Eating before bed

Aaron_K123
Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hey all. A post by a fellow MFPer got me thinking about eating before bed. I tend to do so personally because that's how my schedule naturally ends up.

In thinking about it it seems to me like it is a good idea to eat right before bed (dependent on your goals). I'm hoping to get opinions or to be corrected if I say something clearly wrong.

If I understand correctly your body requires calories (which can come from any macro), micronutrients (which can come from only certain foods) and amino acids (which can only come from protein). If the body lacks calories and needs them it can harvest from either your fat (more efficient) or your muscle (less efficient) but if it needs amino acids it can only harvest from your muscle.

The idea for why you shouldn't eat before bed I've heard is it lengthens your fasted state in terms of hours and it is during those hours that your body is going to require calories but not have intake so you will burn fat. But isn't it also true that your body requires but lacks amino acids during this time? Isn't this going to put you into a catabolic state where you are also reabsorbing some muscle to supply those amino acids?

If so it seems to me like you would want to minimize that fasted state. That you would want a small protein meal right before bed so although your body will likely still go catabolic it would be for less time. Can still burn fat during the day through activity while having the supply of amino acids to retain your muscle.

Anything wrong there? Comments?

Replies

  • suejenfb
    suejenfb Posts: 54 Member
    I eat before bed too and still manage to loose weight. You can find studies showing that it's good or bad, you know what's right for you. I can't sleep on an empty stomach, plain & simple.
  • Elsie_Brownraisin
    Elsie_Brownraisin Posts: 786 Member
    I also eat in the evenings and have lost weight. I usually allow 400-500 cals for snacks and most of those are in the evening.
  • Elsie_Brownraisin
    Elsie_Brownraisin Posts: 786 Member
    I eat before bed too and still manage to loose weight. You can find studies showing that it's good or bad, you know what's right for you. I can't sleep on an empty stomach, plain & simple.

    Ah, in the bad old days of low cal yo-yo dieting, going to bed with a rumbling stomach meant I was doing it right!
  • 1PatientBear
    1PatientBear Posts: 2,089 Member
    Doesn't matter. Your body doesn't know what time you eat. Overthinking it.
  • tech_kitten
    tech_kitten Posts: 221 Member
    This was addressed at bodybuilding.com in this article: http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/berardi16.htm
    I hope that helps a little
  • zyxst
    zyxst Posts: 9,150 Member
    I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed, so I don't understand your OP's point.

    I don't have issues with eating before going to sleep, so if I wanted to I could snack while I'm waiting to fall asleep. It wouldn't matter if it was a protein food or ice cream.
  • silverinc13
    silverinc13 Posts: 216 Member
    If I'm awake, I'm probably eating.
  • DoNotSpamMe73
    DoNotSpamMe73 Posts: 286 Member
    Allow for a nice yummy later meal and you'll be fine. I do it a lot and I've done fine so far.
  • kdeaux1959
    kdeaux1959 Posts: 2,675 Member
    Meal timing has nothing to do with long term weight loss... It may make the scale a little heavier on the morning after but that is a transitional weight having to do with when you last ate... Not a long term weight...
  • tech_kitten
    tech_kitten Posts: 221 Member
    I think the OP is requesting info on catabolism not weight loss. Please see my link in my reply above regarding the bodybuilding.com article.

    Most MFPers are concerned with calories in - calories out, btu I believe the OP is talking how to have less muscle wasting during sleep.
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    I think the OP is requesting info on catabolism not weight loss. Please see my link in my reply above regarding the bodybuilding.com article.

    Most MFPers are concerned with calories in - calories out, btu I believe the OP is talking how to have less muscle wasting during sleep.

    Correct I care about muscle retention and fat loss not scale weight. I'll check out your link when I have a spare moment thanks.

    My assumption is that muscle catabolism can be triggered based on duration of fasted state and that by intentionally not eating before bed you are effectively increasing the duration of fasted state. If that does lead to more muscle loss that woyld manifest as a scale weight reduction that some might misinterprete to be a positive outcome.
  • tigersword
    tigersword Posts: 8,059 Member
    Meal timing is irrelevant. Muscle catabolism isn't something that randomly happens just because your sleeping. That would be a horribly inefficient way for any living creature to evolve.
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  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    Meal timing is irrelevant. Muscle catabolism isn't something that randomly happens just because your sleeping. That would be a horribly inefficient way for any living creature to evolve.
    Yup^^^

    An extra couple of hours or even a day of fasting is not nearly enough time to go into a catabolic state. You are also assuming that let's say you eat a steak dinner at 7pm, go to sleep at 11pm and wake up at 7am that that steak you ate will be fully digested and you would have gotten all the nutrients that you can get by that point and your body is now breaking down muscle. It doesn't work like that.

    Theories like the one you are presenting are exactly what the supplement companies thrive on people believing so they will race out and go buy some Whey Casein so they won't lose all their gains.

    <shrug> Never claimed I was right, I put out an idea that I clearly labeled to be an assumption and asked the community to evaluate it. Freely admit that my assumption (being an assumption) could be flawed or inaccurate. You are correct that my assumption was predicated on the idea that the bioavailability of amino acids from a meal would have some sort of half-life that would mean that after a certain amount of time amino acids required by the body would no longer be available from injected food and would have to be harvested from muscle. I think this has to be true but I have no idea what the time scale is and whether it would be effected by essentially "fasting" 8 hours while you are asleep after eating before bed versus "fasting" 12 hours from sleep after eating at 8pm.

    Hope you understood I was asking it as a question not declaring it as fact. As I said in my first statement the reason I eat before bed is because of my schedule not because I am some die-hard ardent believer in the assumption I stated.
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    Basically the way I am looking at it is this.

    Fact 1: If your body lacks essential amino acids from injested food it will catabolize your own muscle to acquire them
    Fact 2: The nutrients and amino acids derived from injested food have a bioavailability half-life, they won't be in your system forever


    Based on that it stands to reason that if that half-life is sufficiently short that it would matter how long your fast periods were on how much your body catabolized your own muscle. If the maximum amount of time essential amino acids would be available to you from a meal was under 8 hours after digestion then a meal before bed could reduce muscle catabolism. If, however, the maximum amount of time essential amino acids would be available to you from a meal was much above 8 hours then no it wouldn't matter at all.

    I'm guessing studies have been done and I'm just not aware of them and should look them up and one of the posters linked to one which I'll take a look at when I get home.

    Its not that I don't believe you, I just want to understand it myself.

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