We’ve shared some foods to help promote sleep, but what about foods that hurt our sleep?

Our research showed four themes coming up repeatedly and we’re here to tell you about it!

Caffeine can seem pretty obvious, unfortunately, things like dark chocolate and soda are included in this list. Does you or someone you know have a habit of drinking coffee before bed? Interestingly enough, most night time coffee drinkers don't realize how it's hurting the quality of their sleep. Drinking coffee (or caffeine in general) before bed has been linked to disruptive sleep, often not picked up on by the people it affects.

Alcohol can be less obvious since it does have the effect of relaxing and causing drowsiness in the drinker. Similar to caffeine though, alcohol can cause a more restless sleep, resulting in more fatigue when you're awake!

An interesting category of foods to avoid are spicy foods. While we sleep, our metabolism is slower, and the spicy food sitting in our bodies longer can cause indigestion. Even if you don't have an issue with spicy foods, just like caffeine and alcohol, sleep can often be disruptive. Give your body some time to process the food before bed if you're in the mood for something spicy.

Last but not least, high fat foods cause poor sleep. Ironically, when sleep deprived, the body often craves high fat, high sugar foods. The nutrition in such foods are often lacking and only serve to further the cycle of poor sleep.

We hope these fun facts have helped you all! Happy eating and sweet dreams.

 

 

Written by Alexis Borquez

 

Sources:

"Foods That Help or Harm Your Sleep With Pictures." WebMD. WebMD

"What Are the Five Worst Foods for Sleep?" Mercola.

Hall, Alena. "5 Ways Sleep Deprivation Affects Your Diet." HuffPost. HuffPost, 03 Mar. 2015.

Rettner, MyHealthNewsDaily Rachael. "Caffeine Disrupts Sleep for Morning People, but Not Night Owls." Scientific American.

"Sitemap." JCSM - Caffeine Effects on Sleep Taken 0, 3, or 6 Hours before Going to Bed.

Cespedes, Andrea. "Does Your Metabolism Slow Down at Night?" LIVESTRONG.COM. Leaf Group, 18 July 2017.