Stress & Fat Gain in Women

August 27th, 2014 by

I came across a study the other day recently published in Biological Psychiatry that got my attention. After reading it, I was like, “Hey that’s interesting” and “Oh, I should share that”. So here’s me doing that. I’ll give you the Cliff/Coles notes on the study as not to bore you with all the unnecessary details and to keep this post from getting to wordy. Ok here goes:

Part of the study was conducted to see the effects that stress can have on a woman’s body in regards to fat gain. In the study, women were categorized as having stress the day before or not. They were then given a high-fat meal, which was comparable to eating a Big Mac and medium fries. [On a side note: The reason why the researchers chose a high-fat meal is because stress can elevate cortisol production (a hormone that breaks down body tissue) and higher levels have been shown to lead to consuming more calorie-dense, comfort foods.] The women then had blood samples taken in intervals over the next 6 to 7 hours.

What the researchers found was that women with more stress had a slower metabolism, higher levels of triglycerides (fat) and insulin (a storage hormone, which stores fat) in their blood, and lower fat oxidization (burning) after eating a high-fat meal than those women who were not stressed. What this suggests is that the body has a tougher time using fat as an energy source under stressful conditions.

That being said, the purpose of this post was to 1) make you aware of the effects that daily stress can have on the body, 2) encourage you to control and remove stress from your life to prevent fat gain (obviously easier said than done), and 3) keep you out of McDonald’s. Ok, maybe not so much the last one as they apparently do have some healthy options, but you know, choose wisely off the menu if you are there and having one of those days or had one the day before.