How do you track late night eating?

GuardiansChild
GuardiansChild Posts: 17
in Health and Weight Loss
How do you track anything you eat late at night (we'll say after midnight equals "late")? Do you count it in your daily allowance? Do you simply ignore it? Right now, I'm in college and I'll find myself staying up late (sometimes until 2 or 3 in the morning) to work on a project or homework I simply couldn't get done in the day. I'll usually find myself starving around midnight or 1:00, so I'll always eat something and list it as "Snacks" in my food tracker. But if I eat a 200 calories snack, then I'm down 200 calories the next day and usually either end up hungry because of the missing calories or eating as normal and going over my limit. Should I count those late night snacks and just deal with the hunger the next day, or can I assume my body just needs extra fuel because I'm staying awake longer and not worry about tracking it?

Replies

  • rompers16
    rompers16 Posts: 5,404 Member
    I would count it for the day I ate it..so if it's 1 am, I would have less left for the day. You could try picking more filling, less calorie items as well..fruit, nuts, etc, so that you'll have more wiggle room later on.
  • Ainar
    Ainar Posts: 858 Member
    I list as snacks... sometimes as meal, doesn't really matter how you name it...

    First of all decide when your day starts and when it ends. Is it from 24:00 until 00:00? Or is it from the moment you wake up until moment you go to sleep? Or any other way? For me it's from waking up until going to sleep. So if I ate something at Wednesday before bed at 01:00 I still count it as my Tuesday meal. ^^
  • loliblullama
    loliblullama Posts: 140 Member

    First of all decide when your day starts and when ends. Is it from 24:00 Until 00:00? Or is it from the moment you wake up until moment you go to sleep? Or any other way? For me it's from waking up until going to sleep. So if I ate something at Wednesday before bed 01:00 I still count it as my Tuesday meal. ^^

    ^ That's what I do too.
  • Masterdo
    Masterdo Posts: 331 Member
    Midnight snacks are a must for late night college work!

    I usually counted a "day" as whatever was between two times I slept, and being in college that can be a rather vague concept.
    Also, note that you are actually making it significantly harder to lose weight by not having regular sleep habits. Food for thought :p
  • BelindaDuvessa
    BelindaDuvessa Posts: 1,014 Member
    I have my Diary set up in 4, 6 hour time slots. This way, no matter what shift I end up getting stuck working, I log whatever I eat in that time-frame.
  • Pixi_Rex
    Pixi_Rex Posts: 1,676 Member
    I log it like i do everything else, on the day I eat it. If I eat at 1am ...its logged at 1am on the day I ate it and I just have to deal with less calories for the rest of that day.
  • jesswait
    jesswait Posts: 218 Member
    I count 'days' as the time between sleeps. So I add it to the day I ate it, I have a evening snack category to log things for this purpose.
  • BlackCat1383
    BlackCat1383 Posts: 7
    I work shift work, and end up working a lot of backshifts, so I do a lot of "late night" eating. It's not so bad in the middle of a run, where I sleep all day and am up all night; it functions like a normal day for me, and that's how I track it, even though I'm eating during two different days.

    The worst is that first shift, when I'm up most of the day and then up all night long. My dietician said that even if I'm eating after midnight, it counts as part of the first day and I agreed with her. I try to track between sleeps as "one day", and try to plan my calories accordingly. If you find yourself eating past midnight more often than not, then take that into account for your daily calorie count. Try eating multiple small meals instead of three large ones with snacks, and try to keep that late night snack as healthy as possible. Try a bowl of whole grain cereal with milk or a piece of whole grain toast with jam. If you're finding it hard to do that, try and find ways to "earn" those calories through exercise earlier in the day, or by making meal and snack choices that are filling, but lighter in calories so you have them available for your late night snack.

Categories