Table of contents:
- Why do we feel hungry in the middle of the night?
- What you eat throughout the day can leave you hungry in the middle of the night
- Psychological factors can make you crave sugary or high MSG foods at night
- What to do if you feel hungry in the middle of the night?
- 1. Identify why you feel hungry
- 2. Improve your diet
- 4. Change your consumption when hungry at night
- If it occurs too often, behavioral therapy may be needed
Hunger is the body's attempt to balance energy for various metabolic functions. This can certainly occur at night, including midnight, a time when the body is resting and needs nutrients for the recovery process after an activity. Even so, overeating at night can disrupt sleep time and lead to obesity.
Why do we feel hungry in the middle of the night?
What you eat throughout the day can leave you hungry in the middle of the night
Feelings of hunger in the middle of the night can be influenced by a variety of factors ranging from body mechanisms to habits. Consumption of simple carbohydrates such as rice or starchy snacks at night can easily increase the hormone insulin. Because these foods don't last long, blood sugar levels tend to drop and the hormone ghrelin sends signals to your brain to make you feel hungry.
Food ingredients that are not sufficient nutritionally fiber, protein, and fat can also cause hunger even after dinner. This mechanism can be repeated, starting from the habit of choosing food, becoming accustomed to feeling hungry and then eating at night.
Psychological factors can make you crave sugary or high MSG foods at night
Psychological factors can also trigger hunger at night. Unlike daytime filled routines, at night you tend to experience less distraction to think about things that might affect your emotions. As a result, this can lead to stress and difficulty relaxing, which can lead to overeating at night.
However, unlike hunger in general, this tends to encourage you to want foods that are sweet, high in fat, and contain MSG. If it is in the habit of eating something to make you feel calmer, then this will become a difficult habit to break.
What to do if you feel hungry in the middle of the night?
1. Identify why you feel hungry
It is fundamental to make you think twice before indulging in hunger. Hunger is normal, especially when you are dieting or trying to adjust your diet. However, hunger can also arise because you think eating is one way to reduce stress. Therefore, looking for other alternatives to distract and make you fall asleep easily, for example drinking water, stretching, walking around the house, or reading a book are easy things to make you more relaxed.
2. Improve your diet
This can be started by changing your diet at breakfast by meeting most of your daily calorie needs with carbohydrates, protein and fat. Then continue with lunch and dinner interspersed with healthy snacks such as fruit to prevent blood sugar from dropping too low. Postponing dinner no later than two hours before bedtime can also be done to prevent hunger at night. In addition, consume more foods that can produce energy and a longer feeling of fullness, such as fiber and protein.
3. Avoid trigger foods
Hunger at night may simply be the desire to eat something again. Some foods that taste good, such as sweet foods or contain MSG, can be addictive, especially when you have trouble falling asleep or when you wake up in the middle of the night. Overcome this by avoiding or reducing consumption which you think can be addicting as it approaches dinner time.
4. Change your consumption when hungry at night
This is a last resort if all efforts are made not to eliminate hunger. Replace foods that are usually consumed during midnight starvation, such as fried rice, instant noodles, or chips, with healthier foods such as fruits or nuts. Besides being low in calories, these foods also prevent addiction and overeating.
If it occurs too often, behavioral therapy may be needed
Apart from being triggered by psychological and biological factors, midnight hunger is likely an eating disorder such as binge eating and night eating disorder (NES). Both are eating disorders triggered by the perception that eating calms the mind or can reduce the effects of insomnia. Someone with binge eating can eat excess food at any time including midnight, then feel guilty but repeated. Meanwhile, someone with NES has the habit of consuming more food at night but not feeling too hungry during the day.
Obesity and sleep disorders may be experienced by sufferers binge eating and NES, therefore the earliest possible treatment is required. Eating behavior change therapy can solve both problems. But specifically, sufferers binge eating requires diet formation and anti-depressant drug therapy, while patients with NES require relaxation therapy and changes in sleep time.
