Food Trick RESETS Your Body Clock
If you didn’t know already, your body runs on an invisible “24-hour clock” that follows the rhythm of the sun.
It’s called your circadian rhythm.
This biological clock affects the production and release of hormones, insulin regulation, sleep, and much more.
But all kinds of things can knock the clock off balance. Some examples include stress, exposure to artificial light, poor sleep, pain, and illness.
One of the BEST ways to regulate your circadian rhythm is to get appropriate sun exposure during the day and limit your blue light exposure at night.
But there’s another weird way to reset this clock that has nothing to do with light. Instead, it’s linked to FOOD.
Believe it or not, your diet impacts your circadian rhythm. But it’s not about WHAT you’re eating… but WHEN.
In a new study, two groups of mice were fed a high-calorie diet. One group had unlimited access to the food while the other was given a 9-hour eating window (they fasted for the other 15).
This mimicked something called intermittent fasting. It’s a diet method that limits your eating window to a short period, like 6, 8, or 10 hours.
Intermittent fasting is a great way to lose weight and boost your overall health. It’s also excellent at balancing blood sugar and reducing inflammation.
In fact, it’s something I like to routinely incorporate into my OWN lifestyle.
But the new mouse study revealed something remarkable. It showed that in the time-restricted eating group, 70 percent of their genes responded in more than 22 regions of the body.
These included the liver, stomach, brain, heart, lungs, and more.
Plus, areas of the body that regulate hormones and circadian rhythm were also impacted. Specifically, 40 percent of genes in the adrenal gland, hypothalamus, and pancreas were affected by intermittent fasting.
The researchers explained, “We found that time-restricted eating synchronized the circadian rhythms to have two major waves: one during fasting and another just after eating. We suspect this allows the body to coordinate different processes.”
This study gives us further insight into ways to support our circadian rhythm.
In addition to practicing intermittent fasting, you can keep your body’s biological clock running smoothly by getting sunlight first thing in the morning, avoiding blue light at night, sticking to a consistent bedtime, and not eating after dinner.
P.S. Staying up past dark—and exposure to artificial light at night—doesn’t JUST set you up for sleep and hormone problems. It’s a significant factor in the recent type 2 diabetes surge. I’ve got the scoop RIGHT HERE.
SOURCE:
“Diurnal transcriptome landscape of a multi-tissue response to time-restricted feeding in mammals,” Cell Metabolism, Volume 35, Issue 1, 2023, Pages 150-165.e4, ISSN 1550-4131, doi.org/10.1016/j.cmet.2022.12.006.
