Can Your Own Circadian Rhythm Help You Lose Weight?

Article posted in: Lifestyle

Jenny Craig has a strong foundation in science. Whether it’s working with Registered Dietitians to offer delicious versions of your favorite foods, to being the first commercial weight loss company to integrate Nobel Prize winning research on circadian rhythms into their program, Jenny Craig keeps up with the latest nutrition research and then puts it into practice to help their members reach their health and wellness goals while living everyday life.

While you already know that your food choices impact your weight, more and more research has demonstrated that when you eat is just as important as what you eat. This is based upon the science of circadian rhythms.

What are circadian rhythms?

The National Institute of General Medical Sciences defines circadian rhythms as one’s mental, behavioral and physical changes over a 24-hour cycle. The patterns are typically divided into two 12-hour periods, which are dictated by daytime and nighttime. During the day, you go about your errands, job, and family life, while in the evening, you typically wind down from the day’s activities and go to sleep, which allows the body to recover from everything you did throughout the day.

How do circadian rhythms work?

In the same way that you are busy getting tasks done throughout the day, so are every one of your body’s cells. They all hard at work metabolizing, or managing, complex chemical processes throughout your body. This metabolism process has a predictable curve that follows a 24-hour cycle paralleling the 12-hour light-dark periods during the day. Your metabolism peaks toward mid-day and tapers off towards the early evening. In the peak period, your body is busy digesting food for the energy needed to use as fuel for all of your daily activities. By late afternoon and into the evening, your metabolism is still active but not as efficiently as earlier in the day.

How circadian rhythms affect weight loss

Late-night eating has a reputation for leading to weight gain, and the research on circadian rhythm has now given us insight as to why. From morning until mid-afternoon, our metabolism is optimal and the body is most efficient at burning calories. That’s why eating large meals in the evening when the body is winding down and getting ready for bed works against you and can lead to weight gain.

Jenny Craig’s plan leverages the powerful science of intermittent fasting – eating smart during the day and taking a break at night – to help promote incredible weight loss benefits. Your metabolism isn’t constant: It’s most efficient in the day and tapers off at night. Your Jenny Craig plan aligns your meals with this daily cycle, so you’ll eat when your metabolism is optimal.

Here’s how it works:

• Rest: During this 14-hour rejuvenation period, you’ll take a break from food and caloric beverages – most of this time is spent sleeping! This is when the body generally switches to fat-burning mode.
• Recharge: Treat yourself with our Recharge Bar. Enjoy this bar 1-2 hours before the end of your 14-hour rejuvenation period. Then, for the remaining 10 hours, nourish your body with Jenny Craig’s chef-crafted meals and snacks
• Repeat: Stick to the plan and experience the best results!

Eating in sync with your natural circadian rhythm can not only help with weight loss, but there are several health benefits as well, ranging from improvements in immune function, alertness and mood, preservation of muscle mass, management of appetite and hunger, as well as decreased risk for dementia. A key benefit of the rejuvenation period is that body fat, especially belly fat, decreases while muscle mass is maintained. This reduction in belly fat decreases risk for obesity as well as the risk of Type 2 diabetes. 

This exciting circadian rhythm science is now a new tool you can use to help manage your weight and improve your health. By paying attention to your own body clock, you are better equipped to achieve your weight loss goals, help prevent disease, and enhance your energy, quality of life and overall wellness.