Your Sleep Cycle and Eating Patterns
Healthy Living
Circadian rhythms: a pattern or rhythm that your body goes through over a 24 hour period, carried out on a molecular level by things literally called ‘clock proteins’. The sleep wake cycle is an example of this but it isn’t as simple as ‘we sleep for 8 hours and we are awake for 16…’ there are other variations of wakefulness during those 8 hours and 16 hours. Like that mid-afternoon slump! It’s a real part of the cycle.
Let’s talk about how food intake and sleep are linked…
A structure in the hypothalamus (which is in your brain) called the suprachiasmatic nuclei, is considered the ‘master clock’ which controls your circadian rhythms and is synchronised by light. Second to the master clock are the secondary clocks which are things like your endocrine system and activity in your peripheral tissues, these are largely affected by external cues and behaviours like eating and sleeping. These are called zeitgebers.
A misalignment in our sleep wake or food cycle can cause negative health effects e.g., over eating, meal skipping, eating later, poor sleep quality. If this happens over a long period of time, it could lead to more serious metabolic dysfunctions.
Misalignment can exist as jetlag, shift work, eating late at night, having irregular mealtimes, having a different sleep/wake and food cycle on the weekend (termed ‘social jetlag’), and trying lots of different diets related to meal timing.
Chances that you have experienced one of these to some degree.
Here are some interesting sentences (we can’t call them facts because it’s so complicated and we don’t know everything yet):
Firstly, you get hungrier when you’ve had less sleep because your brain is saying ‘feed me high energy food so I can stay awake!!’
Having a large meal or a meal high in the amino acid tryptophan (foods like turkey and some carbohydrates) means you get sleepy, because tryptophan is a precursor for melatonin – your sleepy hormone
We’re better at metabolising carbohydrates in the morning and metabolising fats or lipids in the evening
Eating later in the night long term is somewhat associated with higher weigh status and other metabolic issues. This is because it affects the secondary clocks but not the master clock
Males and females respond differently to misaligned eating patterns
We all have different types of sleep and food intake cycles, so it is important to listen to our bodies about how we feel when eating/sleeping at certain times. No one person is the same
Some take homes:
Stick to your eating patterns even if it’s the weekend or you’ve eaten ‘too much’ the day before. Our bodies like sticking to these rhythms
Avoid irregular eating times
Get a good amount of quality shut eye to help your body support your natural cycles
Honour your individual hunger cues and preferences. Just because one person is eating one way, doesn’t necessarily mean it will work for you too
Our nutrition programmes are holistic in nature and provide support for a wide range of health and wellness topics. We’re ready when you are.
Blood sugar imbalances can really affect your sleep cycle