Strange work schedule

Wdanderson
Wdanderson Posts: 2
in Food and Nutrition
So I work 24 hour s h i f t s (apparently that gets blocked) and very often work through the entire day and night. My question is, should I continue to eat small meals through the night or stop eating after my 7pm snack? I am usually starving by midnight again and could be up till who knows when or I might get lucky and no t get anymore calls through the night, then I would have a stomach of food when i sleep. Just at a lost and help?

Replies

  • Omnidir
    Omnidir Posts: 10 Member
    the "don't eat after 7pm theory is based on someone who works a standard .. up at 6am. bed by 10 pm" type schedule. Since you are subject to being awake any of 24 hours straight, your eating pattern should be modified to when you are awake to eat. As long as you log all your food, the when is not the important part.
  • EMTFreakGirl
    EMTFreakGirl Posts: 597 Member
    FF and/or 'medic? :wink: Sounds like my schedule!
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    the "don't eat after 7pm theory is based on someone who works a standard .. up at 6am. bed by 10 pm" type schedule. Since you are subject to being awake any of 24 hours straight, your eating pattern should be modified to when you are awake to eat. As long as you log all your food, the when is not the important part.

    Also, the don't eat after 7 PM theory is utter nonsense...
  • Confuzzled4ever
    Confuzzled4ever Posts: 2,860 Member
    eat when you are hungry day or night.. esp since you are awake for so long


    I ate dinner at 9pm last night and went to sleep at 11.. i'd never survive on the "don't eat after 7pm" diet.. lol
  • steve_mfp
    steve_mfp Posts: 170 Member
    The only food timing i do is getting a good chunk of my protein amount before going to bed. Not sure if it would apply to you with your 24 hour shift...it would be interesting to see if they have done studies on HGH levels. For typical schedules your HGH concentration peaks when you are sleeping which is when our body does a lot of its repairing. Sleep is essential for good muscle development.

    http://www.humanengine.com/index.php/articles/nutrition/item/nutrient-timing-endures-circadian-rhythm-protein-timing?category_id=3

    As for when to eat everything else...whenever you need it. Also most food takes 24-72 hours to be fully absorbed by body and studies have shown that intermittent fasting for 20 hours does not affect your carb, fat, and protein metabolism.

    http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/90/5/1244.full.pdf

    I've read about some exact timing of food for the 'anabolic' window and what to eat before bed, when you wake up, 30 minutes before working out, 30 minutes after...which may...and it's a big may...since there is no conclusive data fully supporting it. But for those of us that are not elite athletes it doesn't matter. And i know of elite athletes that do not follow it either.

    The human body is an amazing machine. Feed it once a day and it already has built in ways of slowing down digestion to ensure it gets all it needs and then some. Feed it every 2 hours and the same thing. So just watch your over-all calorie intake and eat when you want/need or have time to.
  • Pang29pang
    Pang29pang Posts: 103 Member
    i am a dispatcher that works midnights ....10p to 6a...basically i eat a 100 cal snack when i come in...then at midnight i will eat some type of fruit...at 2 am i will eat my dinner ususally consisting of no more then 350 calories...then i will have one more snack, either microwave popcorn or something lights before 4am..that way by time i get to bed at 7am my food will be settled...i try to eat something every few hours but quit about 2-3 hours before i know i will be sleeping....being on call does make that hard..i guess i would eat your most calories when you know you are going to be awake for awile and then just lights snacks throughout the night...good luck
  • Wdanderson
    Wdanderson Posts: 2
    Fire/Medic here. Thanks everyone for the input,
  • EMTFreakGirl
    EMTFreakGirl Posts: 597 Member
    Fire/Medic here. Thanks everyone for the input,
    I recognized myself in your post! I knew it! Best of luck to you! FYI: Pre-portioned snacks in snack-sized baggies have been my saving grace. I have a rubbermaid mini-tote full of them to grab on the go, for those middle of the night calls. I almost greyed out on a scene ONCE...will NEVER happen again. lol

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