Correction. Get a LOT of sleep. At least 8-9 hours.

I’ve done a blog entry on this before, but as I sit here in the California Sleep Society conference (I’m a registered sleep technologist), I am compelled to write about it again. If you are serious about your health, if you are serious about losing weight, SLEEP is your first line of attack. Without good sleep, you are just hindering your efforts. I have just seen research results showing that getting less than 9 hours of sleep greatly increases glucose levels, insulin resistance, and weight gain. At 5 hours of sleep, not only are all three of these biomarkers GREATLY increased, but the risk for Coronary Artery Disease and cognitive deterioration also greatly increases.

This is more than just the amount of sleep you are getting; it is also about the quality of sleep. If you are constantly being aroused from sleep by snoring, apnea, pets sleeping with you, kids sleeping with you, your spouse or bed partner, or any other environment surrounding you, this is reducing your quality of sleep and may be preventing you from getting adequate amounts of slow wave sleep (deep sleep or stage 3 sleep) – a stage of sleep REQUIRED for body healing including weight loss.

A note to those of you who may have type 2 diabetes like me – ask you doctor to order a sleep study for you. There is a HUGE percentage of type 2 diabetics that have Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) that go undiagnosed and untreated. If you don’t resolve sleep apnea, again, you are hindering your weight loss efforts.

I go into more depth about sleep in my post Side Note: Importance of Sleep. Visit for more information. And feel free to send me any questions you may have.