A couple of nights ago I was rooting around the bathroom
closet, looking for a new stick of deodorant, which, unfortunately, for the
rest of the world, I was not able to find, when I found something else. I found my crack cocaine, which I had not used or even thought about in months. It’s not
real crack cocaine, Silly. My crack cocaine
is what I used to call my assortment of “natural” and not so natural over the
counter sleep aids. Prior to going NSNG
(no sugar, no grains, for the newly initiated), for about as long as I had been hungry, which is about as long as I can remember back in my adult life, I
had also not been able to sleep all of the way through the night. I would have no problems falling asleep but
at some point in the middle of the night, I would wake up, my mind would start
wandering and I might be up for fifteen minutes or an hour or two. For someone who starts their day before
sunrise, the loss of even fifteen minutes of sleep is disastrous to overall
daily productivity.
In the past I always chalked this problem up to too much stress at work, since my 2:00 a.m. mind would generally wander there first or too much life in general, as my mind would wander to my mental list of daily activities and tasks next. But could my mid-night awakenings have actually been caused by my diet? I say yes. Here’s why.
Life has not been simplified or become less stressful in the last six months. The only thing that has been simplifed is my diet. And now I sleep through the night.
Pre-NSNG, a typical work night might look like this: Get home from work. Do a run or bike workout for one to two hours. Snack on “recovery” drink while making dinner. Eat dinner, possibly with a glass of wine, and definitely with some type of dessert. Get hungry. Eat a bowl of “healthy” cereal. Go to bed.
Looking back, I realize I was spiking my blood sugar with all of those carbohydrates, in particular that cereal snack, so close to bed. Recent studies show that when you eat sugar, whether in the form of a “heart healthy grain” or refined, processed sugar, parts of your brain light up. The response is very similar to the response you would get from taking heroine or another hard drug. In addition, your body starts a series of hormonal processes to break down the sugar. Knowing what I do now, I have to imagine my sugar-happy brain fell asleep easily while my body worked overtime in the background to process all of the carbohydrates forced into it in the last four hours of the day. Then, when that process was complete, my no longer sugar-satisfied brain woke up. This pattern of insomnia becomes a self-fulfilling circular error for a lot of people, including myself, when the next day, tired and mentally foggy, they reach for a soda, piece of candy or double caramel Frappuccino to spark some energy.
If you are having problems falling asleep or staying asleep, I would suggest backing off of the sugar and starch, at least in the evenings. Try it for a few weeks. What have you got to lose except for that flock of sheep you have been counting?