I wish I had an answer for you, because that would mean I have it figured out for me too! I workout in the morning and eat fine during the day, but...you know the rest of the story. I have been doing a lot of reading to try and figure this out and I am at my wits end. I feel like I am a rational person, sound of mind and body, but what I do makes no sense to me at all. I think the important thing for us to do is to stay aware of what we are doing to ourselves and to keep looking for answers. Never give up. :noway:

I too agree that it is a habit and it takes at least 21 days of consistent change to break a habit......I have done a ton of reading on this issue and when I am in the zone, I am good.....however over the last week w/ Christmas, etc my 'good habits' have not been so good....however...

some suggestions that have worked for me....

1) save some calories for a night time snack.....portion it out in baggies so that you don't over eat though.

2) drink herbal tea or fat free hot chocolate

3) find another distraction.....for me it's jumping on the computer....i can totally lose track of time if I need to...

4) do you live in a split level house? I find that if I go upstairs and do paperwork, read, watch tv, etc that it is not as tempting to walk by the kitchen and grab a bite of this or a bite of that....

good luck.

Hi - like everyone else I do great during the day but as soon as I walk through my front door after work! Disaster. But my problem is before my evening meal. I eat all sorts of bad things while waiting for food to cook. No amount of healthy snacks (e.g. carrot sticks) ready and waiting make a difference. I head straight for bread, butter and spreading cheese. After dinner I am ok usually unless I am in the frame of mind that "oh well ruined the day anyway". BUT I have now decided to remove myself from the kitchen and go upstairs and read or crochet until food is ready.

May take a while to train myself but fingers crossed. Good luck everyone

I have a very similar problem. This is exactly what happens I barely eat during the day because I'm usually in class or at work. So when it hits about 8pm and all of my school work is done I start to "de-stress" from my day and eat everything and anything.

Gah. I'm an night-time eater as well. It just gets harder to control myself when the night comes. And I know it's the only thing that holds me back from losing weight. By the time I get up in the morning, I feel horrible and guilty but then the night hits and I'm like "Meh, one more night won't hurt."

HI Kimberly

I was awful at doing this, and have gained a lot of weight over the last 2/3 years, largely through eating late at night. I've finally kicked the habit and have definitely lost weight as a result! These are a couple of things that were suggested to me (I'm not saying they will necessarily apply to you but I thought I'd mention them anyhow!) :

- How balanced is your daily calorie intake? If you don't eat much all day then you will be super hungry come night time, make sure you try and eat throughout the day.
- Are you bored? Do something like reading or playing a game with your kids. Being distracted from the food will likely make you realise you're not actually hungry just bored!
- Are you eating secretly? If you're not telling anyone about the late night eating it's likely that it's because you couldn't justify it if anyone caught you. Maybe try telling someone every time you want to eat something (like members of this group/a friend/a husband), and hopefully they can distract you, or at least make you double check your cravings.... you might find you're not that hungry once you've told someone !

Personally, I managed to wean myself off it by doing a couple of things:

- Having something healthy - instead of a bar of chocolate, I'd have coco pops. Takes longer to eat so you feel more satisfied, and has WAY less fat and calories.
- Have something very crunchy/noisy/tricky to eat like carrots, green beans, popcorn. You don't mindlessly eat it and then can register when you're full
- Having a glass of fruit smoothie (it's bulky and feels like food but it's actually healthy). Just be careful, it is calorific and I'm not sure how good it would be for you if you are diabetic (sorry, not too sure how that would work!)
- The main issue for me was I just said to myself it didn't count because I don't eat breakfast, so that extra food at night was in place of my breakfast. However, I wouldn't eat a toasted sandwich for breakfast... or 3 bowls of cereal... so my logic was all wrong. Make sure you pay attention to what you've eaten throughout the day so you don't wrongly justify it by counting it as missing calories, when actually it isn't.

I hope some of this is helpful. If it's not sorry for the long message! Good luck!!!

xxx

First off, great job coming as far as you have I am a bad night eater as well. I can do fine then night hits and it kills me. I need someone to lock up my kitchen for me lol. Add me if you wanna talk about it any time I am here to support you.

Thanks so much for posting this. I have managed to lose all the weight I was set to, and thought I was out of danger, developed healthy eating habits an wouldn't have night cravings anymore. WRONG! This last week I've been overeating every night. I snack on healthy food (i´m lucky I don´t like junk) but still go way above my "needed" Calories for the day. I don´t want to ruin all the hard work I've doing for more than 3 months. I feel pretty and healthy and love but I just can´t stop myself from eating at night. And I know perfectly why the cravings are back, I'm going through a stressful time right now, and I'm turning to food for comfort. I'm so mad at myself!!
But reading your posts, I'm telling myself that today is a brand new day and that I have donde well so far, and today will be the magic day that I break this distructive pattern.