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Women who sleep less than 7 hours per night are more likely to gain weight (Journal Watch Women’s Health Jan 4 2007), possibly because of sleep-associated physiologic changes. Getting too little sleep might also impede postpartum weight loss. In an observational longitudinal cohort study, 940 nonsmoking women were followed during pregnancy and the first year postpartum. Prepregnancy and 12-month postpartum body weight was self-reported (recorded prepregnancy weight in a subset of 170 women correlated highly with self-reported weight). At 6 and 12 months postpartum, women reported hours of sleep per 24 hours.
Most participants (mean age, 33) were white and college-educated, with household incomes ≥$40,000. At 6 months postpartum, women averag…