Sprucing Up Your Look

Three Non-Food/Non-Fitness Actions That Can Affect Your Weight

by Tammy Tucker

If you're trying to lose weight and have been seeking help from programs that help you revamp your diet and exercise plans, you're taking positive steps. But losing weight and keeping it off both involve more than just the basic eat-less-move-more advice. While that advice remains the core bit of information involved in weight loss, a number of factors can make that seemingly simple process a lot more difficult. Here are three actions you can take to help keep eat-less-move-more as effective as possible.

Keep a Complete Journal

It's no secret that psychological issues can promote weight loss or gain, and journaling can be a healthy way of letting these issues leave your head (and thus leave you alone). However, journaling can also be a straightforward way to investigate why you're eating, when you're eating what, and what you did that day regarding your health. In 2013, for example, CNN reported on a woman who lost 130 pounds and who kept detailed journals that let her find her true eating patterns. Through the journals, she was able to restructure her diet and life to better suit her health. There was no one major issue causing her weight gain; she simply didn't realize how much she was eating and why she was eating so much.

Keep a journal of what you eat, what you're feeling when you eat it, whether you're actually stomach-hungry (is your stomach growling, or is your brain saying food might be a nice thing to have?), and how much water and sleep you've had. If you have any issues making you really want to chow down that don't involve actual hunger, write those down as well as the specific cravings you have. Periodically review the journal to locate patterns such as what you eat when your co-workers annoy you or what you eat when you don't drink a lot of water.

Eliminate Specific Stressors

Another non-secret is that stress can make you pig out -- but chronic stress in particular can put you in a vicious cycle of cortisol production, testosterone loss, reduced muscle mass, and reduced calorie burning that makes you gain more and more weight, even if you start changing your diet.

Find the chronic stressors in your life. A once-in-a-while work project that makes you eat a couple of bags of chips isn't chronic, but a job that has you working overtime all the time and that has you feeling under threat is a chronic stressor. Constant financial pressure can be a chronic stressor, too. It may be easier said than done to change these stressors, but you have to start taking steps if you want a fighting chance against stress's effect on your weight. See a financial counselor, look for another job, or take other positive actions.

Get Sleep

Sleep deprivation has been a hot topic with regards to weight gain and hormone production for some time. Lacking sleep can not only lower your defenses against food cravings -- it's just easier to give in -- but it can also send your hormones out of whack and make you want to eat more and more. The Mayo Clinic notes that the hunger hormones leptin and ghrelin may be particularly affected, and stimulated, by a lack of sleep.

The New York Times notes that it might not be easy or even possible to catch up on sleep and make up what is known as sleep debt. However, you can start getting better sleep now and just go from there. Ensure your bed is clean and comfortable, that your room isn't too hot or cold, and that you make the room as dark as possible. Avoid electronics before bed. In the same New York Times article, a professor of sleep medicine notes that less than six hours of sleep per night is sleep-debt territory, so try to work up to getting more than that each night.

With a good, all-around support system that includes your doctor and anyone else working with you to promote weight loss, you can be successful. If you are now also considering surgery, body sculpting, or any other method of weight loss, talk to experts like those at Soul Body Image to ensure you can make those lifestyle changes.

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