How much weight would you like to lose in six months? I will 100% guarantee that you will lose that much in six months. Or I’ll work with you until you do. There’s zero risk here. If this sounds interesting to you, then click the link in the description to get all the details. All right now, back to nighttime eating.

Specifically about when you can’t fall asleep or when you wake up in the middle of the night. Now, before we dive too far into this, you may have wanted to listen to this episode to learn about evening snacks after dinner, eating. And let me just address that and my philosophy on that. Although this podcast will not heavily discuss that. But here’s my philosophy, it is really important to plan an evening snack. That doesn’t mean that you have to eat it. But if you plan to eat a snack, a few hours after dinner. I have found that it can be very effective, especially in the beginning of your weight loss journey, because it can prevent you from overeating at dinner, knowing that you’ll get to eat later.

It also can prevent you from white knuckling it and that lie that I shouldn’t eat after seven o’clock. Well, why? If you want to have a snack, if you plan it, planning something that you feel good about that you enjoy. That you feel like you can stick to is so key. And if that means that it’s three or four scoops of ice cream, instead of one, because that’s when you can stick to, then do that. That’s totally fine. It also helps reduce the mind drama because you aren’t grabbing things that you didn’t plan. So, if you have something that you plan, it reduces the mind drama. And I find it is just so much more helpful for women.

Alright, so let’s discuss nighttime eating. And if this happens to you because you can’t fall asleep and you get out of bed or you wake up in the middle of the night, what I want you to do is to just meet yourself where you are, don’t shame yourself, be gentle. For some reason, your body believes that there is safety in food. And so what we’re going to do here is to show your body and your brain that you were safe to stay in bed. Now, if you get up, that’s totally fine, but that’s what we’re trying to retrain your brain and show your brain that you were safe to stay in bed. Now the suggestions that I give you just be open-minded you might say, oh, that would never work. But be willing to experiment.

You only have to try something once or twice just to see if it might work for you. And if you’re not ready, don’t push yourself either. I always think it’s very helpful to find out what you are thinking at these times? So when you can’t fall asleep, what does your brain think? I’m hungry. Food will help me feel better. Start to become aware of what you’re thinking. Your brain might like to offer you. If you can’t fall asleep. Oh,If I had a fuller stomach, I could fall asleep. Oh, milk will help me. Oh, I just need more carbohydrates. It’s just kind of interesting. Just check in with your brain. Kind of see what’s what you’re thinking. It might get you some, give you some more information to help you overcome this now. And if you don’t want to do any thought work and you just want to try some experiments, that’s pretty cool too.

So I’m going to give you lots of things that you can try. So we’re going to talk about those two times when you can’t fall asleep, but when you wake up in the middle of the night, so first let’s talk about if you can’t fall asleep. The first thing that I’d like for you to do is to start to create a very soothing nighttime routine.

What time do you want to be asleep? Back it up. What time do you need to be in bed? Back it up. What time do you need to start your nighttime routine? For me, if I want to be asleep at nine o’clock. That I need to be in bed by eight 30. I need to start my nighttime routine at eight 15. Which means I need to be on the couch with my husband at seven 30. My kids are older. And that’s my ideal. That does not really happen, especially during the summer. But just back it up. Create that night time routine. When do you need to start getting ready for bed? And so for me, mine is I shower and change into my jammies. I go hang out with my husband on the couch for 30 minutes. Maybe an hour. I take my snack to bed with me 30 minutes before I want to go to sleep. Because I do my evening review. I journal, I read a book and then lights out. Lights out while I say the rosary. And I really challenged myself to not think about anything, except for saying the rosary, when I’m going to sleep.

And that’s been really effective in helping me calm down. The second thing, if you can’t fall asleep, let’s just decide to make a decision. When can I can’t fall asleep? Is that a time? Does that mean that when you close your eyes at nine o’clock, if you aren’t asleep by nine 30, that’s when you get out of bed? Just to decide when you will your brain know that I can’t fall asleep? Cause we kind of have this general, like, oh, I can’t fall asleep. Well, how do you know when you can’t fall asleep? Is it after you’ve been in bed an hour. And so just decide what that mark is. And then now decide what will you do if you cannot fall asleep? So once you get to that point, What is your next step? Does that mean you’re going to grab a book and read 10 more pages. Are you going to say two more decades of the rosary?

Are you going to listen to something on the hollow app? Are you going to listen to music? Are you going to massage your feet? What are you going to do when you can’t fall asleep? Now you can decide to get out of bed and go eat. But again, let’s just plan and decide ahead of time. Decide what you’re going to eat. If you’re going to get out of bed. And now I’m going to go through if you wake up in the middle of the night, this was happening to me and it didn’t happen in my food recovery until like a year in, I started waking up, waking up in the middle of the night and then I would find myself going downstairs to eat, which. I knew it was a big red flag and a big like, whoa, what is cooking here? And so what I ended up doing was creating a rule that once I went to bed, I am done. I can not get out of bed until the morning time.

I mean, like I can’t get out of bed to go eat. And I just realized that that’s the rule that I had to do. And I will tell you, 98% of the time, I take a snack with me to bed and I eat it in bed. And maybe that’s a strategy that you want to try to show your brain we’re not hungry. We’re not going to start everything is fine. We can just stay here in bed. Show your brain that you are safe to not eat. And if you’re not ready for that, that’s not a problem. So, if you’re not ready for that, let’s just decide how the middle of the night thing is going to go. Create a plan or what we like to call a protocol again, I wake up in the middle of the night. What am I going to do? What am I going to try first?

Let’s don’t make the first thing. Get up and go have a snack. What will I try first? Will I read, will I say a rosary? And when will, you know, it’s time for you to get out of bed. Will it be after you’ve read 10 pages after 30 minutes of being awake after you’ve said two decades of the rosary or the full rosary, how will you know? Okay, now it’s okay to get out of bed. And then if you decide to get out of bed, let’s just decide. you have a couple options here, I worked with clients on a variety of these and different things I’ve worked for different people. One option is to decide what you’re going to eat ahead of time. So, this is what I will eat if I get out of bed that I enjoy and my body is typically craving and I feel good about and you plan ahead of time. But if you’re not ready for that, a step forward would be willing to write down what you eat. Just write it down.

It doesn’t matter what you eat. Just write it down, being willing to write it down. And I like to trick my brain into just willing to live in truth and honesty. What’s interesting is I had one client who used to eat full meals in the middle of the night and just feel absolutely totally out of control. She would feel so full during the day. She had some childhood trauma around food scarcity. But she was willing to write down what she ate. And you guys know what slowly by slowly, she found that she wasn’t waking up in the middle of the night as much. And that when she did, she was eating less and less and less. And by the time we got done working, she was having two nectarines. She would have two nectarines and then go back to bed.

And so we’re just looking to take some steps forward and be willing to experiment with a few things. So a couple other things that aren’t related to those specific times of the day, but that can help you during those times is to make sure that you’re thoroughly nourished throughout the day. Keep your food balanced and high protein, the food that you enjoy. And I would really recommend that you don’t do anything that could be considered extreme. Like you might not be a good candidate at this point for intermittent fasting that might just be triggering some food scarcity stuff for you.

And when I say enough protein, I mean, 20 to 25 grams per meal, and that’s about two and a half ounces of meat to two and a half to four ounces of meat per meal. And you can look up the equivalent of that if you’re plant-based. But just making sure that you are well-nourished during the day and there’s no problem with taking a snack to bed. I have this special protein pudding that I make every night. And I’ve had a variety of different nighttime snacks that are usually some sort of high protein pudding or a mug cake that I add some Stevia. It’s on the sweeter side and I just love it.

I just really enjoy it. I have no mind drama about it. It’s something I plan. And the more you practice this and create those new neuro pathways in your brain. And the more you walk up by yourself and meet yourself where you are. And take one step forward, the easier and more natural overcoming this will feel. So I hope this has been helpful in helping you overcome one of the obstacles that may be keeping you from being at a healthy weight, which is nighttime eating. And if you’re done, trying to figure out how to lose weight and and trying to fit yourself into other people’s weight loss programs and want somebody to walk by your side every single day to help you lose weight in the next six months, then I encourage you to click the link in the description and chat with me about what that can look like. For you to learn, to lose weight in a way that feels natural and possible and fully supported where the results are a hundred percent guaranteed. Where else are you going to find that?

You deserve to finally be at your goal weight. Likely you’ve been struggling for years. If not decades. It’s time to end that struggle and I’m here. Click the link in the description to get all the details.

Okay. Everybody have a blessed day.