When I created SmartDreamzzz.com to provide sleep solutions for children and their parents one of the most interesting things that I kept coming across in my research was the link between lack of sleep and obesity. It is counterintuitive to think that a sedentary activity like getting more sleep would actually decrease a child’s risk of obesity, but lack of sleep disrupts at least 5 hormones that regulate appetite and burning of fat (grehlin, leptin, cortisol, insulin, and growth hormone). When kids are not getting good sleep, they are hungrier and their bodies produce more fat.
Dr. Eve Van Cauter, at the University of Chicago, discovered a “neuroendocrine cascade” regarding this link. First, lack of sleep leads to an increase in the production of ghrelin. Ghrelin is a hormone that is released in the stomach to signal hunger. Second, when kids don’t sleep enough their bodies produce less leptin, which signals to their brains that they are full. Finally, lack of sleep increases the production of cortisol which can signal the body to produce more fat. The result: hungrier kids that eat too much and produce more fat. In fact, for every hour of lost sleep a child’s risk of obesity goes up 80%.
In the past, we have focused on nutrition and portion control. While these factors are also vitally important, the impact of a child’s sleep habits should not be ignored. Additionally, most obesity prevention programs have been targeted towards school age kids, but recent research is indicating that this is too late for many children. Dr. Leslie Lytle of Seattle Children’s Hospital has just pinpointed more evidence linking lack of sleep and obesity in teens. But pivotal events early in life, such as sleep difficulties, can set young children on an obesity trajectory that is very difficult to alter. In fact, infants who receive less than 12 hours of sleep a day have twice the risk of obesity at age 3 as those who receive 12 hours of sleep. We need to start intervening earlier.
As I’ve mentioned before, we expect children to naturally develop healthy sleep habits, but kids aren’t sleeping. The use of pharmaceutical sleep aids in children ages 8-18 rose 85% from 2000-2005. Children don’t exactly have great role models for sleep either. In 2009, the number of adults who suffer from insomnia rose 33%. We are living in a 24/7 world filled with constant stimulation that makes it difficult for all of us to get the sleep we need. Adults and children need tools. They need to learn how to relax, and similar to learning any skill, it is much easier to master when introduced at an early age. This is one of the reasons why the SmartDreamzzz CDs are designed to be developmentally appropriate and effective for very young children.
The impacts of an hour less sleep are much greater than a grumpy kid!
