Turn off the Lights to Increase Fat Burn!... No really!

You may have heard that blue light from our cell phones, tablets, tv's and laptops before bed can cause us to have interrupted sleep and impact our rest.  

But now to make it worse, it is now said to impact our body’s ability to burn fat! 

A medical study published in December 2021 was completed in a Metabolic Ward, essentially a lab studying human metabolism.  Over the years it has been shown exposure to artificial light at night has been associated with a higher body weight and a higher risk of obesity, but reasoning is still unclear.  

Over the years we realized that by having interrupted sleep our metabolism were essentially not rested and charged enough, making it harder for them to function at their best!  And also since we were tired our metabolism would say “Hey grab another snack or meal for energy, to keep you going, because we can’t”  and so you would get hungry or crave carbs and fats.

Now I will not bore you with details but what this new study found was that 3 hours of bright light before bed suppressed melatonin levels, reduced fat oxidation (during light exposure and during sleep) and increased carbohydrate oxidation (during sleep).

So what does this mean?

The study found that bright light suppresses melatonin levels, making it harder for us to fall asleep and stay asleep, leading to a bad nights’ rest.  There was also a reduced oxidation level at all times!  Meaning, the light exposure literally decreased our bodies ability to burn fat during the day and night!   Instead there was a higher calorie burn from carbohydrates.

This really messes up your night time Netflix binge, but if you are serious about gaining control of your cravings, optimizing calorie fat burn and your overall metabolism, we may need to go back to reading some paper books or listening to audible!

If you love to get more into the details of the study click here to read it all yourself.