5 Sneaky Ways Stress Sabotages Your Fat Loss (And What To Do About It)
Stress is a common part of our everyday lives, but it can have a significant impact on our health and wellness goals, especially when it comes to fat loss. While it's well known that stress can lead to emotional eating or skipping workouts, the effects of stress on fat loss are more complex and far-reaching.
In this article, we'll explore five ways stress can make fat loss more challenging, and provide strategies to help you manage stress and stay on track with your health goals.
Intensifies Hunger and Cravings
Stress can significantly impact our eating behaviours. When stressed, the body releases cortisol, a hormone that can increase appetite and cravings, particularly for high-fat, sugary, or salty foods. This is why those unhealthy snacks in the cupboard are so tempting when we stress eat. It's a coping mechanism where the brain seeks these comfort foods to counteract stress, often leading to overeating. This increased calorie intake can make it harder to maintain a calorie deficit, which is crucial for fat loss.
Small Actions To Try:
Practice mindful eating. Become fully aware and present while eating, savouring each bite, and listening to the body's hunger and fullness cues. Just eat your meal one bite at a time instead of shovelling food down unconsciously while watching TV. This mindful eating trick is hard to do at first when you feel like you’re starving stressed and want to cope by eating more but because it takes 20 minutes for your brain to get the fullness signal after you start eating, this helps to hit that point without stuffing yourself.
Try to do one minute of deep breathing, meditation, or yoga before your meal. These practices can help reduce the impulse to stress-eat and improve your mindful eating action as well.
Slows Metabolism By Suppressing Thyroid Production
Stress can negatively affect the thyroid gland, which plays a pivotal role in regulating metabolism. Chronic stress can lead to conditions where thyroid hormone production is reduced. This reduction can lead to a slower metabolism, meaning the body burns fewer calories at rest. A slower metabolism can make it more challenging to lose fat, as the body becomes less efficient at using energy.
Small Actions To Try:
Make sure that your diet is rich in nutrients that help to support thyroid health. This includes minerals like iodine, selenium, and zinc. Foods like seafood, nuts, seeds, and whole grains are great sources.
If you suspect a chronic issue with thyroid hormones, consult your doctor or a registered dietitian to get further support.
Drains Your Energy, Making You Too Tired to Work Out
High levels of stress can lead to both physical and mental fatigue. This exhaustion can make it challenging to find the motivation or energy to engage in physical activities, including workouts that help to promote fat loss. Exercise not only helps burn calories but also builds muscle, which can increase your resting metabolic rate. Without regular exercise, achieving a calorie deficit for fat loss becomes more difficult.
Small Actions To Try:
10-minute walks around your block after meals. When stress stacks up and time constraints are making it impossible to hit the gym, fit in shorter activities like going for a walk around your block or searching for a 10-minute stretching or home workout routine on YouTube.
These shorter activities can be more manageable and less daunting than longer workout sessions when you don’t have extra time in your schedule.
Interferes with Sleep
Quality sleep is crucial for weight management and overall health. Stress can lead to sleep disturbances like difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep, reducing the overall quality and quantity of sleep. Poor sleep can disrupt the balance of hunger hormones, like ghrelin and leptin, leading to increased appetite and a tendency to overeat. Additionally, lack of sleep can reduce energy levels, further impacting exercise routines and daily activity.
Small Actions To Try:
We love sleep around here and taking small actions to improve “sleep hygiene” is what can help to combat how stress is affecting your sleep.
Set a regular sleep schedule. Sticking to it even on weekends will help to regulate your sleep cycle even when highly stressed.
Create a more comfortable sleep environment by eliminating lights, using white noise or earplugs, and keeping your room cool or to the temperature you prefer.
Turn off screens an hour before bed and switch to other relaxing things like reading, yoga, meditation, or taking a warm bath.
Makes It Difficult to Keep Long-term Goals Front of Mind
Stress can impact cognitive functions such as focus, memory, and decision-making. When under stress, it becomes harder to stay focused on long-term objectives like fat loss goals. Stress can lead to a short-term mindset, where immediate gratification (such as eating comfort foods) takes precedence over long-term benefits. This shift in focus can derail progress towards fat loss goals, as it becomes challenging to adhere to dietary plans and exercise routines that require consistent effort over time.
Small Actions To Try:
Just like we’ve done in this article, break down your long-term health goals into smaller actions.
Use a journal or app like Flow Coach to track your progress and reflect on your achievements. We see much greater success and long-term consistency when we make one small change at a time instead of trying to overhaul our whole routine. This is at the root of our coaching philosophy and how we’ve designed the Flow Coach App.
By understanding and addressing these stress-related challenges, individuals can better navigate their fat loss journey with more effective strategies and a holistic approach to health and well-being.
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