How do you think stress affects your metabolism?

You don't want to have a slow metabolic rate because that would make it harder to maintain a lean body composition.

You can probably also agree that most of us are exposed to plenty of stress during a average day.
I think you will find the reviewed research interesting because it investigated how stress may affect our metabolic rate (Kiecolt-Glaser JK, et.al.,2014).

Fifty-eight healthy women, with the average age of 53.1 years, participated in the study and were given high fat test meals. The day prior to eating the test meals, stressors were also assessed using a standard test. Fat and carbohydrate oxidation, triglycerides, cortisol, insulin and glucose were measured before and after the 2 high fat meals.

It was found that greater numbers of stressors were associated with lower fat oxidation after the meals and also higher insulin levels.

The difference between stressors the day before and no stressors turned out to be 435 kj which is approximately 104 calories. The researchers estimated that it could add up to almost 11 pounds per year in weight gain.

This means that stress can contribute to weight gain.

You may not be able to control the factors contributing to stress, but you can, with some training, control how you react to stress.

In other words you can make yourself more stress resistant.

Meditation is a great tool for that.

Kiecolt-Glaser JK¹, Habash DL², Fagundes CP³, Andridge R⁴, Peng J⁴, Malarkey WB⁵, Belury MA⁶.

Daily Stressors, Past Depression, and Metabolic Responses to High-Fat Meals: A Novel Path to Obesity. Biol Psychiatry. 2014 Jul 9. pii: S0006-3223(14)00385-0. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2014.05.018. [Epub ahead of print]
 
Published with permission by Didrik Sopler, Ph.D., L.Ac : www.TissueRecovery.com Dr. Marsh has worked with and referrers patients to Dr. Sopler for co-management for years . . . He is quite simply San Diego's top functional medicine consultant.