How do I stop eating snacks after 6pm?

It's not a myth. Calories are energy. If you provide your body with energy you body needs to use that energy to burn it off.
If you eat before you go to bed without exercising, then that energy isn't utilised.
Good snacks for the evening are clear chicken soups / broths.

So, how quickly do you think the body converts food into energy? Do you think it just passes through the back of your throat and turns into majik energy pellets?

There are two seperate issues here that are getting confused.

1) Calories are calories, regardless of when in the day you eat them. If your body burns more calories than you consume, you will lose weight - whether you space your eating out into 20 small incraments or eat it all at one time immediately before bed. This math is fundamental to the concept of counting your calories.

2) The reason the calories before bed myth has continued for so long, is there is an argument to be made that a diet is more likely to be SUSTAINABLE if you are eating your calories earlier in the day, rather than before bed. The reason is that when you eat earlier in the day (as opposed to before bed), you will feel satiated (or full) for a higher percentage of your waking hours. Conversely, if you eat more calories before bed (and fewer throughout the day) you will be hungrier throughout the day and more satiated while asleep (when feeling satiated does not even give you any benefit). A lifestyle is more sustainable if you are not always feeling hungry, so it is easy to see why the eating calories early in the day myth continues.

A "diet" is more sustainable if it fits your lifestyle & preferences. Not eating at night makes me cranky, makes me have more trouble sleeping than usual, and makes me 200% more miserable in the morning. I am perfectly "satiated" during the day having oatmeal, fruit, yogurt, maybe a salad or soup or something for lunch. I'm ravenously hungry at night-regardless of what I eat during the day. Fighting that leads to a whole lotta binging at night. Planning for it makes it fit my life and very easily maintainable.

I realize I'm an n=1 non-peer reviewed study and all, but I'm not seeing any other evidene to support that what I'm doing is "bad."

Also, of course it is not bad what you are doing (see #1). Any adherence to your calorie plan will result in you achieving your goals - which is the whole point! I was merely trying to explain rationally why I think the "no calories after 6pm" myth has persisted for all these years. For certain people it works, although not for the reasons they think it is working. The reason it works is because it allows them to adhere to their total daily calorie plan, not because night calories are evil.

I think we are in agreement. I think the myth has persisted because of Bob Harper and Dr. Oz (and whoever their counterparts were before Oprah made them famous-not sure if Oprah had anything to do with Dr Oz though).

Different things work for different people.

I also put a limit on how late I will eat – but considering I don’t usually go to bed until 11:30pm. I make mine 8p.m.

There’s a lot of info out there – some say don’t eat after 6, some say it doesn’t matter at all, some say stop eating 2 to 4 hours before bed.

Personally, I think the best thing anyone can do is to listen to your body!
If you are hungry – eat….

That being said, I think we often mistake true hunger for other things – boredom, stress, habit.

When I want to eat something I try to decide if I actually feel hungry and how hungry I feel. I use a scale of 1 to 5 - 5 being I would chew my own hand off, and 1 being I’ll live, it just sounded good. If I’m a 1 to 3 I will try drinking a full 8 ounces of water before I eat, or just doing something else to take my mind off of it – If I’m still hungry then I try the 2 bites rule – just have a few bites of whatever it is you are craving.

How many times do you eat a day?

I try to eat small amounts 6 to 8 times a day.

Water will help you to feel full as well eating a lot of protein…lean meats can make really good snacks.



Good Luck!
Hope you find what works for you!

I plan in what I am going to eat. It is always healthy snack. A piece of fruit, cheese sticks, like that. I don't deviate from the written plan.

Put down the pipe?

If it fits your macros, just eat.

I chew sugarless gum or do a challenging crossword puzzle.

eat smart snacks like air popped popcorn within salt or butter.

I struggle with the same thing. I agree snacking after 6 is not taboo. However when you are NOT hungry and are just eating to eat or because it is a habit, that's when it is a problem. Lately, I've been eating dinner a bit later then having a cup of hot tea an hour or so later. For some reason, the tea seems to tell me to stop. If tea's not your thing, try some other hot drink that you would sip. (Brushing teeth doesn't do it for me. About an hour later, I completely forget I've brushed and the taste of the toothpaste is gone. Give it a try though, maybe it will work for you.)

Take a photo of yourself half naked and place it on the place where you snacks are.

TRUE STORY!! I have a FAT Pic on my fridge so whenever I feel the urge to Binge I just look at that Pic and the craving usually goes right away....

DRINK H2O!!!!