Body Workout Plan

You probably know that if you don’t sleep well or sleep enough, you’ll have little energy for the next day’s activities and will feel cranky and unhappy. But you may not realize that insufficient or restless sleep can also affect your ability to stay well and stay fit.

Less sleep can make you fatter! Recent research has shown that there may be a direct correlation between the amount and type of sleep we get and the hormones that signal to our bodies that we’re hungry or full. When we don’t get the rest we need, the hormone ghrelin tells us that we need food. A good rest has the opposite effect: the hormone leptin tells us that we are full and not hungry.

These hormones, as all hormones in our bodies, need to be in balance; and for many people they are not. Actually, there’s not much about our lives that is in balance, so it’s no wonder that obesity is becoming an epidemic. Our modern lifestyles are not conducive to good sleep patterns. Instead of putting aside our work habits and settling down about an hour before it’s time to go to bed, we keep ourselves going till just before we decide to turn in.

Maybe we’re checking our emails or different websites until past midnight or maybe we’re just multitasking right up to the last minute, trying to accomplish things that we think can’t wait till tomorrow. We’re ordering movies on demand on television or on the computer or trying to win that last round in a video game. Never before have there been so many distractions at our fingertips that keep us from getting a good night’s sleep.

Even those who think they are getting a good night’s sleep because they’re turning in and getting up at a reasonable hour may not be. Sleep apnea seems to be a pervasive condition today. Some of us stop breathing for periods during the night without realizing it. If you feel like you can never get enough rest, you may need to visit a sleep clinic to see if sleep apnea is your diagnosis.

If it is, there are lots of things that can be done, including wearing a breathing device at night. It’s important for your rest and also for your fitness, but more importantly because it can be a life-threatening situation because any stoppage of breath is serious. All of this sleep deprivation that we’re experiencing as a culture is serious and carries big health risks.

No one knows for sure, but there are probably many cancers that develop and grow faster with lack of sleep as a component. Diabetes, which is related to obesity, is not helped by lack of sleep, and heart disease is certainly linked to increased tension and nervousness. Stress contributes to many of our diseases, and stress is made much worse when we don’t have the coping tool of a good night’s rest when we arise to face the challenges of a typical day.

Ideal amounts of sleep vary from person to person, but it’s probably wide to aim for 7 or 8 hours of quality sleep time. If you’re not getting that, or if you’re going to bed but getting up feeling unrested, you’ll need to see a health professional. You can start with your family doctor, for instance, or make an appointment at that sleep clinic. Then you’ll know if you have apnea or whether you need to just train yourself to make some behavioral changes.