How dangerous is night eating syndrome?

What does Night Eating Syndrome mean?

Many people snack late at night, but people with night eating syndrome have an uncontrolled urge to eat after dinner or when they wake up in the middle of the night. This makes it hard for them to sleep, function normally, and feel good overall. For people with night eating disorders, eating 25% or more of their daily calories after dinner or when they wake up at night is considered an eating disorder.

What makes the night eating problem happen

Night eating disorder can be caused by a variety of factors, including anxiety, mood swings, sleep issues, and an imbalance in the body's circadian rhythms. For effective treatment, it is important to get help from many different professionals. Sleep-related eating disorder is different from night eating syndrome. While partially awake from sleep, people with sleep-related eating disorders may eat without fully realizing it.

Why is eating at night a problem?

According to research, night eating syndrome affects about 1.5% of the general population and up to 25% of people who are trying to lose weight. Understanding the distinction between night eating syndrome (NES) and binge eating disorder (BED) is crucial for receiving appropriate evaluation and treatment. Both disorders cause distress related to eating patterns, but NES is more about when and how much someone eats in one episode rather than how much they eat overall.

A young man who is stressed out is eating a cookie at night. A person who is unhappy, tired, and sad is eating at night. The idea of insomnia

There are health risks linked to night eating syndrome.

If you don't get the right treatment for a night eating habit, it can lead to serious health problems:

Stress on the Heart

• People who have night eating syndrome are more likely to get high blood pressure, cholesterol, and heart disease because their metabolism is messed up at night, when the body is supposed to be fasting.

Misregulation of metabolism

• Eating at night can raise your fasting blood sugar and make you more likely to get diabetes.

Splitting up your sleep

• Getting up often at night to eat leads to inadequate sleep, which makes it even harder to control your hunger and keep your weight in check. Without expert assistance, breaking this cycle is difficult.

Effects on Mental Health

• People with night eating disorder are more likely to experience depression and anxiety, which can both result from and contribute to their nighttime eating habits and the associated sleep problems.

Problems Managing Your Weight

• The extra calories that are eaten at night and the changes in metabolism that happen when you eat at naturally inappropriate times can make it difficult to lose weight or gain it back.

Treatment for early night eating disorders cuts these risks down a lot and improves life in general. If you or someone you care about has these health issues, you might want to get a night eating assessment.

How to Tell If You Have Night Eating Syndrome

It's important to know the signs of night eating syndrome so that it can be caught early and treated:

Behavioral and emotional signs

Mood gets visibly worse in the evening, and anxiety rises around bedtime and sleep. There is a strong belief that eating is necessary to either fall asleep or return to sleep after waking up.

• At least two awakenings at night with eating episodes per week
• Getting at least 25% of your daily calories after that evening meal
• Overeating in the evenings and at night because they feel out of control
• Feeling shame, guilt, or anxiety about the way you eat at night
• Using food to calm down or deal with worry, especially at night

Symptoms in the body

• Keeping your hunger in check in the morning or skipping food often because you're not hungry
• 4-5 nights a week, you have chronic sleeplessness or restless sleep.
• Weight gain or trouble losing weight because you eat more calories at night
• Fatigue or being too sleepy during the day because of troubled sleep
• Having stomach pain from eating while lying down
• If these signs sound similar, getting a professional diagnosis can help you figure out the best way to treat your night eating.

How to Get Rid of Night Eating Disorder

To get better from night eating syndrome, you need both professional help and practical steps:

Help for professionals

• Cognitive behavioral treatment is designed to help people with night eating syndrome
• Evaluation and control of medications when needed
• Nutritional counseling to help people set up regular eating habits during the day
• Sleep hygiene therapy can help you sleep better generally.

Everyday Strategies That Work

• Having planned, well-balanced meals during the day to avoid feeling hungry at night
• Setting up a regular, relaxing bedtime routine can help you fall asleep.
• Getting better at dealing with stress by using mindfulness or CBT-I techniques
• Having a variety of healthy, well-balanced foods on hand while reducing trigger foods
• Adding light physical exercise to your day to help you sleep better
• Eating with awareness at night if you feel hungry
• Early help makes things a lot better.

What You Can Do to Help Someone Who Eats at Night

Helping a family member or friend who has a night eating disorder takes understanding, patience, and useful information:

Figuring out the condition

Find out more about night eating syndrome to better understand what your friend or family member is going through. Know that this isn't just a lack of willpower; it's a problem with biological, psychological, and behavioral causes.

Giving Support

• Show care without judging or criticizing
• Show empathy when they talk about their problems.
• Offer to go with them to their therapy or medical visits.
• Help set up and stick to regular meal times during the day.
• Make your evenings relaxing so you don't eat when you're stressed.
• It might help to get rid of trigger foods from public areas.

Trying to Get Treatment

The video explains how to stop overeating at night.

 

• The best thing you can do to help someone with night eating syndrome is to push them to get professional help. 
• If there aren't many in-person choices, offer to help them look into night eating disorder clinics near them or online night eating treatment programs.
• Keep in mind that getting better takes time and that mistakes can happen. 
• Being there for a loved one can greatly help them heal.

Is there medicine that can help with Night Eating Syndrome?

• Medications that work on serotonin, melatonin, and processes that control hunger may help fix the messed-up circadian rhythms that cause people to eat at night. As part of a full treatment plan, medications that help with nervousness or insomnia may also be helpful in some cases.
• Always talk to a trained medical professional to find out what medication and dose will work best for you. Usually, medication works best when combined with therapy that deals with the mental and behavioral parts of a night eating disorder.

How to Start Treatment for Night Eating Disorder

• Finish an evaluation
• Get a tailored suggestion for treatment
• Start the process of getting better.

A Way Forward for Recovery from Night Eating Disorder

• With the right care and help, people with night eating syndrome can get better.

How dangerous is night eating syndrome?

Night eating disorders can make you more likely to be overweight, develop type 2 diabetes, have heart disease, have high blood pressure, have metabolic syndrome, have trouble sleeping, feel depressed or anxious, have digestive problems from eating before bed, and have nutritional imbalances because of irregular eating habits. Disrupting diurnal metabolic processes can lead to insulin resistance, elevated levels of inflammatory markers, and weakened immune function. Early night eating disorder treatment significantly reduces these health complications.

Conclusion

For many people with night eating syndrome, medication can be an important part of their treatment. Clinical studies have demonstrated that selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), particularly sertraline, can improve mood, sleep quality, and weight loss.