Half of Americans have weight loss on their minds. As many as 45 million of them go on a diet every year with about a 5% success rate. It’s hard to lose weight!
Losing weight sometimes seems like one big conspiracy. When you set out to change your eating habits, it can feel like everything is against you, even your own body.
In some ways, it might be.
Did you know that the body’s internal clock sets an alarm for sweet, salty, and starchy cravings in the evening? Loading up on high-calorie foods at night was a way for our ancestors to get through the next day in a time when food was never guaranteed.
If you’ve been trying to beat the evolutionary habit of late night snacking without much luck, there are things you may not have considered. Here are 8 tips to help you succeed.
1. Plan Against Late Night Snacking
Losing weight doesn’t usually happen by accident. If you don’t make plans to lose it, you won’t. Start planning your meals in advance.
Make a grocery list of snacks and ingredients that you know you’ll prepare throughout the week. Recognize what you usually reach for and make a point of buying healthier alternatives.
Set attainable cooking goals. If you’re not a chef, you’re not likely to keep up with a French consomm? served with vegetable garnish. Even the simple act of cooking at home and preparing your own foods will help you eat fewer calories.
2. Discover Yourself
There are many reasons people reach for the comfort of food at the end of the day, and few of them are hunger. If you’ve had a hard day at work or a frustrating day with your kids, it’s natural to want to reward yourself. A bowl of ice cream feels well-deserved, but it doesn’t address the problem.
Reflect on the struggles of the day and find out how you’re actually feeling. Nighttime eating can be a symptom of depression, and it won’t be the solution. Indulging in food at a time that makes you feel guilty will only feed your depression.
If you’re not depressed, and you really just want to treat yourself at the end of the day, good for you!
Take some time to figure out non-food related rewards. Maybe you love shopping or reading magazines or going to the movies. Reserve that after-dinner snacking time for these activities.
3. Change Your Routine
Food memories are among the strongest memory associations you can make. This explains why the routine of late night eating can be easy to establish but difficult to change.
Switch up your snacks.
If you tend to binge while you browse, limit your social media snacks to unlimited vegetables and healthy dips like hummus. Or air-pop yourself a bowl of popcorn and go to town double-tapping and swiping left or right.
Likewise, TV watching and video game playing can lead to mindless eating. Set yourself up with healthy late night snacks like apple slices with peanut butter. Or you can nosh on an entire container of strawberries, which tops out at 150 calories.
You can also change your bedtime routine. If you’re in for the night, get ready for bed earlier. Brushing your teeth immediately after dinner provides you with a self-imposed snacking hurdle.
4. Don’t Be “Good” All Day
Over-restricting calories during the day is basically a recipe for a midnight snack attack. It’s not a lack of will-power, it’s cause and effect. When you constantly calculate the calories you’re saving up for later, you end up obsessing about food all day.
Being “good” all day at depriving yourself causes cumulative hunger pangs that reignite when you finally satisfy them. When you reach your end-day goal with those 1,000 calories proudly banked, you wind up eating more food in less time than you otherwise would have.
5. Fill Yourself Up
Instead of starving yourself all day, keep your body fueled and feeling full. A diet rich in protein and fiber is essential to achieving those feelings of fullness.
Have some protein at every meal, aiming for close to 50 grams a day. Don’t skip milk at breakfast. Snack on nuts throughout the day. Peanut butter, boiled eggs, and canned tuna are easy sources of protein.
Combining protein with fiber helps you feel satisfied longer. Fiber also slows down digestion and regulates bowel movements. Whole grains, berries, carrots, and good old celery, dieter’s best friend, are great sources of fiber.
6. This Is Not a Cinderella Story
For some reason, the myth that late-night food makes you gain more weight than daytime food won’t go away. If that was true, you could solve world hunger by telling everyone to eat after 6 pm. Calories, unlike Cinderella, are the same before and after midnight.
The problem with late night eating is that it increases your overall calorie intake.
Eat at night if you feel hungry, but make good choices. Sit down at the dinner table. Eat something with both protein and fiber, like ants on a log or yogurt with fruit, and set yourself up for a good night of sleep.
7. Go to Sleep
Speaking of which, you need to get more sleep. Sleep deprivation, like calorie deprivation, has a negative effect on metabolism and can keep your body from shedding extra pounds.
More than 33% of Americans don’t get enough sleep, and almost 40% of Americans are obese.
Thirst and exhaustion are often mistaken for hunger, so if you’re wondering how to curb hunger late at night, drink a glass of water and go to bed. Try to get the recommended 7 to 9 hours of sleep.
8. The Future is Bright
Consider your future, and consider it in a positive light. Losing weight shouldn’t be an obligation, but an opportunity to enjoy more things for more time. Think of Scuba diving in Hawaii or walking the streets of Rome, whatever dream you have that is limited by being overweight.
It may be something as simple as keeping up with your grandchildren one day.
Be kind to yourself. Replace the negative thoughts of failure with positive thoughts of future experiences. The single most important thing you can do to be happy with your weight is to change the conversation about it.
Are You Feeling Hungry for More?
Are you ready to change your relationship with late night food? If you can conquer late night snacking, you can conquer the next objective. Feeling empowered to change one thing can have a domino effect.
For more help meeting your goal weight, check out all our weight loss tips and tricks.
