss?
A small (239 subjects) but long (6 years) study showed that increasing sleep from 6 hours or less to 7 hours or more reduced belly fat gain by about 26%.
[Read closely: That does NOT say you will lose 26% of your belly fat by sleeping more. The point here is that sleep does indeed make a difference.]
There’s a pretty good chance you’re noting getting enough sleep. About a third of American adults don’t.
Get your sleep routine together:
- Decide on a bedtime – and stick to it
- Get outside in bright sunlight when you can
- Watch the late day caffeine intake (duh)
- Avoid screens (phone, TV, etc.) at least an hour before bed
- Consider a magnesium supplement. My doctor-wife recommends Natural Calm to her patients.
- Make sure your bedroom is cool (69 degrees or lower) and dark. If you can straighten your arm and still see you hand, the room’s not dark enough.
- Experiment with a quick shower an hour or so before bed. Some people find a hot shower relaxing, while others do better with the body-temperature-lowering effect of a cold shower.
Geeky footnote:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24420871
“A spontaneous change in sleep duration (from a short to an adequate duration) is independently and inversely associated with long-term VAT [Visceral Adipose Tissue] accumulation.”
