How Stress Can Cause Weight Gain - Deepstash
How Stress Can Cause Weight Gain

How Stress Can Cause Weight Gain

Curated from: verywellmind.com

Ideas, facts & insights covering these topics:

5 ideas

·

3.71K reads

16

Explore the World's Best Ideas

Join today and uncover 100+ curated journeys from 50+ topics. Unlock access to our mobile app with extensive features.

Stress can prevent you from keeping a healthy weight

Stress can prevent you from keeping a healthy weight

Stress can prevent you from keeping a healthy weight.

Every time you're stressed, your adrenal glands release adrenaline and cortisol. Your body releases glucose into your bloodstream to increase your energy levels for a possible fight or flight response. Once the threat is gone, your adrenaline high wears off, your blood sugar drops and cortisol kicks in to quickly top up your energy supply.

152

968 reads

Cortisol and sugar cravings

With increased levels of cortisol, your body is supplied with glucose for energy, and your body signals the need for extra sugar.

The downside of eating sugar is that your body tends to store sugar, especially after stressful situations, as abdominal fat. The vicious cycle continues: stress, cortisol release, craving sugar, weight gain.

137

761 reads

Cortisol and metabolism

Cortisol slows down your metabolism, decreasing your ability to lose weight.

Researchers found that women who reported one or more stressors burned fewer calories than non-stressed women. Stressed women also had higher insulin levels, resulting in fat storage.

133

649 reads

Unhealthy habits caused by stress

  • Emotional eating: Excess nervous energy can cause you to eat more than necessary.
  • Eating "accessible" or fast food: When stressed, we often eat what is readily available, which is often unhealthy options—for example, eating fast-food instead of cooking a balanced meal.
  • Exercising less: With too much stress, exercise is often the last thing on your list to do.
  • Skipping meals: With too much on your plate, you may find yourself skipping meals.
  • Sleeping less: Many people are unable to sleep well when they're stressed. Sleep deprivation is linked to a slower metabolism and can also reduce willpower.

151

572 reads

How to break the cycle of stress

  • Make exercise a priority. It can reduce stress and regulate stress-related weight gain.
  • Eat healthier comfort foods, such as air-popped popcorn.
  • Practice mindful eating. Focus on what you're eating without distractions such as your phone or the TV.
  • Keep a food journal. Being more aware of what you eat could improve your eating habits.
  • Drink more water. We often confuse thirst for hunger. If you eliminated mild dehydration and you still feel hungry, then grab a healthy snack.
  • Incorporate stress-relief strategies such as reading a good book, taking a deep breath, listening to music, or going for a daily walk.

175

769 reads

IDEAS CURATED BY

racfp

I believe we can live longer if we live healthier. Travel ninja. Problem solver.

Rachel P.'s ideas are part of this journey:

How To Break Bad Habits

Learn more about health with this collection

Understanding the psychological rewards of bad habits

Creating new habits to replace old ones

Developing self-discipline

Related collections

Read & Learn

20x Faster

without
deepstash

with
deepstash

with

deepstash

Personalized microlearning

100+ Learning Journeys

Access to 200,000+ ideas

Access to the mobile app

Unlimited idea saving

Unlimited history

Unlimited listening to ideas

Downloading & offline access

Supercharge your mind with one idea per day

Enter your email and spend 1 minute every day to learn something new.

Email

I agree to receive email updates