The 13 Worst Foods to Eat at Night
The 13 Worst Foods to Eat at Night
Photo by: Bigstockphoto
It’s late at night. You’re dead tired. You lie down in bed and close
your eyes, wanting to get a goodnight sleep. You toss and turn, take on
all the sleeping positions you love, and count sheep in your head… only
to find that more than an hour has passed and you’re still wide awake.
What’s wrong with you?
Chances are, you probably ate something that’s keeping you up right
before bedtime. If you don’t want to have insomnia come knocking into
your bedroom, stay away from these 13 worst foods to eat at night. These
are the kinds of foods that will prevent you from getting a shuteye and
well-deserved rest.
1. Chocolate
I know what you’re thinking. How can something so divine be bad for
bedtime? Just the thought of smooth, luscious chocolate gliding in your
mouth makes you want to snuggle with a pillow and call it a night.
Chocolate has caffeine though, especially dark chocolate. Caffeine is
normally found in the cacao pods used to make chocolate. It is the same
thing present in coffee which gives you that morning jolt and extra
doses of energy throughout the day. It is a stimulant that improves
mental alertness, reduces tiredness, and speeds up your metabolic rate –
not exactly the things you want before heading to bed.
Darker chocolates usually contain more caffeine than lighter colored
ones, making them the worst possible chocolate to eat before sleep.
Basically, the darker the chocolate is, the more caffeine you can get
out of it. The more caffeine a chocolate has, the more you should avoid
it at night.
Some of these dark chocolates contain a significant amount of
caffeine. Take Hershey’s Bliss Dark Chocolate for example. It has 30 mg
of caffeine. That is about 25 to 38 percent the caffeine of a standard
sized cup of coffee, more caffeine than a half ounce of espresso, just a
little less than the caffeine found in a cup of brewed tea, and the
same amount found in a cup of instant tea. Even milk chocolate has
enough caffeine to keep you up. A 1.5 oz. Hershey’s Milk Chocolate Bar
has 9 to 12 mg of caffeine, which is 3 to 4 times more than the caffeine
present in a cup of decaffeinated coffee.
Caffeine is not the only culprit in chocolate however. It also
contains another stimulant – theobromine. Theobromine causes your heart
to race and will make sleeping difficult. The one type of chocolate you can eat at night is white chocolate. It does not contain theobromine and has little to no caffeine.
2. Spicy food
Digestion slows down during sleep. And because it takes extra effort
for the body to digest spicy food, it will have a harder time doing so
during sleep. The body is supposed to rest and recover during this time
of the day. Eating spicy food hours before bedtime will disturb the
continuity of your sleep and cause you to wake up several times during
the night. As a result, you will have poor quality sleep that leaves you
tired even if you did manage to get some.
Another way in which spicy foods reduce the quality of sleep is how
it raises the core body temperature. Your body will have a hard time
adjusting to this above-than-usual temperature and further reduce the
quality of your sleep.
It has also been suggested in some studies that eating spicy foods
disrupts the sleep by causing nightmares. Tore Nielsen, a director of
the Dream and Nightmare Laboratory at Sacré-Coeur Hospital and professor
at the Université de Montreal, believes this is possible. According to
Neilsen, some people may be sensitive to the chemical composition of
spicy foods, inducing nightmares and weird dreams.
Lisa Medalie, a Clinical Associate of Psychiatry at the University of
Chicago Hospitals, recommends avoiding spicy meals at least two to
three hours before going to bed.
3. Coffee
It’s not surprising. The coffee beans used to make this beverage
contains caffeine. Millions of people rely on coffee to stay awake and
keep away the Z’s. In the United States alone, 50% of the population or
150 million Americans drink coffee at an average of 3 cups a day. But
since you’re after a good night’s rest, you should avoid drinking coffee
in all its forms – cold, hot, cappuccino, espresso, latte, or straight
up.
Caffeine is specifically a central nervous system stimulant. It
blocks the production of sleep-inducing chemicals in the brain and
increases the production of adrenaline, a hormone that allows your body
to make use of available energy. This explains why coffee leaves you
feeling wide awake.
An 8 oz. cup of coffee contains an average of 250 mg of caffeine.
Coffee can lend its stimulating effects in as short as 15 minutes after
consumption. Once you have fully digested it however, its effects can
last for hours. It takes a total of 6 hours for your body to
get rid of half the caffeine found in a cup of coffee. Drinking three 8
oz. cups of coffee in a day is deemed moderate but it is best that you
avoid having a cup at least 12 hours before going to sleep. Drinking
more than 6 servings of coffee in a day is considered and excessive and
will leave you with enough caffeine in your system to stay up the whole
evening.
If you think drinking decaffeinated coffee will spare you from
insomnia, you’re mistaken. Some people are “caffeine sensitive” and may
feel energetic with just a decaf. For these people, decaffeinated
coffees still have enough caffeine content to actually disrupt their
sleep. You can, however, drink a decaf coffee up to 6 hours before
sleep. So if you need some extra energy late in the afternoon, it is
your best option.
There are also people who don’t metabolize caffeine efficiently. And
so they can feel the effects of coffee longer than the average person.
In which case, it is advisable not to drink coffee after lunch – even
decafs.
4. Alcoholic beverages
Chugging down a bottle or two of beer or 1-2 glasses of wine at night
can sure help you fall asleep faster. It’s led many people to believe
that they promote a well-rested evening. But sleeping is not true
resting if you don’t get enough of it or if you wake up every now and
then. Research has shown that drinking alcoholic beverages actually
causes you to wake up frequently during the night.
In a review of 27 studies linking alcohol intake to sleep quality, it was found that alcohol does not improve a person’s quality of sleep. The review appeared in the April 2013 issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.
According to findings, alcohol did enable healthy people to fall
asleep faster and get deep sleep for some time. However, it reduces
their rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, the only phase during the sleep
cycle when the body recovers and prepares itself for the waking part of
the day. Sleep specialist Dr. Michael Breus emphasizes that compared to
other phases of sleep, REM is the more mentally restorative part. A
disturbed REM sleep will then keep your mind from de-stressing and cause
drowsiness, difficulty concentrating, moodiness, and memory problems
from the time you wake up until you finally get a good quality sleep.
Researcher Irshaad Ebrahim, medical director at The London Sleep
Centre in the United Kingdom, says that alcohol causes disturbance in
the second half of the sleep cycle. He added that alcohol also
suppresses the normal breathing pattern, which may eventually predispose
an individual to develop sleep apnea, a medical condition that results
in the pausing of breathing during sleep.
The more alcohol you drink before sleep, the more pronounced these
negative effects will be. It is recommended to limit alcoholic beverage
intake to 1 to 2 servings and to drink them 4 to 6 hours before bedtime.
To ensure good sleep, it is best you avoid it.
5. Fatty food
That slice of meaty pizza or that large serving of burger and fries
may be irresistible at dinner time. But eating fatty foods is bad for
your sleep.
Scientists conducted a study at the University of Minnesota and
Minneapolis Veterans’ Affairs Medical Center. They found that foods high
in fat may decrease the quality of sleep in humans. They placed rats on
a high fat diet for 8 weeks to investigate its effects on sleep,
carefully monitoring their sleep-wake cycle and comparing them to rats
which were maintained on their regular diet. Results revealed that the
sleep cycle of rats which were on a high fat diet turned for the worst.
While these rats slept for longer periods than those on regular diet,
they had more fragmented sleep and had difficulty staying awake during
the day. Why is this?
Researchers suggest that it is possibly related to orexin or
hypocretin, a brain chemical that regulates the sleep-wake cycle. Orexin
stimulates wakefulness, and a lack of this neurochemical causes daytime
sleepiness. It is believed that orexin deficiency is the main cause of
narcolepsy, a sleep disorder that causes an individual to be extremely
sleepy during daytime and suddenly fall asleep any time during the day,
without warning. In the study, rats who received high fat foods
regularly had decreased sensitivity to orexin, resulting in disturbed
sleeping patterns.
A separate study assessed the link between daytime sleepiness and
alertness with the meals participants ate. 31 healthy, non-obese
individuals aged between 18 and 65 years and were normal sleepers were
monitored. They found that those ate fatty foods were more likely to
feel sleepy during daytime than those who ate less of them, or didn’t
eat them at all. Dr. Alexandros Vgontzas, the principal investigator of
the research and professor of psychiatry at the Penn State College of
Medicine, also says that eating high fat foods decreases a person’s
mental alertness.
6. Red meats
Some foods like milk, peanut butter, and cheese contain healthy
amounts of protein that promote a restful sleep. They are best taken
with high-carbohydrate foods for an even better sleep. Red meats are
rich in protein. While they are great for weight loss, they contain too
much protein. If not paired with carbohydrates during a nighttime meal
and when eaten in excess amounts, red meats and other high protein foods
can prevent you from sleeping well.
Unlike carbohydrates which are fairly easy to digest, the body has a
hard time breaking down protein. Eating a hearty serving of red meats
and foods rich in protein prior to sleep will force your digestive
system to do some hard work, even during REM sleep when it’s supposed to
be relaxing. Protein-rich foods also contain tyrosine, an amino acid
that stimulates the brain and keeps you awake. And yet there are more
reasons why you should be avoiding protein-only meals at night.
Indeed, a meal that only has protein in it is satiating. But the
absence of carbohydrates leaves you with a feeling of fullness that is
uncomfortable enough to actually keep you from falling asleep. Even if
you do fall asleep, it is a heavy meal nonetheless. The problem with
sleeping right after a heavy meal is that it will cause gastric acids in
your stomach to regurgitate. This will damage your esophagus and
possibly result in Gastro-esophageal reflux disease (GERD) wherein you
will regularly experience regurgitation of stomach content, especially
after eating more than what you can handle. The reflux of gastric acids
while sleeping may not always cause GERD, but it may disturb your sleep.
Red meats are also high in fat, another no-no before bedtime. It is
advisable that if you eat high protein food before bedtime, you consume
only a limited amount and eat it with carbohydrates. Because red meats,
like any protein food, contain tryptophan, an amino acid that promotes
sleep.
7. Cereals
Cereals are typically eaten during breakfast but some folks enjoy
making snacks out of them throughout the day. Pairing them with milk in
the evening is said to promote sleep, especially since milk has some
protein and tryptophan. But this sleep-inducing effect depends largely
on what kind of cereal you are eating before going to bed. Majority of
the cereals available in the market today have excess amounts of sugar.
The main reason why cereals are recommended for encouraging sleep is
because it is a high-carbohydrate food. Carbohydrates are quite easy to
digest so it doesn’t take much toll on your body during sleep. And
because they are paired with milk, a food highly acclaimed for its
benefits with regards to sleep, it is no wonder that some people would
eat a bowl of cereal at night. Eating cereals rich in sugar
unfortunately cancels these beneficial effects. How so?
The sugars added into cereals are often simple sugars, which are
easier absorbed and used up by the body. Eating high-sugar cereals will
then cause your body to use up these sugars, resulting in a surge of
blood sugar levels. An increased blood sugar will give you what is
popularly known as a “sugar rush” and keep you awake longer. This would
then shorten your sleep and greatly reduce its quality.
Once your blood sugar levels go down, you will start to fall asleep.
That sounds good, right? Not exactly. During your sleep, your body will
try to compensate and release stress hormones like cortisol. These
stress hormones will interfere with your REM cycle, the restorative
phase of your sleep. And you will wake up without feeling any less
stress or fatigue. You will feel tired, like you didn’t have any sleep
at all.
When it comes to cereals, avoid varieties that have added sugars. Opt
for low-sugar, whole-grain cereals. They can still give you the
carbohydrates you need to induce sleep, minus the sugar that will keep
you from getting adequate rest.
8. Vegetables and fruits
People say that vegetables are good for you. But this is not the case
with some vegetables, especially when you’re trying to have a good
night’s sleep.
Cauliflower and broccoli make nice examples for this. These
vegetables contain tryptophan, the same amino acid present in proteins
that regulates sleep. Tryptophan does this by assisting in the
production of serotonin, a hormone that induces sleepiness.
Unfortunately, cauliflower and broccoli are also high in roughage. The
roughage makes them difficult to digest. If you eat these vegetables too
close to sleeping time, you will still be able to get some shut eye.
But your body will take time in digesting them, preventing it from
relaxing completely.
Other vegetables that are high in fiber or roughage are bran,
cabbage, leafy greens, celery, squash, beans, and white mushrooms. These
are veggies you can freely enjoy throughout the day except at night.
Some fruits like oranges and raspberries don’t make ideal bedtime snacks
either. They are also high in roughage and will leave your digestive
system with hard work even during sleep.
You should stay away from tomatoes too. Tomatoes are acidic and will
result in indigestion and heartburn. These two will make you
uncomfortable and make it difficult to sleep. Better stay away from
tomatoes and any food slathered with tomato-based sauces like pastas and
pizzas!
Of course, there are exceptions. You can eat some fruits and
vegetables without actually having to worry about sleeping problems.
Bananas help promote sleep because they contain the sleep-promoting
substance, tryptophan. Cherries contain melatonin, a substance that
induces sleepiness. One study shows that drinking tart cherry juice
prior to bedtime experienced improvements in sleep duration and sleep
quality among adults that suffered from chronic insomnia. Lettuce
contains lactucarium, which has sedating properties and can therefore
relax your brain.
9. Sweets
Tempted to eat cake, chocolate cookies, or maybe some ice cream late
at night? Not so fast. These sweet delights may be comforting to your
mood, but they are not good for sleeping at all.
We all know that sweets give you that jolt of energy called a “sugar
rush”. It is exactly this which will prevent you from sleeping early in
the evening, and could keep you up for up to hours depending on the
amount of sugar you consumed. But then you experience the “sugar crash”
where you are left feeling tired or drained. By the time you hit the
sack, you will have less hours of sleep – not what you need if you want
to feel fully rested in the morning.
That’s not all. Eating foods high in sugar throughout the day can
also affect your sleeping pattern and result in insomnia. A high-sugar
diet will keep you in a loop of sugar rush and sugar crash during the
day. In moments of sugar crash, you might be forced to take naps. So
when you get home, you will have less urge to sleep.
Nighttime sleep is very important for resting. Studies show that
getting adequate sleep at night is essential in maintaining your
circadian rhythm, an internal clock that regulates the release of
hormones for sleeping, metabolism, and other important functions
throughout the day. If you don’t get enough sleep at night, no amount of
sleep during the day will help your body recover from everyday
stresses. You will feel more tired, and more stressed for each day
without nighttime rest.
Eventually, with more sleepless nights, stress will pile up and cause
you to crave these sugary goods, contributing further to the insomnia.
You can break this unhealthy cycle by avoiding foods high in sugar
regardless of the time of day.
10. Junk food
You’re craving. You think that eating your favorite junk food may
actually help you fall asleep – all you need to do is give in. Junk
foods come in many forms. There are candy bars, potato chips, and fast
food for starters. But because they are typically high in fats or
sugars, giving in to your craving is actually a bad idea. The more you
eat them, the harder it will be to make a trip to Z Land.
Junk food has long been associated with weight gain and obesity. If
you eat them at night, you are more likely to pack up on weight than you
would at other times of the day. That’s because your body stores the
fats found in junk food, since you are asleep and inactive. Once a
person becomes overweight and obese, having a sound sleep becomes more
difficult due to complications such as difficulty breathing. The length
and quality of sleep is therefore lessened – but it doesn’t end here.
Studies have also shown that sleep deprivation fuels junk food
cravings. The less sleep a person has, the stronger the cravings are for
these foods. Researchers from UC Berkeley scanned the brains of 23
healthy young adults after a good night’s sleep, and after a sleepless
night. They have found that lack of sleep impairs the frontal lobe, the
part of the brain responsible for decision-making. At the same time,
sleeplessness also increased the activity in deeper brain areas which
respond to rewards, explaining the link between sleep deprivation and an
increased appetite for junk foods.
What does this mean? It means that it will become an unhealthy cycle
of eating junk foods, weight gain, and fewer hours of sleep, over and
over again. Do yourself a favor and stay away from junk foods before
bedtime.
11. Water
Crazy, right? How can water, a liquid crucial in our diet, be so harmful to sleep? Let’s break down the facts.
Water is essential for hydration of the body. It helps regulate our
body temperature, assists in proper circulation, and speeds up
metabolism among many things. The human body is made up of 50 to 75
percent water. And we lose water quite easily when we urinate, sweat, or
even so much as exhale. An adult can lose up to 3 liters of water in a
day and the elderly lose about 2 liters of water per day.
Drinking water constantly makes up for these losses and prevents
dehydration, allowing our bodies to function optimally. Men and women
are advised to drink 2.6 liters and 2.1 liters of water respectively.
Drink too much water before bedtime however, and you will curse yourself
for the night to make several trips to the bathroom.
It is true that digestion slows down at night when you’re asleep. But
it sure doesn’t stop. Binging on water or any other liquid before
sleeping will cause your bladder to fill up and prompt you to wake up.
As a result, your sleep will be interrupted occasionally, and you will
have brief periods of sleep. This won’t be enough for rest and recovery.
Even worse, you may not be able to asleep again after a trip to the
bathroom! Besides getting puffy eyes, you will have problems staying
awake during daytime.
Taking a nap in the afternoon to make up for lost hours of sleep will
only make it worse for you. Your sleeping pattern will become
imbalanced and you will eventually develop insomnia. You can avoid all
this by simply limiting your water intake at night. Or, you can keep
yourself from drinking water at least 2 hours before bedtime.
12. Sodas
Carbonated sodas are bad for sleep due to a couple of reasons. They
are acidic, they contain copious amounts of sugar, they are considered
to be ‘junk foods’, and they have caffeine.
Soda is an acidic drink with an average pH of 2.5. The stomach
produces hydrochloric acid (HCl), a gastric juice that breaks down food
so its nutrients can be readily absorbed by the intestines. Hydrochloric
acid has a pH of 2. The phosphoric acid found in soda decreases the
secretion of HCl in the stomach and cause indigestion. So if you eat a
heavy meal at night and drink soda with it, you will surely have trouble
sleeping.
The sugars found in soda are also excessive. And we all know what
that leads to – an initial sugar rush that keeps you awake and leaves
you with less hours of sleep, and a sugar crash that will prevent you
from getting a good rest. Because sodas are also considered junk foods,
they might contribute to a cycle of cravings, weight gain, and sleep
deprivation.
Sodas are guilty of containing caffeine. Caffeine, the same
ingredient found in coffee and chocolate, is a known substance that
prevents drowsiness by blocking the effects of serotonin and melatonin,
both hormones that induce sleep.
Additionally, a lot of the sodas marketed have aspartame, an
artificial sweetener. Aspartame contains phenylalaline, a substance
associated with health concerns in people suffering from phenylketonuria
(PKU). In healthy people, phenylalaline has been linked to sleep
disorders. Drinking too much soda at night will increase your aspartame
intake, which then raises the levels of phenylalaline in your brain. Do
this on a regular basis and you might develop a sleep disorder.
Watch out for the caffeine and sugar content of sodas if you intend
to drink some at night, though it is best that you avoid drinking sodas
hours before heading to bed.
13. Medications
Okay, so medications are not really food. But you do take them in
like food, which is why we’ve added them to this list. There are
prescription and over-the-counter medications which are not good for
sleep. They may result in insomnia and cause side effects that reduce
the length and quality of your sleep.
Medicine for asthma has been proven to cause insomnia in some people.
They also contain chemicals that are related to caffeine, which
explains why it is that way. Medications prescribed for depression,
namely Paxil, Prozac, and Zoloft have been associated to insomnia and
other sleep problems in 10 to 20 percent of people who use them. Heart
medications have been known to cause similar problems, with some times
believed to cause nightmares. Other prescribed medications related to
sleep problems are those given to people with hypothyroidism and
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).
The more common medications we buy over-the-counter can affect sleep
too. Decongestants, for example, cause insomnia. Cough medicines also
tend to contain alcohol, which has been proven to cause an individual to
wake up frequently during sleep. OTC pain relief medications usually
contain caffeine, which has stimulating effects that can last up to 8
hours. Even herbal medications, like St. John’s Wort and ginseng, cause
overstimulation and insomnia.
The best way to deal with medication-related sleep problems is to
discuss these issues with your physician or pharmacist. Ask if there are
other medications you can take that will not affect your sleep. If this
is not possible, discuss whether or not the timing of these medications
may be changed. Maybe you can drink them in the morning or afternoon
instead, and not take them at night. When it comes to OTC meds, you can
simply change the time you take them without consulting a health care
provider.
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