After the big holiday, I entered a tense and busy working state again. Many people will have a midnight snack after work. Unexpectedly, eating midnight snack often does great harm to human body. How can we eat a snack to be healthy? Let’s take a look at the strokes of traditional Chinese medicine.
five hazards of eating late at night
1. Easy to cause stomach disease
Eating late at night will increase the burden on our intestines and stomach, because we need to carry out gastrointestinal peristalsis and digestion at night. In this way, the intestines and stomach will not get a good rest, and the repair of gastric mucosa will be very difficult.
2. Cause obesity
At night, our metabolism will decline, so the amount of heat consumed will be correspondingly reduced, so that excess heat will be stored in our body as fat. This will lead to weight gain for a long time, and postpartum recovery will be more difficult.
3. Indigestible nutrition
Often eat snacks, and the snacks are rich, so over time, the nutrients in the snacks will be difficult to digest. Studies have found that if you eat a lot of high protein foods such as eggs, meat and milk during the night snack, the calcium in urine will increase, which will not only induce rickets, myopia, osteoporosis and so on; At the same time, it will also lead to urinary tract stones and so on.
4. Cholesterol increase
There are many disadvantages to eating late night snack. If you eat late night snack that is high in fat and protein, your blood lipid will suddenly increase. If we eat too many snacks at night, the content of blood cholesterol will also increase significantly, making our liver produce more low-density lipoprotein, which is easy to cause coronary heart disease, impotence and other diseases in our body.
5. Induce insomnia
Overeating at night can easily lead to oppression of the internal organs. And after eating a midnight snack at night, the organs in the body can’t rest and must continue to work. This nervous emotion will be transmitted to the brain, resulting in increased brain excitement, and transmitted to all corners of the body, causing insomnia at night.
Traditional Chinese medicine believes that “if the stomach is not harmonious, it is difficult to sleep.”. Only when the intestines and stomachs are comfortable and smooth can quality sleep be guaranteed. Therefore, it is better not to eat anything two hours before bed, so as not to increase the secretion of gastric acid and bring more burden to the intestines and stomach. If you feel particularly hungry before going to bed, you can eat a light diet, such as a slice of whole wheat bread. In addition, don’t eat too full for dinner, just 70-80%, don’t be too hot, and be light. Millet porridge is a good choice. Eat less potatoes, onions, beans, Chinese cabbage and other foods that are easy to produce gas, and don’t eat spicy foods such as peppers and garlic, so as to avoid gastrointestinal discomfort and affect sleep quality.
four precautions for eating midnight snack
1. Just supplement energy properly. Don’t eat supper as dinner. Bread slices and porridge are better choices. Try not to eat roast meat and instant boiled meat that are too fat.
2. The interval between night snack and sleep must be calculated. The two should not be too close. You should rest for an hour or two before lying in bed. Fruits with a lot of water and sugar and some diuretic foods must be eaten less before going to bed, otherwise it will affect the quality of sleep.
3. The share of night snack in the whole day should not exceed 1 / 5. The variety can be diverse and the amount must be small. The best match is dairy products, a small amount of carbohydrates and a little fruit.
4. Not too salty. This is very important. In addition to making you want to drink water all the time, it will also make it difficult to discharge water and cause swelling of your face in the morning.
Recommendation: healthy food instead of night snack
Bananas: bananas are rich in serotonin and pinealein, which help promote sleep. In addition, it is rich in magnesium, which can relax muscles.
Milk: drinking a cup of warm milk before going to bed will help you sleep. Because milk contains tryptophan, it can play a sedative role like hypnotics, and calcium can help the brain make full use of this tryptophan.
Honey: eating a large amount of sugar at a time has an exciting effect, but a small amount of glucose can suggest that the brain secretes a neurotransmitter related to thinking reactions. Drink a spoonful of honey and a glass of water before going to bed.
Oats: oats contain pinealein, which is helpful for sleep. Therefore, if you are hungry before going to bed, you can cook a small bowl of oatmeal porridge.
Potatoes: potatoes can remove the acid compounds that prevent tryptophan from playing its hypnotic role. You may as well have a small steamed potato before you go to bed.
Almonds: almonds and other nuts contain tryptophan and magnesium to relax muscles. If you are hungry before going to bed, you can eat a small amount of nuts, which has a hypnotic effect.
Whole wheat bread: whole wheat bread can help the human body release an insulin, which can make tryptophan reach the human brain and convert it into serotonin.
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