How many times have you stayed up watching television or are ready to go to bed and you are hungry. You try so hard to ignore it because we all have been told that we should not eat after a certain hour and especially before going to bed.
But when those midnight munchies strike, they are very hard to avoid. As a matter of fact, if you go to bed hungry you won’t fall asleep. All you keep thinking about is food and until you eat something, you can’t go to sleep. But what should you eat? Usually when we get these cravings we look for junk food.
What we want is candy, cake, ice cream, cookies or chips. We basically want something sweet or salty. So, not only do we want to eat very late at night but we also want high calorie, greasy, sugary foods. This is why some of us will go to bed hungry in order to avoid eating something that is not right for us. Bad think is that in the morning, some of us wake up with a stomach ache or worse, hungrier than ever and can’t stop eating.
If we are all honest, we will admit that we do give into our cravings and then feel guilty. That does not have to be the case. You can give into the cravings but you should avoid these types of foods or drinks:
- Avoid caffeine – don’t drink coffee, cocoa or soft drinks. These drinks will only make you jittery, keep you up and may even give you more hunger pangs.
- High Fat – avoid eating any foods that are greasy and high in fat late at night, such as fried chicken, pizza, chips, etc. These foods will take quite a while to digest, they are heavy and if you finally go to sleep after you eat, you will end up with indigestion.
- Sweets – most of us have a sweet tooth and will go for sugary foods first when we have these cravings. If you are having a hard time falling asleep, it could be due to high levels of stress hormones called cortisol. These trigger the desire to eat something sweet. By giving into the desire of eating sugary foods, it will cause you to toss and turn all night long.
To many, this looks bad because these are the only foods we truly want at midnight and nothing else sounds appetizing. Don’t worry, you can satisfy your cravings and be healthy. Doing the following will allow you to eat or drink and not feel guilty, sick or cause you a sleepless night.
- Water – nutritionists have found that at times a person, who drank two glasses of water before eating anything, has calm or eliminated their hunger pangs. The reason, dehydration will be mistaken for hunger pangs.
- Sweets – if its sweets you want, then snack on dried fruits. They are naturally sweet and will calm down or get rid of your hunger pangs. Another plus is that they are high in fiber, potassium and magnesium which will help aid with digestion.
- Carbs – for those that can’t sleep at all and are hungry eat starchy foods, such as whole wheat toasted English muffin. Researchers found that eating something starchy will raise the blood sugar levels and neurotransmitter serotonin which will make a person feel drowsy and help them drift off into sleep.
- Milk – a glass of non-fat milk (minus the cookies) can help you sleep better. The calcium content in milk along with amount of tryptophan in the blood will relax the muscles and promote sleepiness.
Basically we have to retrain ourselves and acquire new eating habits. By switching the junk food for healthy foods, we can give into our midnight cravings and wake up the next morning satisfied and guilt free. Always keep these types of foods or snacks in your home. The good thing is we don’t have these cravings often so we don’t have to worry about overdoing it.