You may know what to avoid eating before bed.
Drinking coffee after noon isn’t helpful. Eating chocolate will keep you up.
Also, sugar and spice alike make for wide eyes while horizontal.
But what about when we eat?
According to the Cleveland Clinic, the window between food and snooze time should actually be about three hours or so. Why? Because when you sleep on a full stomach, your body is trying to multitask between two crucial processes: one is the entirety of all of your sleep functions and the other is digestion. Granted it may not seem like you’re doing much when you sleep (after all, you’re just laying there – how hard could it be?). However, this time is when your body goes to work to do repair and restoration. That takes energy. But, since digestion does too, the problem when you go to sleep too soon after eating is that neither thing happens in a quality way. (Worse yet, this definitely won’t help with your weight loss goals if you have any, inasmuch as it correlates with a higher BMI.) Also, heartburn may become an issue if you lay down too quickly after a meal.
So, that’s why you don’t want to slumber too close to supper.
Okay, but what if you wait too long?
Is it so bad to go to bed hungry? Well, that depends. Although they say it’s better to go to bed on an empty tummy versus a freshly filled one, there’s always a caveat. For example, it matters how long ago you ate. If you haven’t had anything since that on-the-run snack you shoved between your teeth at 2 P.M., then your blood sugar is probably gonna be a bit low. This is one I’ve had the unintentional misfortune of realizing when I’m going through busier times of my life. I’ll accidentally skip my evening meal, head to bed, and… proceed to lay there for the next three hours with my heart absolutely racing. Why? Well, it might be because rapid heart rate is a common side effect for those suffering from low blood sugar. It’s pretty tough to zonk out when your body’s acting like it’s running an ultra and missed the memo that it’s time to deactivate for the day.
The fix?
Well, it’s actually in the advice itself: it’s better to eat nothing than to go to bed on a full stomach, sure. But this doesn’t mean you can’t have a light snack to appease your blood sugar. (You’re still not “stuffing” your stomach.) The logic here is that you can either lay awake all night anyway with a racing heart or take an hour to enjoy and digest a small snack that will regulate your sugar levels (and bring your rate back to normal) before you lay down. Since it’s not a full meal, you may feel just fine laying down far sooner than the dinnertime three hour window normally allotted for a fuller meal’s necessary digestion time.
And what should we eat before bed?
Keep reading to find out…