Eating at night is bad... truth or myth?
Posted by volacious.r on May 23, 2007 · Member since Sep 2005 · 313 posts
Ok. Is eating close to bedtime going to make a person gain weight or not? I keep hearing conflicting information. On one side people tell me that everything you eat that is undigested when you hit the sack gets converted into fat and on the other hand people tell me that although you might have more trouble sleeping with a full tummy, it's your overall calorie count that matters and not when you eat. Anybody have personal experience or a good article (cited preferably) regarding this?
I have heard both sides to that story as well. The most rational that I read recently (I'll need to find the article) is that you do digest while you sleep. You obviously do not burn the calories as fast as you would if you went running. But those calories are burned quick and you will usually eat something after that. If you sleep for 8 hours, you body has plenty of time to digest what you ate, and has plenty of time to use those calories. During the day it is not as normal to go 8 hours between meals. Though on the other hand...you might be like me and sleep very little because of a little brown dog named Hershey that wakes you up at 6am EVERY DAY! :D
Unfortunetly to us late night snackers...truth.
Various studies have proven ha your metabolism i slowered at night an dthat generally it is best to eat before 8 pm every night....
Unfortunetly to us late night snackers...truth.
Various studies have proven ha your metabolism i slowered at night an dthat generally it is best to eat before 8 pm every night....
I have to say that I am a pretty big late night snacker. I mean all the time. I always get the muchies before I go to bed and always have. No problem here on this end. As MDvegan said, it comes down to calories...how many you put in, and how many you use up....
I myself run or hike almost every day. That is were I use up all those extra calories.
I believe it all comes down to calories in vs. calories burned. But I have noticed that when I eat too close to bedtime, I have a hard time falling asleep, and I feel like I have a rock in my stomach the next morning. I've also noticed that if I am hungry before bed, but don't give in and eat, I am really not hungry when I wake up.
The theory I've heard that seems to make sense is that eating at night may be bad for you because your body wants to use all of its energy for healing and repairing itself during sleep. If it's trying to digest food at the same time, it doesn't do all of its other maintenance work as well.
I think it depends on your metabolism.
I have a slow metabolism - I'm usually not hungry enough to even eat dinner. I'm overweight.
My sister has a fast metabolism - she eats a snack just before going to bed and has another one on her side table in case she wakes up hungry during the night. She's thin.
your body wants to use all of its energy for healing and repairing itself during sleep. If it's trying to digest food at the same time, it doesn't do all of its other maintenance work as well.
I totally believe this version... it's not that the stuff you eat goes "straight to fat" but you are not making your body an efficient machine this way...
It's not that your body won't digest it, it's just mean to do to yourself when you're body has another job, sleeping and repairing! IF you have a hard time losing weight anyway you want to give your body all the chances you can to actually digest WELL.
I HAVE heard a theory that if you eat while watching TV your body does digests SLOWER because you are in fact in a coma-like state.
I usually do not eat past 6pm. I will also walk or hike or bike a couple miles after dinner. :)
I usually do not eat past 6pm. I will also walk or hike or bike a couple miles after dinner. :)
Even in the winter? I hike less in the winter because, in the dark, I'm a bit apprehensive about coyote packs and vicious racoons. I'm easily impressed by people who hike in the dark.
This is probably one of those things that is different for everyone. I know that ultimately calories in vs calories out is the key, but I try to have my last meal by 6pm. I have started eating an apple sometime around 8:30pm. The dog likes it too!
8)
I agree with the previous posts that state that it is most likely dependent on your body and your metabolism.
I know that personally, if I don't have a snack consisting of protein and carbs before bed (1hr before approx.) I won't be able to sleep due to hunger or I will wake up at 4am so hungry I'm nauseous.
Now, I have an active job and exercise on top of that. So this works for me, not necessarily everyone else.
IMPORTANT: if you have heartburn/gastric reflux issues, DO NOT EAT BEFORE BED.
I agree that it depends on metabolism. I snack at noght, if I don't I wake up hungry. I am and always have been thin. My theory is that eating before bed helps slow my body down just enough to actually sleep better. As far as studies go, there are versions to satiate every viewpoint.
Personally, I sometimes don't get home from work until 8-9 pm or so and I'm usually in bed between 11 or 12. When I get home that late, I eat a very small dinner and maybe dessert and it doesn't affect my weight. The way I see it, if I don't before I go to bed, I'll be too hungry to fall asleep. And not getting enough sleep definitely does affect my weight (makes me gain it). I think the not eating right before bed rule is mostly to keep people from eating snacks after they have already eaten a full dinner and dessert.
I wont eat after 5 pm I know im a wierdo!
But from what ive been told from working in the health industry is that you dont burn that many calories when you sleep beacuse your not moving around so if you eat something like cake or anyother bad for you late night snacks it only takes 30 min to digest but its staying in your body for 8 hrs turning into fat beacuse your not burning it off.
Hello everyone!
I'm going to answer this question technically, because everyone's body is different. My answer is coming from one of my nutrition classes.
Eating late at night does not cause weight gain. The reason that this has become such an urban legend (so to speak) is because most people tend to over eat at night and mostly chose foods that are not good for them. However, if your caloric intake to maintain your current body weight is 1800 calories and you waited until 8pm to eat it all and then went to bed you will not gain weight. Your metabolism does slow down when you go to sleep though.
It seems like when you eat, your metabolism is kept up (hence the idea behind maintaining a high metabolism and eating more often). So if you eat close to when you (try) to go to bed, you'd have a hard time sleeping because you're still in the 'awake' mode thanks to the food.
The idea that you would gain weight because your metabolism is slower while sleeping seems kinda silly. I'd learned in bio that there were two general "modes" for your body: sympathetic and parasympathetic. One (sympathetic) is the high-energy, exercise, danger, whatever kind of mode, and parasympathetic is the less active mode, which "takes" over when sleeping, digesting, etc. Point is, your body specifically digests when it's resting, so there's no issue of not digesting food while sleeping (on the contrary, you won't digest properly if you eat right before exercising). I found a third "nervous system" while browsing on wikipedia though: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enteric_nervous_system seems that it is autonomous... Also, if you didn't digest while you sleep, then why the heck do I wake up hungry? ::)
I'm not sure where this concept that everything is converted to fat while you sleep comes from. I mean, how would anyone know or study this? Also, what happens to the parts of molecules that cannot be "converted" to fat (the nitrogenous group of amino acids)?
I think this idea comes from the fact that you may eat, you may digest, but you won't use those calories while sleeping, so they get stored. You do actually burn calories just by existing (not as much as you do while awake and doing something though), and storing anything isn't necessarily bad and it isn't necessarily fat (sugar is stored as glycogen in the liver).
That said, though... if eating before sleeping isn't your dinner but is instead your pint of Purely Decadent... you might just gain weight ;D