Pillow Talk

Weight loss is often about the small steps we take each day that sum up long-term for huge results.

Big, sweeping life changes really boil down to small, everyday decisions.
~A Vincent

Dr Oksana Aron and other medical experts chime in on the benefits of good sleep and weight loss. Studies continue to roll in extolling the virtues of extinguishing the night oil.

Follow through on several blog posts past with blog post label sleep:

Perchance to Dream

Some light-hearted quotes about sleep to help you relax:

• If you can’t sleep, then get up and do something instead of lying there and worrying. It’s the worry that gets you, not the loss of sleep. ~Dale Carnegie
• People who say they sleep like a baby usually don’t have one. ~LJ Burke
• Laugh and the world laughs with you, snore and you sleep alone. ~A Burgess
• [Sleep is] the golden chain that ties health and our bodies together. ~T Dekker, English dramatist (1572-1632)
• Getting enough sleep can be just as important as working out. ~A Vincent
• There is a time for many words, and there is also a time for sleep. ~Homer, The Odyssey, Greek epic poet (800BCE-700BCE)
• Finish each day before you begin the next, and interpose a solid wall of sleep between the two. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson, US essayist & poet (1803-1882)

Weight Loss Guidance

Work with Dr Oksana Aron of Dr Aron Medical Weight Loss Center at WeightLossNYC.com and receive personalized weight loss structure and support to help achieve your weight loss goals.

What if you slept? And what if, in your sleep, you dreamed? And what if, in your dream, you went to heaven and plucked a strange and beautiful flower? And what if, when you awoke, you had the flower in your hand? Ah, what then?
~Samuel Taylor Coleridge, English critic & poet (1772-1834)

Labels: easy weight loss, fitness, sleep, wellness

Source: Huffington Post

Labels: appetite, bronx, easy weight loss, new york, obesity, sleep, weight gain, weight loss

Dream Meme

A new study in the journal Obesity looked at what happened to sleep quality when healthy young men ate nutritious meals vs. junk food. Even though both groups slept the exact same number of hours, eating junk food disrupted the quality of deep sleep—making it more shallow and less restorative.

Short-term consumption of a more unhealthy diet alters sleep oscillatory features that regulate the restorative properties of sleep.

This matters because restorative sleep is necessary for hormone production, a healthy metabolism, graceful aging, brain function, mood, and more.

Low fiber and high saturated fat and sugar intake is associated with lighter, less restorative sleep with more [disruptions].

Health Benefits Add Up

Diet and health in public health posed by the U.S. Departments of Agriculture (USDA) and Health and Human Services (HHS) affirmed:

Strong and consistent evidence demonstrates that dietary patterns associated with decreased risk of cardiovascular disease are characterized by higher consumption of vegetables, fruits, whole grains, low-fat dairy, and seafood, and lower consumption of red and processed meat, and lower intakes of refined grains, and sugar-sweetened foods and beverages relative to less healthy patterns.

Considerable evidence supports the stance that proper diet matters, and you can make simple and meaning changes to your health by making the right food swaps in your daily diet.

Randomized dietary intervention studies have demonstrated that healthy dietary patterns exert clinically meaningful impact on cardiovascular risk factors, including blood lipids and blood pressure. Additionally, research that includes specific nutrients in their description of dietary patterns indicate that patterns that are lower in saturated fat, cholesterol, and sodium and richer in fiber, potassium, and unsaturated fats are beneficial for reducing cardiovascular disease risk.

Looking to Improve Your Health?

Schedule a consultation with Dr Oksana Aron via her practice website, Dr Aron Medical Weight Loss Center and find how you can lose weight easily via physician supervision. Her clinical evaluation and guidance can help you improve your fundamental health metrics in the course of participating in her medical weight loss program.

Labels: diet, dieting, low fat, nutrition, sleep, sugar

• Activity

  Perhaps the most obvious and least achieved, yet you can surely spend just half an hour daily following your favorite youtube fitness type online, be it eXercise, Yoga, Zumba or another other alpha fitness. Best to schedule the same time each day, or at least a regular interval each day that you can guarantee yourself to be there and aware. Better still if you've got a friend or family member at home willing to keep you on track and join in the fitness fun.

• Hydrate

  Before you reach for that morning joe, get some water into your system. Consider you've been fasting all night and likewise needing to rehydrate too. You may even find your caffeine urges will temper once you've had some morning water, before, during and after a workout too.

• Sleep

  We've blogged a few times on this, the easiest weight loss tip ever. Your body needs to recharge and provide all the regenerative benefits that go along with a solid night's sleep. No surprise that fitting fitness into your life will help you sleep better at night too. Being too sedentary robs you of all the natural rhythms of life you need for balance.

• Nutrition

  Eating proper meals at mealtimes is the best way to keep energy high and hunger cravings low. Now that you're at home, guess what -- you're always steps away from preparing your own healthy meals instead of so many tempting and unhealthy ways from your on the go ways.

  Keep tabs on yourself though, by avoiding temptation to graze around the kitchen when home.

More to go on

Consider breaking out of the habit of staying in house clothes all day too. Get up on a regular schedule and gear up and groom for a real day ahead. Having a steady routine is fundamental for all things mental and physical too. You can do this! and you may pick up some great lifetime habits along the way.

Learn more

Visit WeightLossNYC.com to learn more about ways to lose weight and how Oksana Aron, M.D. can help you achieve weight loss success where other methods may have failed you.

Labels: 718-491-5525, fitness, healthy habits, nutrition, sleep, water

The Sleep Diet? Dream on…

“Sleep: As important as diet and exercise, only easier,” proclaims the National Sleep Foundation on a refrigerator magnet. How true, yet between 1960 and 2010, the average night’s sleep for adults in the United States dropped from eight hours to six and half.

Much has been written about the hazards of this sleep debt. Now new research shows that lack of sleep may also be making Americans fatter. While doctors have long known that hormone levels are affected by sleep, it is only recently that appetite has been linked to this picture.

Here’s how it works: The hormones leptin and ghrelin work in balance with each other to control feelings of hunger and fullness. Ghrelin is produced in the gastrointestinal tract and stimulates appetite. Leptin is produced in fat cells and sends signals to the brain when a person is full.

When a person doesn’t get enough sleep, leptin levels drop so s/he doesn’t feel as satisfied after eating. At the same time, ghrelin levels rise from lack of sleep, meaning the person’s appetite is being stimulated. This combination sets the stage for overeating which may lead to weight gain.



Sleep researcher Michael Breus, Ph.D., has found, “Once a person is not as tired, they don’t need to rely on sweet foods and high carbohydrate snacks to keep them awake — and that automatically translates into eating fewer calories.”

A Stanford University study found that those who slept less than eight hours per night not only had lower levels of leptin and higher levels of ghrelin but they also had higher levels of body fat. Another study by Harvard researchers involving 68,000 middle-aged women found that those who slept five hours or less per night weighed 5.4 pounds more, and were 15 percent more likely to be obese, compared to the women who slept seven hours per night.

“The hormones leptin and ghrelin work in balance with each other to control feelings of hunger and fullness. Ghrelin is produced in the gastrointestinal tract and stimulates appetite. Leptin is produced in fat cells and sends signals to the brain when a person is full.”

Lack of deep sleep may also affect a group of neurons in the hypothalamus of the brain, where another hormone, orexin, is involved in regulating feeding behavior. So it may be more than coincidence that Americans have gotten fatter while the amount of sleep has declined.

Some people with health or other issues may need medical consultation to address their sleep problems. For the rest of you (you know who you are), turn off the TV, send your last email, stop texting, close your book, and get a full night’s sleep. Your waistline will thank you.

Sima Michaels Dembo

References:
Bouchez, Colette, “The Dream Diet: Losing Weight While You Sleep,” WebMD, Sleep Disorders Center, reviewed 1/1/2007, WebMD

Brody, Jane, “A Good Night’s Sleep Isn’t a Luxury; It’s a Necessity,” New York Times, 5/30/2011.

“People Who Eat and Sleep Late May Gain Weight,” National Sleep Foundation website, SleepFoundation

Labels: 718-491-5525, appetite, diet, energy, hormone, hunger, sleep, weight loss, women