In this episode of the Eric Roberts Fitness Podcast, I simply go on a black seed oil rant. Unscripted, did not take time to plan out what I was going to say. This is just me ranting on not only black seed oil but the entire fitness industry selling bullsh*t and people continuously buying it.
There are no quick fixes. There never will be. If you keep chasing quick results, you will keep chasing your tail and never seeing results.
The sooner you realize this shit takes Time, effort, and consistency, the sooner you see results.
With the hustle and bustle, the constant need to be connected, and so many responsibilities pulling in so many different directions, it is almost impossible not have these two things be apparent.
Maybe you do a little late night scrolling on your phone and netflix binge watching.
Maybe you are a shift worker who sleeps weird hours.
Either way, I will take you through the science of what the relationship between lack of sleep has with your metabolism, hormones, and cortisol.
You will know how lack of sleep affects other areas of your life and if it is causing a major hinderance to your weight loss journey or not.
By the end of the article you will leave here knowing what to do moving forward.
All I ask is that keep your eyes peeled to the entire article.
There are millions os searched on google for “ is lack of sleep causing weight gain ?”, about 46 million at the time this article was written.
Therefore I want to make sure you leave here knowing exactly what the deal is.
Cool? Awesome. Let’s dive in.
Is Lack Of Sleep Causing Weight Gain?
First Things First
Before we talk about gaining or losing weight, let’s talk about what occurs for either one of those two things to happen.
Your weight is determined by an energy balance equation, energy in and energy out.
Our bodies use calories as our unit of energy, therefore this can be simplified to calories eaten and calories burned.
If you eat more calories than you burn, you will gain weight, which is a calorie surplus.
If you eat the same amount of calories as your body burns, you will maintain your weight, which is a calorie maintenance.
If you eat less calories than your body burns, you will lose weight, which is a calorie deficit.
This is not up for debate.
Now, there are things that influence this energy balance equation. For example your metabolism may be faster than mine, in which case, you would burn more calories than I do.
If you want some scientifically proven ways to increase your metabolism, watch this video I did HERE.
Yet the fact still remains true, this energy balance equation is what leads to what your weight is.
Tying this into this article in particular, if you are reading this article you are probably wondering is lack of sleep causing weight gain.
In which I will respond what causes weight gain is you being in a calorie surplus.
How can sleep affect this? Let’s talk about it now.
Lack Of Sleep And Hormones
Everyone is very quick to run to things like hormones and metabolism when they are not losing weight.
I want to cover what is going on in your body hormonally when you are not getting adequate sleep.
For the purpose of this article “adequate sleep” is referred to 7-9 hrs of sleep per night.
There are two hormones in your body called Leptin and Ghrelin.
Leptin decreases appetite.
Ghrelin increases appetite.
When you sleep through the night Leptin is increased and Ghrelin is decreased.
You are sleeping. Your body is going through its parasympathetic responses of recovering, digesting food, and so on. It does not need to be fed.
This leads Leptin to be increased telling your body you are not hungry.
However, when you are awake, your body is not in this parasympathetic state and Leptin is not being increased.
This leads to Ghrelin being increased. This causes you to be hungrier, have more cravings, and have a bigger appetite.
If we refer back to the beginning, the only way to lose weight is to be in a calorie deficit.
If you are constantly under sleeping this means your Leptin is constantly lowered and Ghrelin is constantly increased.
This leads to you being hungrier, leading you to intake more calories.
If you constantly intake more calories than what your body is burning, that would mean you are in a calorie surplus.
Leading to, you guessed it, weight gain.
Therefore the answer to the question of is lack of sleep causing weight gain is, possibly.
Yet it is not because it is inherently the lack of sleep, it is what comes after the lack of sleep.
You are hungrier due to an increased appetite from your hormones being out of whack. This leads you to intake more calories. You go into a calorie surplus, leading to weight gain.
Is Lack Of Sleep Causing Weight Gain?
Lifestyle Changes
Decreased Energy Expenditure
Face it.
It is hard enough to get up early in the morning and workout as it is.
You don’t want to get out of your comfy and cozy bed.
Or even if you workout at night time.
You get done a stressful work day, you have your kids to take care of, and you have dinner to make.
You have other responsibilities pulling at you to begin with. Working in exercise can be a struggle as is.
Therefore do you really think lack of sleep is going to help that cause?
You are going to wake up in the morning, fresh off 4 hours of sleep, and proceed to say to hell with this I am staying in bed.
Rather maybe you are driving home from work, again fresh off 4 hours of sleep and a stress filled work day on top of that.
This will lead to you saying to hell with this, I am tired. I am going home, skipping my workout, and sitting on the couch to binge watch Netlfix.
Which, me and you both know, comes with snacks. Snacks that aren’t 0 calories celery or pickles. Yet we will get to that later in this article.
Recall the information we started off this article with, weight loss or weight gain comes down to an energy balance equation.
If you are getting inadequate sleep you are now decreasing the energy you expend during the day, aka less calories burned.
When you eat the same as you normally would, but burn less calories, what is this going to do?
Ah, you are smart! Yes, again, it will lead to you being in a calorie surplus and gaining weight.
Yet again, it is not inherently the lack of sleep.
We can ask the same question as we asked earlier, is lack of sleep causing weight gain ?
The answer will be the same, possibly.
It is the fact that from this lack of sleep you affect the energy balance equation in your life tipping towards the weight gain side as opposed to the weight loss side.
This can largely be connected with the fact that when you are sleep deprived your Ghrelin increases which in turns increases your appetite, like we mentioned earlier.
Let’s bring this back to our scenario above where you are on the couch binge watching Netflix, an all too familiar site for so many of us.
You get home from a stressful day at work, tired from the 4 hours of sleep and from the emotional stress at work.
Do you really think you are going to have the willpower to sit there and say “Man, I can’t wait to put a ton of effort into cooking a healthy low calorie dinner!”.
Yea, let’s not kid ourselves. It is going to go more like “What can I eat so my kids will leave me alone and I can just get some peace and quiet”.
“Healthy eating” becomes an afterthought. You have a dinner that you know isn’t the healthiest option yet you eat it anyway because you are tired and just want to sit down and relax.
This normally is not the most beneficial thing when looking to take steps closer to your weight loss goals.
Yet it doesn’t normally stop there.
I mentioned that when you are sitting there on the couch, you are not normally snacking on 0 calorie celery and pickles.
What are you usually snacking on? Be honest.
You are snacking on chips, pretzels, cookies. In other words, all highly palatable snacks.
You aren’t just having one cookie or one pretzel. You are taking a few handfuls and enjoying them.
Therefore now are you not only skipping your workout and sitting on the couch instead, but you are intaking more calories than you would have because you are on the couch snacking.
This, once again, decreases your calories burned and increases your calories taken in.
Which, for the final time you guessed it, leads to weight gain.
As opposed to if you were well rested you would getting your workout in, which would increase your energy expenditure.
You would also have more energy and willpower to be able to make a healthy dinner and skip the late night snacking.
Is Lack Of Sleep Causing Weight Gain?
Break The Chain
Now you know the answer to the question is lack of sleep causing weight gain is possibly, what do you do about it?
First and foremost realize it.
As mentioned earlier, in a 24 hour constant up to date world that we live in, so many people are totally unaware of the negative health effects are coming from lack of sleep.
You have now made yourself aware by reading this article, in which I congratulate you.
Also, you have learned that is not inherently the lack of sleep that is packing fat on your body.
Weight gain or weight loss comes down to an energy balance equation we talked about earlier.
Rather it is what you do after you are sleep deprived that leads to weight gain.
The lack of sleep is leading you to have an increased appetite and eat more.
It is leading you to have less energy during the day, leading you to expend less energy during the day, aka calories burned.
The lifestyle factors that get affected and cause you to intake more calories and burn less calories is what is leading to the weight gain.
There is a chain of events that is leading you to skip your workouts.
It isn’t that in that one moment in time you decide you are not going to workout. There are certain events that led up to that decision.
You got inadequate sleep, you were tired, and you were hangry so you went home instead of working out.
Yet, in the same way you have to cut the head off of the snake, you have to break the chain of events to create a different outcome.
In this scenario it is getting adequate sleep.
What can you do to improve your sleep?
Simple things like.
Having no phone activity 30 minutes before bed
Journaling for 5 minutes before bed
Stretching for 5 minutes before bed
Making an “appointment” with yourself in the morning to wake up to motivate yourself to be well rested for (aka a workout)
Amongst many others can help.
Yet I have a funny feeling you know exactly what you need to do.
You just needed this article to be that kick in the pants you needed to do it.
Got The Answer To Is Lack Of Sleep Causing Weight Gain?
Didn’t I tell you you were going to leave this article knowing everything about lack of sleep and weight gain?
I know it can be incredibly difficult to make sleep a priority in your life with all of your other responsibilities pulling at you.
Yet I hope this article shed some light as to why sleep should be right at the top of your priority list.
I make sure all of my online coaching clients know what I am about to tell you.
Fill your cup up, so you can fill everyone else’s up.
You are a people pleaser. You want to take care of everyone else, and that is admirable.
What you realize is if you are tired, overweight, and not in good health, do you really think everyone is going to get the best version of you?
No, they will be getting 40 50 60% of you.
As opposed to if you got adequate sleep, improved your energy, and improved your health, you would be able to set the world on fire more than you are right now.
Which I know is what you want for you and those around you.
Use this article to make that change in your life. You can do this.
In this episode of the Eric Roberts Fitness Podcast I talk about how everything is hard.
Losing weight is hard. Eating healthy is hard. Working out when you don’t want to is hard.
Yet so is cutting your life 5 10 15 20 years short because you never changed your eating habits. You never started exercising like you were supposed to all of these times.
This is sneak peek of my most important video I have ever put out on my YouTube channel. If I have ever brought you any value, please share that video with someone.
I want everyone in the world to see this video.
Thank you for listening, and remember, you get to choose your hard.
I almost hate that I even have to write an article on why women should lift weights.
Not because I do not want to educate you on it, that there is even a stigma that women should not lift weights.
Being a coach that trains majority women, the physical, emotional, and mental health benefits lifting weights can bring a woman in particular is through the roof.
For those who may have been on the fence whether to lift weights or not, or who have heard reasons as to why women shouldn’t lift weights, I am here to clear all of that up for you.
I am going to give you 4 proven reasons why women should lift weights.
By the end of this article you are going to be ready to start deadlifting up cars.
Okay, maybe that not extreme, but you get the point.
Let’s dive in.
4 Reasons Why Women Should Lift Weights
Before We Get Started…
The biggest issue I hear when people talk about females lifting weights is that they don’t want to get big and bulky.
Let me put it to you like this.
Just because you drive your car to and from work everyday, doesn’t make you a Nascar driver.
Just because you played soccer on the middle or high school team, doesn’t mean you are going to play on the Olympic team.
Point being, lifting weights does not inherently make you look like a professional bodybuilder.
Trust me, if it was that easy, I would be huge by now.
I have dedicated my entire life to trying to get “big and bulky” and I am no where close to what a professional bodybuilder looks like.
Why?
Because it is hard. It takes time. It takes a ton of effort.
You lifting weights 3-4x a week for 45-70 minutes is not enough to make you big and bulky. I promise you.
On top of that, gaining actual size to your frame is done via nutrition as well.
If you are not eating more calories than your body burns, aka being in a calorie surplus, you will not gain that much muscle size if any at all.
All of this to say
Lifting weights does not inherently make you big and bulky. There are multiple other factors that come into play.
Do not be afraid of lifting weights for this reason.
Actually, it is the exact opposite. You should be looking to lift weights to attain the physique you want. Let’s talk about that now.
Reason #1Why Women Should Lift Weights – Aesthetic Appearance
Most women want to “lose weight”, which I totally understand.
There is nothing wrong with that, again I coach mainly women in their weight loss journeys.
Yet here is the thing, you don’t actually want to just lose weight.
You want to look a certain way.
You want defined shoulders and arms in your dress.
You want bigger glutes.
You want leg definition.
Hell let’s just say it, you want to look good naked.
There is nothing wrong with that, at all.
Yet I am here to tell, you are not going to achieve that through nutrition and cardio alone.
Why?
Because you need to build lean muscle mass in order to show the definition in your shoulders, or to have bigger glutes.
If you solely do cardio and change your nutrition, you will be able to lose weight, but you will end up being “skinny fat”.
You won’t be fat necessarily, but you also won’t look the way you want to look. You won’t have the definition in your shoulders or arms.
This is where lifting weights comes in.
If you are wanting that “look”, as opposed to just losing weight, I would highly suggest making best friends with the weights.
I did an entire YouTube video on how to set up your own workout routine. If you want to watch that you can head HERE.
Now onto the next point, a concern for many women, your metabolism.
Reason #2 Why Women Should Lift Weights – Boosting Metabolism
“My metabolism is just so slow! That is why I can’t lose weight!”.
Sound familiar?
First off I would double check that video by watching this YouTube video here.
Second, even if your metabolism is a tad slow, don’t worry because I got your back.
One of the great things about lifting weights is being able to boost your metabolism.
When you add lean muscle mass to your body, you automatically boost your metabolism.
Lean muscle requires more oxygen to get pumped to it, which means more work for your body, which means more calories burned, aka boosting metabolism.
Yet, truthfully, it is not that much.
The reason building lean muscle mass can help your metabolism is because of the other things you also have to do to acquire this new lean muscle that compounds on top of each other to have a great effect.
For starters you have to push yourself in the gym by having intense workouts.
I don’t mean being out of breath and jumping around like a kangaroo, I mean pushing heavier weights to muscle failure.
This in itself is burns calories, before and after your workout. That is why it can be so beneficial for boosting your metabolism.
If you want to know how much weight you should be lifting during your workouts you can read my article I wrote on that HERE .
Therefore now not only are you physically adding lean muscle which is going to help boost your metabolism, but also the workouts you are doing are going to burn calories before and after your workout.
Yet we aren’t done there.
To build lean muscle mass you are going to have to eat high protein.
This is because protein is the only macronutrient that can build and retain lean muscle mass.
This means if you stick with a consistent weight lifting program, not only are you going to be able to look and feel good in the short term, but you will improve the quality of your life in the long term.
On top of that, think about the exercises done in a strength training program.
Squats, deadlifts, overhead presses, push ups, etc.
Don’t you think as you age, it would be a good idea to be strong in picking things up off of the ground, or reaching over your head to put something on or get something off the cabinet?
You know, everyday normal life occurrences?
Again this will maintain or improve the quality of life as you age.
So you aren’t on a walker at 60 years old or cannot play with your grandkids or travel the world at age 70.
Truly, that is what matters to me and all of the clients I coach.
Losing weight and looking good is awesome, but what you do 30 40 50 years from now, that matters too.
Lifting weights is not just a short term fix, yet a long term solution.
Reason #4 Why Women Should Lift Weights- Mental Health
This is by far the most important reason for me, which is why I saved the best for last.
It seems that every single time I get onboard a new online coaching client, get them set up, and shoot them over their workout program, within the next 1-3 weeks they are telling me how accomplished they feel.
How strong they feel.
How empowered they from completing the workouts. From lifting weights. From pushing themselves to lift as heavy as they can in their workouts.
They tell me they feel confident in themselves. They are proud of themselves.
All from completing the workouts and lifting weights.
This matters. This matters a lot.
I distinctly remember coaching ladies in person and telling them to go pick up the 100lb kettlebell.
Every single one would look at me like I had 6 heads.
Me, knowing they are a bad a** and could do it, insisted once again they they do it.
The moment they picked that heavy kettlebell off of the ground and their face lit up like a Christmas tree, those are images I will never forget.
That sense of feeling strong and feeling empowered that you get from lifting weights is just something, anecdotally speaking, you can’t seem to replicate anywhere else.
The most important part of this is this translates to other areas of your life.
Let’s keep it in the realm of fitness for now.
If you feel accomplished, proud, and confident, guarantee it will be a hell of a lot easier to have “motivation” or “willpower” to stick to your diet.
Not because of any magic sorcery, simply because you completed your weight training workout and feel good. This gives you all of the motivation and willpower you need because you want to keep it up.
Now take it outside of fitness.
If you get done a heavy, intense, weight training session, you now know you can overcome obstacles.
You can push through hard times. You believe in yourself.
Therefore when other obstacles or hard times come up, you will have the confidence to tackle them.
Whether be at work, in relationships, in school, or wherever.
Again, to me and my clients, that is what this fitness game is about.
This is why women should lift weights. It is not only changing your body, but changing you entire life, for the better.
Understand Now Why Women Should Lift Weights?
I hope this article gave you some mental, physical, and emotional insight on why women should lift weights.
If you enjoyed this article, I have one ask of you, and for those who know me I don’t ask much.
Share this article with a lady who needs it. Please.
I want women to feel empowered, to feel strong, to realize how much of a bad ass they are.
By coaching majority women for 4+ years now, some of the things I have seen women do in the gym is something I still struggle to believe if it is real to this day.
You are incredibly strong. You are a bad a**. Own it. Embrace it.
I promise it will make your journey a hell of a lot more enjoyable.
