Hi,

Anyone else work the night shift and struggle with their weight? I have worked permanent nights (10pm-6am) now for 5 years and my weight has just slowly crept up.

Just wondering if anyone has any tips for me as to what to eat and the best times to eat. I find all my meals are mixed up due to the hours I work. I have my breakfast at 6am when I get home from work (just before bed time). I have my lunch on my 2am break, and my dinner at 6pm.

I also find that on my days off I'm so tired I end up bingeing on easy snack foods and takeaways.

Hope I didn't go on too much and that someone has some advice for me

Thanks

Just wanted to say Hi,

I don't work nights but I can imagine it really mucks up your eating habits. I hope someone comes along soon who has some experience.

Moo68

lozlo: I worked second shift 3-11 a while back. The thing that really caused me issues was living normal hours on the weekends and then trying to rearrange my schedule for during the week usually dragging on Mon/Tues and turning to caffeine and sweets to keep up. For myself during the work week - I'd eat breakfast when I woke up first thing usually, then lunch right before work and dinner I'd do between 8-9pm. Snacks I found were a way to keep me awake and a bad additive to my diet (I was thin then). If you can snack on protein type items in moderation - almonds, string cheese and the like that might help. I know I turned to sugars - again to get me through the later hours when I'd so like to be sleeping. I was pushing a lot of water at the time to try and help. But I know it's awfully easy when you are tired to just grab the nearest and quickest thing to eat or go thru drive thru.

Do you have a co-worker that you can ask how they fit their meals in? Sometimes those who have done that shift for a long time have some really good ideas that you can take on for yourself. I do know that there were a group of three of us that once a week would make parts of meal - all healthy stuff - we were all single gals - one would do main course, one a salad and one a smart type sweet on the calories (one gal at the time was dieting) all microwaveable for warm up and we'd sit in the cafeteria having a sit-down meal rather than at our desks - which generally would cause all to overeat. Don't know if this helps - but maybe it's a starting point for you.

I work night shift 4 days a week with 3 days off. Start 5pm and finish 5am. In my opinion Loz you shouldn't eat when you get home, just go straight to bed. Your 2am meal should be your last before you sleep. I eat at 11pm and don't eat again until I wake up at midday.