Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works. Hey, brain Stuff.
Speaker 1: Lauren Vogebam here with another classic episode from our former host,
Speaker 1: Christian Sagar. Today's topic gets to the bottom of an
Speaker 1: old wives tale. Well, eating before bed really give you nightmares?
Speaker 1: What's up, brain stuff? I'm Christian Sagar and it is
Speaker 1: time for some brain stuff. Have you ever been up
Speaker 1: alone at night scarfing down some buffalo wings dipped in
Speaker 1: kim chee and vindaloo, but you fall asleep on the
Speaker 1: couch and you start having these terrible nightmares? What is
Speaker 1: up with that? Why does some foods make us have
Speaker 1: such weird dreams? Well, so far science is yet to
Speaker 1: find a direct correlation between certain types of foods and
Speaker 1: how we dream. But an excessive amount of rich nocturnal
Speaker 1: eating can interrupt your sleep in a variety of ways. Really,
Speaker 1: any type of physical discomfort while you're sleeping can lead
Speaker 1: to bad dreams. But when your tummies are rumbling, that's
Speaker 1: when the monsters really come scurrying out of that trapdoor
Speaker 1: in the back of your head. For instance, late night
Speaker 1: snacks increase both your body's metabolism and temperature, which makes
Speaker 1: you hot and sweaty, especially when you have a high
Speaker 1: carbohydrate meal. Ditto if you have a bunch of doughnuts
Speaker 1: or candy bars before you pass out. A recent study
Speaker 1: shows that seven out of ten people who eat junk
Speaker 1: food before bed are more likely to have nightmares. These
Speaker 1: researchers hypothesized that the high levels of sugar lead to
Speaker 1: physical sleep discomfort, which brought the monsters out from under
Speaker 1: their beds. Another type of upset stomach that leads to
Speaker 1: a bad night's sleep is acid reflux, also known as
Speaker 1: GIRD or just plain old heartburn. More than a third
Speaker 1: of Americans have this condition. I'm one of them, where
Speaker 1: burning acidic bile comes creeping up your esophagus. If you've
Speaker 1: had this happened, doctors recommend that you don't eat within
Speaker 1: three hours of bedtime, and that you try lifting your
Speaker 1: head forty five degrees to keep the acid down. Also,
Speaker 1: you probably shouldn't have citrus onions, carbonated drinks, mint alcohol,
Speaker 1: or cigarettes before you go to sleep. I know, I know, boring, right,
Speaker 1: but cutting down on this stuff will keep the sleep
Speaker 1: goblins away. So it's either be careful what you eat
Speaker 1: or back to a pit of despair filled with evil
Speaker 1: clowns for you. Actually there's an interesting food connection between
Speaker 1: general anxieties and why we sleep poorly. When our bodies
Speaker 1: are stressed, they flush out the mineral magnesium, which increases
Speaker 1: our mental burden, so we sleep poorly. You can head
Speaker 1: this off if you eat healthy prior to enduring stressful periods.
Speaker 1: You retain some magnesium, helping you maintain a normal sleeping pattern.
Speaker 1: And there's our old friend, insomnia, which can be caused
Speaker 1: by a variety of food and drinks. How about meat
Speaker 1: or other high protein foods. Well, it turns out protein
Speaker 1: supplies your brain with the amino acid tyrosine, which makes
Speaker 1: you more alert, and food high in protein is usually
Speaker 1: also high in fat, which digests slowly, causing a rumble
Speaker 1: in the bronx. If you know, the bronx is what
Speaker 1: you call your belly. Plus, remember how carbohydrates bring on
Speaker 1: the night sweats while they also speed up tripped to
Speaker 1: fan and amino acid in your brain that helps you sleep.
Speaker 1: So if you don't eat enough carbs before bed, it's
Speaker 1: harder to get to sleep. My recommendation a small carbohydrate
Speaker 1: snack in the evening will promote calmness and help you
Speaker 1: catch some zs. Finally, alcohol and caffeine before bed can
Speaker 1: make insomnia even worse. So no double fisting coffee and beer,
Speaker 1: and you probably shouldn't drink energy booze drinks like juice
Speaker 1: for loco or fusion either. In fact, i'd recommend staying
Speaker 1: away from drinks with purposely misspelled names. It's just, you know,
Speaker 1: a general rule. Even the United States Food and Drug
Speaker 1: Administration called these drinks a public health concern back in
Speaker 1: two thousand and ten. In the Center for Disease Control
Speaker 1: has an entire fact sheet about the dangers of mixing
Speaker 1: alcohol and energy drinks, and it doesn't even get into
Speaker 1: the whole not being able to get to sleep thing.
Speaker 1: So there you have it. Food doesn't necessarily give us nightmares,
Speaker 1: but the uncomfortable feelings that come with eating certain meals can.
Speaker 1: Today's episode was written by Christian and produced by Tyler Clang.
Speaker 1: If you missed Christian, check out his pop culture podcast
Speaker 1: super Context, available wherever you listen to podcasts, and of course,
Speaker 1: for more on this and lots of other topics that
Speaker 1: will have you sleep in better, visit our home planet,
Speaker 1: how Stuff Works dot com.