- Does stress make you fat?
- Do all people get fat from stress?
- Gene-environment interactions
- Personality
- Other interactions between diet and stress
- Tips for practice: fight stress and not gain weight
- On stressful days, eat little and often
- Add foods that speed up your metabolism to your diet
- Be careful with buns, cakes and other sweets
- do exercise
- Make sure you sleep well and long enough
- Avoid caffeine, tobacco, and alcohol
- Don't skip meals
- Spend some time relaxing
- References
The stress can fatten in some people due to changes in the neuroendocrine system that cause an increase in appetite. In addition to the release of hormones such as adrenaline, coricotropin or cortisol, learned behaviors such as constantly eating food can occur in stress.
"Stress" is a term used in a generalized and colloquial way by most people to refer to a state of anxiety, what we feel when we are overwhelmed by having many tasks and little time to carry them out.
The popular term was coined in 1936 by Hans Selye, an Austro-Hungarian physiologist and physician, who defined stress as “a non-specific response of the body to any demand for change”.
Any stimulus that poses a challenge or threat to our well-being can lead to a state of stress. Stressors, which are the stimuli that cause stress, can be both physical, psychological or emotional.
For example, we may feel stressed in a situation that is difficult for us to predict or control, such as on a first date, a job interview, or during exam times. Other stressors can be loud noises, excessive cold or heat, an unpleasant person…
Does stress make you fat?
While the immediate response to a stressor may be loss of appetite, for some people, chronic stress may be linked to increased appetite, which in turn leads to weight gain.
The problem is caused by our neuroendocrine system, which connects the brain to the rest of the body in a way that helped our ancestors to survive, but not us.
One of the hormones released during times of stress is adrenaline, which provides immediate energy, along with corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) and cortisol. A high level of adrenaline and CRH in the body temporarily decreases appetite, but these effects do not last long.
Cortisol, on the other hand, serves to help the body recover after struggling to fight or flee and it lasts much longer.
These days, we don't actually fight or flee (physically) from stressful situations, but cortisol is released anyway, causing our bodies to “believe” that we need to regain lost calories and increase appetite. When stress is chronic, this can lead to significant weight gain.
In addition to the physiological reasons we just explained, eating more when under chronic stress can also be a learned behavior. In stressful situations, we have the urge to move, to do something, and eating is an activity that can be carried out quickly and is immediately comforting.
Do all people get fat from stress?
However, long-term stress can lead to weight gain in some people and weight loss in others. On the one hand, as we have seen, higher levels of cortisol can increase food intake, but on the other hand, stress can inhibit appetite by activating the sympathetic nervous system.
Animal studies offer the opportunity to examine the effect of stress on food intake by controlling for more factors than in human studies.
In these investigations it has been generally seen that animals eat less when the intensity of the stressor is high, but when the intensity is reduced, they eat more.
Gene-environment interactions
The interactions between genes and environmental factors are also relevant in this topic. Stable differences between individuals can determine which reaction pattern (gaining weight, losing weight, or neither) would prevail for each individual under stressful conditions.
A field study, in which the participants were middle-aged men and women who kept stress diaries and daily food intake, identified three reactions to stress.
Some subjects ate more, consistently, during periods of stress, others ate less, and there were subjects in whom no stress-related change in their eating patterns was seen.
Consistent with this, research with university students found both a tendency to eat more reported by the same students and another to eat less during exam periods.
Personality
Certain dimensions of the personality have also been linked to a tendency to gain weight. Depressive symptoms, psychological stress, and a low level of life satisfaction have been found to be more common among obese subjects than among subjects of normal weight.
Stress, induced by negative life events, and depressive symptoms have been identified as risk factors for short and long-term weight gain.
Obese subjects have also been seen to be more extroverted than control subjects of normal weight, but no differences have been found in the levels of neuroticism of both.
Most of this research, however, focuses on the associations of stress with these characteristics in the short term.
A study published in the International Journal of Obesity (Korkeila, Kaprio, Rissanen, Koskenvuo & Sörensen, 1998) aimed to examine whether certain personality variables predict significant weight gain during two relatively long follow-up periods (6 years and 15 years).
Other interactions between diet and stress
Continuing with the theme of losing weight, experts say that we should not go on a diet when we are under chronic or severe stress.
In a study published in the Journal of Clinical Nutrition in 2001, researchers from the University of British Columbia found that severely limiting calorie intake could lead to a series of biochemical events in the body that not only increase the level of stress, but also It could make us feel hungrier.
The researchers studied 62 women for three days. Of this group, 33 were on a 1500 calorie daily diet, while the other 29 were consuming around 2,200 calories each day.
After analyzing urine samples, it was found that women who had consumed the least food had the highest cortisol levels.
Not surprisingly, these women also reported experiencing more stress during what the researchers called "daily food-related experiences."
In short, the more they restricted their food, the higher their levels of stress-related hormones and, therefore, the more they wanted to eat.
Tips for practice: fight stress and not gain weight
The effects of stress on our body do not have to be entirely inevitable. Here are some tips that can help lower stress levels and maintain weight.
On stressful days, eat little and often
This will keep your metabolism active throughout the day. Eat breakfast, even if you are not hungry or think you do not have time. Eating breakfast helps to get your metabolism going and keep blood sugar levels stable, which reduces stress.
Add foods that speed up your metabolism to your diet
Some foods have been shown to increase metabolic rate, and while the effects are not astronomical, they can counteract some stress-induced decrease in metabolism.
Chillies, coffee, green tea, whole grains (bread, pasta), and lentils are some examples of these types of foods. Make sure you also drink an adequate amount of water; metabolism can slow down if we are dehydrated.
Be careful with buns, cakes and other sweets
The fuel our muscles need to carry out the fight or flight response is sugar; That is why when we are stressed we feel more craving for sweet foods or carbohydrates.
do exercise
In addition to many other things, exercise is helpful in reducing stress. When starting any physical activity, the body releases a torrent of biochemical substances that can counteract the negative effects of those released when there is stress.
On the other hand, if we exercise too much, stress levels can increase; do a sport that you like and with a moderate frequency.
Make sure you sleep well and long enough
To do this, moderate your caffeine consumption. Getting too little sleep increases cortisol levels, making us feel hungry and less satisfied with the amount of food we eat.
Avoid caffeine, tobacco, and alcohol
According to the American Institute of Stress, tobacco and caffeine can cause cortisol levels to rise, as well as stress, lower blood sugar and make us hungrier.
The institute also warns that drinking too much alcohol can affect blood sugar and insulin levels.
Don't skip meals
Many people argue that they do not have time for breakfast or even lunch. Skipping meals, far from causing you to lose weight, can slow down your metabolism and make you hungrier than usual later on.
Spend some time relaxing
A massage, going to a spa from time to time, doing meditation… it is shown to lower cortisol levels. You will feel more relaxed and your productivity at work will increase.
References
- Kivimäki, M., Head, J., Ferrie, JE, Shipley, MJ, Brunner, E., Vahtera, J. & Marmot, MG (2006). Work stress, weight gain and weight loss: evidence for bidirectional effects of job strain on body mass index in the Whitehall II study. International Journal of Obesity, 30, 982-987.
- Korkeila, M., Kaprio, J., Rissanen, A., Koskenvuo M. & Sörensen, TIA (1998). Predictors of major weight gain in adult Finns: stress, life satisfaction and personality traits. International Journal of Obesity, 22, 949-957.