We’ve all been there. After a Thursday night out, you and your friends get out of the cab, stroll into your dorm room or apartment, and bam—you hit the fridge. Your stomach has been grumbling for the past hour or so, and you feel famished when you get home that late. So you either call up Jimmy John’s for some late-night, or you raid the fridge for anything appealing. The first thing you see—maybe those cookies your mom sent you, some leftover pizza, or the college staple—peanut butter, becomes your meal for the night. You make a great sandwich, wolf it down, and decide that you are still hungry, so you go for another one. Two sandwiches down and half the jar of PB gone, you take off your shoes and call it a night.
The next morning, you wake up, feeling uncomfortable and possibly still full. So you decide to skip breakfast…and the unhealthy cycle of eating at the wrong times of the day continues. We all have heard the number 1 rule for maintaining a balanced and healthy weight is to always eat breakfast, but many girls will skimp out this meal if they went out the night before and had late-night, feeling guilty for having that unexpected 4th meal in their day. For a collegiette™ this can be a typical lifestyle, which will often leave a girl with mood swings, difficulty sleeping, weight gain, and digestive issues. But there is a way to solve the issue to those late-night eating pangs that won’t leave you unhappy in the morning; all you have to do is follow these 7 tips:
1. Make sure to eat dinner. Never go out on an empty stomach. This way, you will feel nourished and satisfied going out, and the likelihood of being hungry when you get back is significantly smaller. Planning on saving your dinner for when you get back? Not your safest bet. Researchers at Northwestern University recently discovered that eating your calories earlier in the day (i.e. 6p.m. versus 1 a.m.) helps you maintain a balanced weight and prevents weight gain, even if the amount of calories you eat at night are equal to the ones you would have consumed at a normal dinnertime. Eating a normal dinner is important especially if you are planning on consuming any alcohol that night because alcohol will metabolize quicker in your system when your stomach is empty, which will in turn increase your hunger pangs. By the time you come home that night, you will be borderline ravenous, and your instinct to eat whatever is in sight will overcome any desire you have to be healthy.
2. If you don’t plan on going out until 10 p.m. or later, make sure to have a small snack before you leave. This is important especially if you have eaten an early dinner, and aren’t planning on going out until a few hours later. By having a small snack before you leave you are preventing hunger from striking when you get back. Examples of a small snack are a handful of nuts, some fruit or veggies with dip, or a protein bar.
3. If you are hungry when you get back, it’s okay to have something to eat. Sometimes, even when you do eat a normal dinner, you get back later than you thought, and you’re hungry. It’s okay to eat a little something! Lisa Drayer, a registered dietician whom health magazines like Women’s Health turn to for expert advise, says that it’s okay to occasionally have a light snack late at night. Something like a small bowl of cereal, nuts, or half a sandwich is fine. However, if you know before you leave that it is going to be a long night, and you will probably come home hungry, put out in the open what you plan on eating. So, if you decide you’ll snack on some nuts at the end of the night, put a serving of them in a bowl out in your room. That way, you will be more conscious about the amount of food you are eating. Placing the right amount of your snack out and ready to eat allows you to have control over the portion, and it prevents that “How did I eat the whole bag of chips?” question from forming.
4. Drink water when you get back. A lot of water, that is. Aim for 8 ounces or so. Drinking water helps replenish you and prevent you from feeling groggy in the morning. And if you do plan on having a snack that night, make sure to guzzle down water with it—trust me, this is a no-brainer.
5. Don’t leave food lying out. A preventative action, i.e. putting all jars, bags of chips, peanut butter, candy, etc., away and out of sight will help you stay away from a late-night date with the Chex Mix or (my personal favorite) Pretzel M&M’s. It’s the whole out-of-sight-out-of-mind strategy. If those chips aren’t lying out in front of you, chances are, you won’t eat them!
6. DELETE JIMMY JOHN’S NUMBER…hehe just kidding!
7. One last thing: Every now and then it’s perfectly fine to eat a meal late at night—just don’t make it a habit. Most importantly, if you do eat late at night one night, don’t punish yourself the next day. Make sure to maintain your usual schedule with breakfast, lunch, dinner and usual snacks the next day. Doing so is the fastest way to get back into your normal schedule and normal weight.