Sound familiar? You eat healthy all day but at night, it all falls apart. That bag of chips or cookies are too much and you give in. All your healthy eating earlier in the day feels negated.
A study in the Journal of Obesity recently concluded that our internal clock actually prompts us for that sweet, starchy, salty food. Probably a leftover from our ancestors to help us store fat to survive when food was scarce, that instinct no longer serves us. So, how do we stop overeating at night? Try these tips:
- Start thinking about food as fuel for your body. With this small mindset switch, we tend to make better decisions.
- Many of us eat out of habit. Change up your routine. If you tend to eat while cleaning up the kitchen, quickly put the leftovers away, walk away from the kitchen for a few minutes, then go back and clean up. If watching TV is the problem, find something else to do like fold laundry, knit, or play with a pet while watching.
- Pre-plan your meals and stick to them. If we eat a protein rich well rounded dinner, we are less likely to feel hungry at night.
- Keep a food journal and find an accountability partner to share it with. When you write down everything you eat, you tend to make better decisions and more so when you share it with someone else.
- Make a rule that you will only eat in the evenings at the dinner table with the TV, phone, e-reader, and computer turned off or out of range.
- Close the kitchen after dinner — no exceptions.
- If these don’t do the trick, then:
- Sip hot tea.
- Brush your teeth
- Go to bed early (this is my favorite and always does the trick!)