Late night eating habits

The effects of eating late at night are significantly negative and could take a toll on your health and well-being. It is crucial to break this habit if you wish to maintain a lifetime of good health. Think of all the possible alternatives you could adopt into your lifestyle - strategies that could help you in the right direction.

Let us consider what specific effects eating late at night could cause:


Causes heartburn

Acid reflux is a condition that causes heartburn which damages esophagus. It can cause many health problems like asthma, chronic hoarseness, and in worst cases, even chest pain while increasing the risk of esophagus cancer. In extreme cases, it could even cause ulcers if the heart burns are regular.


Causes sleep deprivation

One of the primary functions of sleep is to help you recuperate from the day, so you can wake up energized. Sleep is important for your mental, physical, and emotional well-being. Sleep deprivation can cause lethargy, mental and physical tiredness, difficulty in concentration and communication, poor memory or in extreme cases even loss of memory.
Most people have experienced how eating late at night can affect sleep adversely. A heavy meal taken late at night may mean lying awake as the body works hard trying to digest too much food.


Hampers digestion

Late-night eating forces your body to use its energy on digestion resulting in improper digestion of food. Also eating late hinders the toxin elimination process-which can cause morning gas and stomach cramps. When you sleep, the digestive system slows down whereby the nutrients in food cannot be absorbed fully.
This triggers the conversion of food into fat and leads to putting on weight. Those who complain about bloating never realize that it's from the gas and food particles left over from improper digestion.



Late Night Eating - 9 Tips to Stop

1. Be sure to eat 3 good meals during the day with 1 or 2 between meal snacks. Most people try to eat too few calories during the day only to binge late at night. A good insurance policy is to eat most of your calories before 6 PM.

2. When you feel the urge to eat late at night, try drinking 2 or more cups of water. You can also make a cup of herbal tea sweeten with honey or artificial sugar. Hot liquids have a soothing effect on emotions and appetite.

3. Remind yourself that it's normal to feel hungry late at night due to habitually eating late. Breaking this habit is like learning to quit smoking. Remind yourself of your goal to lose 20 or 30 pounds and the key to losing this weight is to STOP late night eating.

4. Much of late night eating after dinner can be avoided by hiding the junk food. Put foods that you're prone to eat late at night out of sight. Better yet, don't buy junk food at all, though this may not be possible if you have kids.

5. Suck on hard candy. Most hard candy has only a few calories and they give you the satisfaction of snacking.

6. Keep a written copy of your diet plan in view, which will keep your goal of losing weight firmly fixed in your mind. The temptation to snack late at night will not be as great if you don't give into the urge for several weeks.

7. Some people have great success by simply brushing their teeth late at night. This method has been known to curb late night eating for many people.

8. The most vulnerable time for eating late is 1 hour after dinner right up to bedtime. Keep your life interesting by working on a favorite hobby and NOT watching TV. The ads on TV can subconsciously trigger the impulse to eat. Boredom is your biggest danger to late night eating.

Psyche yourself for the battle. You know that you will feel tempted to snack late at night. It's an artificial feeling that will go away when you go to bed. The next morning, you probably won't be hungry .... eat breakfast anyway .... it's the most important meal of the day.

Your health is in your hands. So, start tonight!