“In the short term, adrenaline usually makes people feel less hungry,” says Dr. Chao. “However, with chronic stress, adrenaline's effects on appetite wear off and cortisol starts to urge the body to replenish your energy stores. For some people, this tends to result in weight gain.”
The question of whether excess amounts of cortisol can lead to weight gain is essentially the same as asking if too much stress can cause you to put on unwanted pounds. The answer in both cases is yes.
Not eating won't directly lead to weight gain -- in fact, you may lose weight as you'll temporarily eat fewer calories than you burn. The problem is that fasting is unsustainable, so any weight-loss benefit will likely be short lived and your health will pay the price.
Unintentional weight gain occurs when you put on weight without increasing your consumption of food or liquid and without decreasing your activity. This occurs when you're not trying to gain weight. It's often due to fluid retention, abnormal growths, constipation, or pregnancy.
Hypothyroidism. If your thyroid (the butterfly-shaped gland in the front of your neck) is not making enough thyroid hormone, you're probably feeling tired, weak, and cold, and gaining weight. Without enough thyroid hormone, your metabolism slows, making weight gain more likely.
You will not gain weight from eating too few calories.
There are many reasons why it can seem like under-eating can lead to weight gain. But, science has shown over and over again that this isn't physiologically possible.
Stress causes the body to produce more of the hormone cortisol: cortisol is a stress hormone that promotes body fat and makes it harder to lose weight, especially around the middle.
Heart disease, heart attack, high blood pressure and stroke. Sleep problems. Weight gain. Memory and concentration impairment.
There are a lot of behavioral reasons why depression could contribute to weight gain — a person who is depressed might not feel motivated to exercise or might seek comfort in foods that are high in fat and sugar.
An emotionally stressful day might also lead to overnight weight gain. Increased stress gives way to more cortisol which is how the fat starts storing in the body.
Chronic Stress
It's meant to give you a quick boost of energy. But if you're stuck in a stressed-out zone, the body thinks you still need to fight, so it keeps making cortisol. High levels of this hormone make it harder for your body to use insulin. That puts the brakes on your metabolism and fuels weight gain.
Increased cortisol levels, as the result of anxiety, cause fat to build up in the stomach and leads to an increase in weight. The longer that a person experiences stress and anxiety, the more weight he or she can potentially gain.
Stress. It's possible that high levels of stress can cause weight gain and bloating. Too much stress can have a variety of negative effects on your body, including on your digestive symptom. When you're stressed, you can experience gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms like bloating, abdominal discomfort, and diarrhea.
You're holding onto water weight.
It's as simple as that really, unless you're incredibly small and in active you should and will lose weight on 1000 calories unless of course you're chronically stressed or really suck at counting calories.
The thyroid gland creates thyroid hormone that keeps the body running. An underactive thyroid, or hypothyroidism, occurs when the thyroid gland fails to produce enough of these hormones. As a result, your metabolism slows, leading to weight gain and fatigue.
While body weight and fat are distributed equally in weight gain due to excess caloric intake, people with hormonal weight gain usually notice increased weight around specific body parts, such as the waist, arms, thighs, chest, and lower body.
Your Slow Metabolism:
When you have a slow metabolism, your body doesn't convert food into energy in sufficient quantities. So most of the food you eat is stored in the form of fats. This is the main reason why some people get fat even though they don't eat much.