How Stress Can Cause Weight Gain
/Stress and weight gain are tightly linked. When stress goes up, weight gain has been shown to follow. Here’s what to know and how to avoid stress related weight gain.
Stress. Anyone got any of that? My hand is in the air.
It’s hard to live in this world without experiencing some level of stress.
But did you know that stress can lead to weight gain? I know. That thought makes me even more stressed too.
How Does Stress Lead to Weight Gain?
When you’re stressed, your body tries to help out by releasing cortisol, as well as adrenaline. The cortisol and adrenaline are preparing you to flee or battle since it thinks you’re in danger. There could be a tiger getting ready to chase you, except there probably isn’t.
Your body doesn’t know what kind of stress you’re experiencing. It doesn’t differentiate between mental and physical stress.
Any kind of stress, emotional or otherwise, can cause cortisol and adrenaline to flood the system. When the perceived stress disappears, adrenaline levels drop back down, but cortisol can remain high.
Guess what cortisol does for your appetite? It stimulates it.
Connecting the dots: lots of stress leads to lots of cortisol in the body, which leads to you wanting to eat a lot. You crave more, eat more, and gain more weight. It’s a vicious cycle.
What Stress Does for Metabolism and Weight
A 2015 study found that when you’re stressed, your metabolism is slower so you burn fewer calories.
The study showed that if a person experienced one or more stressful situations the day prior, they burned 104 fewer calories. That might not seem like a lot but it could add up to almost 11 pounds per year.
Here’s another kicker, when you start eating with all that excess cortisol floating around your body, extra weight usually ends up sitting right around your middle. It can get stored there as visceral fat.
The Connection Between Stress and Emotional Eating
So you know stress increases your cortisol in your body, which stimulates your appetite and can cause you to overeat.
And guess what you’re overeating? Yeah, it ain’t carrot sticks.
You often crave fat and sugar when you’re stressed. Your body wants a quick hit of energy. And sometimes it’s something more emotional that you crave.
Taking a step back, your stress eating may be caused by unhappiness at your job or dissatisfaction with your relationship. You’re often looking to fill a void so you turn to food and begin emotional eating.
The thing is that fat and sugar only give you a temporary high. It then leads to a crash and potentially more cravings for the same.
So what’s the solution? Reduce stress!
Practices to Reduce Stress and Weight Gain
I know reducing stress is easier said than done. Telling someone to just stop stressing out just isn’t that helpful.
There are practices you can do daily to help relax your nervous system, so you can get a better handle on your eating.
Meditate – here’s how
Move your body to release some of the energy and cortisol
Get out in nature
Call a friend
Help someone
Feel what you feel instead of pushing it away
Do yoga for its mind–body benefits
Breathe long slow deep breaths
Drink Water
Eat balanced meals each day with protein, healthy fat, and fiber
Identify triggers for stress – food, places, friends, situations, feelings, trigger-reward system, addictive food
