Category — Night Eating

Healthy Evening Snack- Replace Those Late Night Candy Bars

One of the best things about many modern diets is that they have built in evening snacks. Eating a healthy evening snack is a great way to help avoid the junk food that many women over 40 find themselves eating as they wind down for the evening. The only problem is finding a healthy evening snack that you enjoy.

If you do not enjoy the snack that you eat, you will be more likely to turn to junk food later in the evening to satisfy your late night cravings. If you are attempting to lose weight, you probably already know that eating junk food late at night can cause significant damage to you dieting plans. By making sure that the healthy evening snack you chose is enjoyable, you can avoid reaching for the candy bar later on.

What Can I Eat For a Healthy Evening Snack?

Often times the difficulty for women over 40 who are trying to lose weight is finding a snack that satisfies them. Most of the lose weight gurus tell you to snack on plain fruits and veggies, or to eat a few crackers throughout the evening. Whom are they kidding? Those are not snacks that are going to satisfy anyone on their own.

What you need is a snack that can make you forget about the chocolate you have hiding in the cupboard somewhere. Here are a few healthy evening snacks that some women over 40 have found helpful in their journey to lose weight.

Fruit Smoothies as Healthy Evening Snack

Fruit smoothies are a great snack to have at night. They are healthy, delicious, and relatively easy to prepare. Additionally, there are an endless combination of flavors you can concoct. By mixing different types of fruits together, you can come out with a different flavor every night of the week if you choose.

Fruits and Vegetables as Healthy Evening Snack

You would probably like to smack me right about now. I know what I said above about the diet gurus always telling you to eat more fruits and veggies. The fact is they say it because it is true. They do make healthy evening snacks, and many women over 40 have been able to lose weight by replacing junk food with fruits and vegetables. That being said, they still are not a very delicious snack. I know that eating a carrot does not take my taste for the piece of pie away.

What can help curb those cravings is adding a low-fat low-calorie dip to your fruits and veggies. You can find many dips that will add great flavor to your healthy late night snacks. If dips are not your thing, cottage cheese can also be a great source of flavor enhancement. Cottage cheese also has essential minerals like calcium that all women over 40 could use more of.

Plain Popcorn as Healthy Evening Snack

Sometimes it does not matter what you try, you need to feel the comfort of constantly reaching in to a bowl of something and eating. If it has just been one of those days, and we all have them, one thing that many women over 40 trying to lose weight have found effective, is to eat plain popcorn. While it may not sound like the most appetizing snack in the world, it is healthy and it will help you satisfy those late night cravings.

Popcorn has no fat and is low in calories. You can pretty much eat all of the plain popcorn you can handle, and it will not make much of a difference as far as your diet goes. Popcorn’s ability to satisfy your cravings while not ruining your diet make plain popcorn one of the best options for a healthy evening snack.

Your attempts to lose weight can be successful. By replacing the late night junk food binges with healthy evening snacks, you can munch in the evening and still lose weight. Many women over 40 struggle with the same things that you do, so you should never feel like there is something wrong with you. There is not.

Old habits are difficult to break, and making the changes you need to make will take time. Keep up the good work you have started, make a few changes in your late night eating habits, and you can join the group of women over 40 that have met their weight loss goals.

Overcome Your Late Night Cravings

One of the biggest problems that women over 40 have to overcome in their journey to lose weight is late night cravings. If you suffer from the midnight munchies, you know the havoc they can wreak on your diet. Over the years, how to stop the late night cravings is one of the most frequently asked questions that I get.

The truth is that there are many ways that you can put an end to your late night cravings. Many women over 40 have been able to successfully overcome their urges and continue to lose weight. The key to reaching your goals is having a path to follow.

Late Night Cravings-Taking the first steps

The first step for women over 40 to stop the late night cravings is to figure out what their triggers are. Triggers are the things in your environment that immediately precede your urge to eat late at night. In order to continue to lose weight successfully, you need to take an inventory of your triggers.

So how do you figure out what your triggers are? One way that women over 40 have been able to identify their triggers is to have a notebook handy at all times during the evening. Over the next week, each time you find yourself munching on something late at night, write down what you were doing when the urge to eat hit you. Write down the activity, what you were feeling, and anything else that you feel may be important. The first step to overcoming your late night cravings is becoming aware of why you are eating.

Late Night Cravings-Changing Your Behaviors

Once you have completed your weeklong inventory, you need to sit down and analyze the data you have accumulated. Figure out what time you were most likely to eat late at night, what you were doing when the urge hit you, and how you felt at that time. Once you know these things, you can move on to developing a strategy to modify your behaviors so that you can change your late night eating habits.

How to Change the Behaviors That Trigger Your Late Night Cravings

This is the place that most people would tell you to stop eating late at night. Unfortunately, those people do not understand how hard it is to stop. Your late night cravings have developed over a long period, and it will take time to break those habits. By compiling the information on your triggers, you have already taken the first step to breaking your habit. The next step is taking actions that will help you turn those late night eating triggers, into something positive.

What you need to do is replace the eating with something else. If one of your triggers is running to the kitchen and grabbing a snack at the commercial break during your late night television watching, then you need to replace that behavior with a healthier one.

Late Night Cravings- Retrain Your Body and Mind

One thing that many women over 40 have used to stop them from dashing to the kitchen is crunches. Instead of heading for the kitchen, get down on the floor and do as many crunches as you can during the commercial break. It does not have to be crunches, it could be stretching, walking up and down the stairs, anything really. The point is to retrain your body and mind.

Right now, we are like Pavlov’s dogs. Once the commercial comes on, your mind is telling you that it is time to eat. What you need your mind to do is to tell your body that it is time to do something else. Habits are difficult to break. Studies have shown that it takes 21 days to break a habit. So over the next 21 days do your best to replace your late night eating with a healthy activity.

Use the triggers you have found, and work towards changing the behavior that follows them from eating to something a bit more active. As you have probably already figured out, replacing junk food with exercise is going to help you lose weight.

Late night cravings can spell an end to you hopes to lose weight. Do not feel alone if you have difficulties breaking the habit. Many women over 40 share the same problems that you do when trying to lose weight. Late night cravings can be overcome, but it will take time and effort on your part to do so.

Remember, your weight loss goals are important to you, so if at first you find yourself cheating and skipping those crunches for a mad dash to the kitchen, do not give up. Your habit was not created in a day, and it will not be broken in a day. Keep trying and you can join the group of women over 40 that have successfully eliminated the late night cravings from their life.

How Do I Stop Eating At Night?

One of the most common questions I get from women over 40 is, “How do I stop eating at night.” Many women over 40 trying to lose weight struggle with night eating. You have stuck to your diet all day long, and then once the sun goes down it is like someone else takes over and you can no longer control your urges for junk food.

If you have ever asked, “how do I stop eating at night”, you are not alone. There is a world full of women over 40 who are asking themselves the same thing. Luckily, many women have answered that question, and successfully met their goal to lose weight. Below we offer some suggestions from women over 40 that may help you answer that agonizing question of, “how do I stop eating at night”.

How Do I Stop Eating At Night?- Get More Fluids

One of the women over 40 that we spoke with said that one way she was able to overcome her night eating was by drinking more water. You have probably heard of the trick of drinking a glass of water and then waiting 10 minutes to see if you are still hungry. If you have not heard of it, you have now. This method really can work. Often times when we think we are hungry, we are only thirsty.

Drinking more water throughout the day will help your body stay hydrated, and assist you in avoiding a situation where you think you are hungry, but your body really only needs water. This woman was able to continue to lose weight, and answer her decades old long question of, “how do I stop eating at night” by adding a few more glasses of water to her day. The next time you start to feel hungry, head to the tap and get yourself a glass of water, it can help you feel fuller and lose weight.

How Do I Stop Eating At Night?- Get More Sleep

Another of the women over 40 that talked with us said that she found the answer to “how do I stop eating at night” by going to bed earlier. This seems like a simple fix, and if you can get in the habit, it can make a drastic difference in your late night eating habits. If your late night eating urges wake up in the late evening hours, going to bed earlier means that you will allow them less time to influence you.

Most people do not wake up from sleep because of night eating urges. Once your body has gone into shutdown mode, it will usually stay there until morning. Getting to bed earlier at night helps you answer, “How do I stop eating at night,” and it allows you to get more rest.

If you are like most women over 40, you likely do not get enough sleep as it is. By getting more sleep, your body will become more efficient at burning fat because you are well rested. In other words, getting the proper amount of sleep can help you lose weight.

How Do I Stop Eating At Night?- Get a Hobby

Another trick that has helped many women over 40 lose weight, and stop eating at night is finding a hobby to engage in during the late night hours. Keeping your mind and hands active will help stave off the munchies that afflict so many of us at night. If you have yet to find the answer to, “how do I stop eating at night”, finding a hobby can provide you with the answer you need. Your hobby does not need to be anything groundbreaking or terribly involved. It can be something as simple as crosswords or Sudoku.

The point to this hobby is to do something that you enjoy, and that will keep you mind off food.

If you are one of the many women searching for an answer to, “how do I stop eating at night” the most important thing to remember is that you are not alone. There are many women over 40 trying to lose weight and struggling with the same issues as you. I hope the above tips provide you with the help you need. Remember your road to lose weight is not exactly the same as anyone else’s.

The above tips only serve as guidelines; feel free to modify them so that they fit your needs. You are on an important path, and curing your night eating habits will help you as you try to lose weight.

How to Stop Eating At Night- Get Past Eating At Night

We all know that eating late at night is bad for your dieting efforts. The question is how to stop eating at night. Unfortunately, the answer is not as simple as it may seem. If the answer were simple, all of us would be able to stop those night cravings. Many women over 40 trying to lose weight have come to me asking for advice on how to stop eating at night; they know that their late night eating is preventing them from losing weight. Below are some of the most common reasons these women over 40 felt they were eating at night. Hopefully, the solutions I have proposed will help you learn how to stop eating at night as well.

How to Stop Eating At Night- I’m So Hungry All the Time

The biggest problem women over 40 who are trying to lose weight seem to have is that they are constantly hungry. If you find that you are hungry all the time, it is likely because you are not getting enough calories in your diet. One of the problems with most of the diets we follow in an effort to lose weight is that they restrict our calories too much.

It may be easy to stick to such a limited amount of calories for a few days, but over time, the cravings our body has will win out. One of the easiest ways to avoid feeling hungry all night long is to consume more calories during the day. You should never let your calorie intake drop below 1,200, and 1,500 is even better. Combine this number of calories with regular exercise, and you will lose weight, while not feeling those hunger pangs all the time.

How to Stop Eating At Night- I Eat When I Get Bored

If you eat when you get bored one way you can learn how to stop eating at night, is to stay busy. That doesn’t mean that you have to be out and about all evening, but instead of spending all night on the couch watching the tube, read a book, play with your kids, and do something that doesn’t keep your mind idle. One of the biggest problems women over 40 have said they have is eating when they don’t have anything to do. If you are trying to lose weight, keeping your mind active in the evening can help you keep it off food.

How to Stop Eating At Night- You Are Not Getting Enough Water

Whenever women over 40 want to know how to stop eating at night, the first question I ask them is how much water they drink. It is not uncommon for the answer to be less than 16 ounces. Drinking more water is one of the best things you can do to lose weight. Not only does water help your body function at a higher level, it also helps you to feel less hungry.

If you need to know how to stop eating at night, one of the best things you can do is drink a glass of water when you feel hungry. Wait ten minutes and chances are that the feeling of hunger will have passed. When we are thirsty our body often mistakes that for being hungry, this is especially true in women over 40 who do not drink as much water as they should. Drinking a glass of water and waiting ten minutes may help you stop wondering how to stop eating at night.

How to Stop Eating At Night- I Eat When I Feel Bad

Emotional eating is a huge problem for women over 40 who are trying to lose weight. If you haven’t figured out how to stop eating at night, it is possible that you need to examine your psyche at the time you get hungry. If the first thing you do when you are feeling bad, or get upset, is grab that carton of ice cream, then your late night eating may be an emotional eating disorder.

If that is the case, this can be one of the hardest habits to break. Women over 40 who suffer from an emotional eating compulsion, have likely spent their entire lives turning to food for comfort. One way to break this cycle is find another outlet for your emotions. One thing that many women over 40 have found to help is exercise. Physical activity naturally releases endorphins that put you in a better mood, the happy pill that so many people talk about, is actually exercise. If you are trying to lose weight, exercise will not only help you in your efforts, it can also provide you with the answer of how to stop eating at night.

There is hope for women over 40 who are trying to figure out how to stop eating at night. The suggestions above are not the only solutions, be creative with what you try. There is no hard and fast answer, the right one is the one that works for you. Your goal to lose weight depends on your ability to change your late night eating habits, so do not be afraid to try new things. Keep at it, and eventually you will figure out how to stop eating at night.

Stopping Evening Eating can be a Real Chore

Evening eating is a big problem for many women looking to lose weight. If you are a woman after 40, you may know how difficult it can be to overcome your late night cravings. In some cases, your desire to lose weight has no chance of overpowering your lifelong practice of late night eating. If you have tried everything to make sure your evening eating does not sabotage your goal to lose weight, yet still cannot stop snacking, there are ways to satisfy your cravings and not blow your diet.

How to survive evening eating

Losing weight is difficult. For a woman after 40 it can be even more difficult. As we age our metabolism slows, unfortunately our appetite does not. The slowing metabolism means that sticking to your diet and getting regular exercise is even more import for the woman after 40 than it was during your youth.

When you cannot stop your late night eating one of the best things to do is to substitute your current junk food snacks with a healthier alternative. Below, we provide some ideas so you can snack at night and still lose weight.

Evening Eating- Sugar-Free Meringue Cookies

If your favorite evening eating snack is cookies, substituting sugar-free meringue cookies for your current high-fat, high-calorie snack is a good way to be able to munch and keep your diet under control. For the woman after 40, this healthier alternative can provide the snack they need without adding to the pounds they carry around.

The normal serving size for these tasty little buggers is fourteen cookies, and they come in at less than 100 calories per serving. If evening eating is a problem for you, sugar-free meringue cookies could be just the thing to satisfy your hunger pangs and keep the pounds off.

Evening Eating- But Plain Popcorn is so Plain

Popping a bowl or two of plain popcorn is another good way to replace your current unhealthy snacking with something that will have a minimal effect on your dieting efforts. While plain popcorn may not be your ideal snack, it can serve the purpose you are looking for.

Most of our evening eating is less about craving a certain taste and more about having something to chew on. The mindless eating that we engage in while watching our evening television shows is a great place to substitute a low-calorie, no-fat snack like plain popcorn.

Evening Eating- Chewing Gum to Satisfy My Hunger

If you are a woman after 40 who struggles with evening eating, a great way to get rid of those cravings is to pop a piece of chewing gum in your mouth. As we have said, many times the eating we do at night is not caused from being hungry; it comes from being bored and having developed a habit over the years.

The act of chewing gum can help your body think it is eating something without really having to eat anything. Most of the time evening eating is an example of mind over matter. Your body tells you that you need something to eat, not because it actually does, but because you have grown accustomed to eating late at night while watching television.

For the woman after 40, keeping chewing gum at hand can help you curb those evening eating cravings and make sure that your efforts to lose weight during the day do not fall by the wayside at night.

You work hard to lose weight. If eating at night has continued to be a problem for you, some of the tips listed may help you satisfy your need to chew on something without causing significant damage to your diet. Always remember that what worked for one person, may not work for you, after all, each of us are different.

Your journey to lose weight is yours and yours alone, take the tips above and be creative with them if you find they work, but not as well as you would like. Stop letting evening eating ruin your diet, and start letting it be a part of your diet.

Plan for Your Late Night Snacks

If you are a woman over 40 trying to lose weight, you probably know the devastating effect that late night snacks can have on your diet. We all know that avoiding late night snacks is the best choice, but it isn’t always the easiest one. Most of the advice we hear is to just avoid eating at night, but if we could do that, we would never to seek out advice on how to stop eating those late night snacks.

There is no simple answer, and as a woman over 40, you already know how difficult it can be to lose weight. One of the best things you can do if you haven’t been able to overcome late night eating is to incorporate those late night snacks into your diet. You can find some ideas on how to do below.

Late Night Snacks- Build It into Your Diet

One woman over 40 I know decided that she was never going to be able to overcome her late night eating desires, so she did something about it. Instead of trying to avoid her cravings, she owned them. By building her late night snack into her diet she could manage what it was she was going to eat.

Planning her late night snacks allowed this woman over 40 to make sure that her house was stocked with the healthy choices that would offer her something tasty to snack on, while avoiding the weight gain that comes with unhealthy snacks. So what exactly did she eat?

Late Night Snacks- Get Rid of the Processed Foods

Maybe more important than what this woman over 40 did eat, is what she didn’t eat. She avoided processed foods and sugars, for the most part. While there were a few exceptions, she stuck to foods that were natural and low in fat. Occasionally, she would build more traditional late night snacks into her diet, but the key is that they were built into the diet.

Late Night Snacks- Fruits and Veggies

Yes, I know you have heard this before, but the reason why fruits and vegetables are on every list of healthy snacks is that they are healthy. By filling up on these late night snacks our woman over 40 was able to satisfy her need to eat, while keeping her calories and fat intake to a minimum.

One thing that she did do that you may not have thought of was to use a low-fat cottage cheese as a dip for her veggies. Low-fat cottage cheese is actually one of the healthiest late night snacks you can eat. It contains a heavy dose of calcium and protein, both essential for the woman over 40 and a healthy lifestyle. Adding a low fat, low-calorie dip to your late night veggies is a great way to liven it up a bit and helps you stop craving all of the junk food you normally grab.

Late Night Snacks- Try a Smoothie

Another way to enjoy late night snacks and not have to worry about ruining your goals to lose weight is by indulging in a fruit smoothie. A fruit smoothie can provide you with a healthy late night snack that can curb your night cravings. One of the best things about planning a smoothie into your diet is there are a nearly endless number of fruit combinations that you can create. The many different choices a fruit smoothies means that you will never have to suffer through snacking on the same thing every night.

If your goal is lose weight but you have continuously struggled with overcoming your late night eating habits, there is hope. Instead of continuing to fight those cravings, it may be time to plan for them.

Planning your late night snacks as a regular part of your diet can help you lose weight. Instead of grabbing anything in the house that looks good, you will always have something healthy to snack on during the night. Give your goal to lose weight a boost and stop breaking your diet with those midnight munchies by making that snack a staple of your diet.

Overcoming Your Night Cravings

Overcoming night cravings is something that many women over 40 have difficulty with. When we are attempting to lose weight, it can be difficult to avoid our old habits that helped put the weight on in the first place. There are many things that women over 40 can do to help avoid the night cravings they have, but it is first necessary to understand why those cravings can lead to disaster for your goal to lose weight.

Numerous studies have shown that eating at night is worse for your body than eating at any other time of the day. The reason is simple. Throughout the rest of the day, you are more active and your body burns more calories. Once you go to bed for the night, your body uses very little energy. Using less energy means burning fewer calories, thus the more calories you consume shortly before bed, the fewer of them will be used.

Since these calories are not used while you sleep, many women over 40 find that they are stored as fat. Avoiding night cravings is even more important for women over 40 when trying to lose weight. As we age our metabolism begins to slow, meaning that it is harder for us to burn the calories we consume anyway. When you eat late at night, your body will burn those calories even more slowly. Now that we have an idea of why night cravings are a hindrance to your goal to lose weight, here are some ideas from women over 40 to avoid that late night eating.

Night Cravings- Get More Sleep

One way that many women over 40 avoid the late night cravings they once had, is to sleep more. As we get older, we need more rest anyway. Instead of waiting until midnight to hit the sack, start going to bed around ten at night. This will not only limit the amount of time that night cravings can strike, it will also give you more energy the following day.

Getting an adequate amount of rest is essential when you want to lose weight. Your body functions at a higher level when you are well rested. Getting to bed early will help you lose weight and fight those night cravings.

Night Cravings- Don’t Starve Yourself

Another option many women over 40 have found useful in curbing their late night cravings, is to give in to them. That’s right I’m saying go ahead and eat late at night, just do it the right way. Normally this is the part where I would tell you to eat fruits or veggies, but not today. Have a real snack. Eating one of the small packages of peanut butter crackers will go a long way to satisfying your late night cravings.

Not only are they delicious, but they are also low in calories and fat. If you have tried everything and haven’t been able to avoid eating at night, give yourself the satisfaction to treat yourself, but make sure you do so in a healthy manner. Starving yourself only helps you lose weight for so long. Many women over 40 have found that a small snack and a glass of water fulfills their desire for a late night snack.

Night Cravings- Ah, The Television

Many women over 40 find that most of their late night cravings occur during their television watching time. There have been studies that have shown that all of the food commercials on television trigger something in your brain that tells your body that it needs to eat. In order to avoid the night cravings that come along with watching your favorite shows, try something a little different.

Many women over 40 have told me that watching their shows on DVR or on the computer have helped them avoid night cravings while watching television. By watching your favorite shows on either of these devices, you can avoid the commercials that may be ruining your plans to lose weight. While it may seem a bit silly, many women over 40 have sworn that making this change helped them overcome their night cravings. Give it try, if nothing else you won’t have to sit through all those commercials anymore.

Night cravings do not have to ruin your diet. Women over 40 all around the globe have successfully overcome their desire to eat late at night. Take the suggestions above and put them to use as you see fit. Remember your goal is to lose weight, and being hungry at night should not derail those goals.

How Can I Stop Eating At Night

If you are one of the many women over 40 asking yourself, “How I can stop eating at night”, you are not alone. Many women trying to lose weight struggle with eating late at night. Over time we develop habits, and one of the most frequent habits that people who struggle with weight gain have developed, is late night eating.

Breaking the late night eating habit is important as you attempt to lose weight. If you find yourself in the group of women over 40 who struggle with the midnight munchies, some of the tips below may help you in your journey to lose weight and provide you with the answers you are looking for when you ask, “How can I stop eating at night.”

How Can I Stop Eating At Night- 21 Day Break the Habit Program

Many women over 40 have had success in stopping their late night eating cravings by making it through the first 21 days without eating at night. Many studies have shown that a psychological habit can be overcome in 21 days. If you constantly ask, “How can I stop eating at night” it is likely that your habit is of a psychological nature. Your body likely is not craving food, but your brain tells you that it is.

If you have been a late night eater for a number of years, this can be a hard habit to break. The key is mapping it out on a calendar. Set a start date and let the countdown begin. Once you make it through the first 21 days, your brain will stop telling you that you need to eat when you sit down in front of the television at night. Now, instead of eating because of habit, your body will only crave food when it is actually hungry.

Another good idea when going through those first 21 days is to replace your bad habit with a good one. When you settle down for the night and reach for those snacks, do a few crunches or stretches instead. Over time, this will become your habit of choice, and instead of doing something to hinder your goal to lose weight; you will be doing something to help achieve it.

How Can I Stop Eating at Night – Start Eating Dinner at the Table?

Another reason many women over 40 find themselves asking, “How can I stop eating at night”, is because they have grown accustom to eating in front of the television. Start eating all of your meals at the table. By having a designated location to eat your meals, you will be less likely to eat in other areas.

You may have heard the saying that you should never bring your work to bed with you. The literal reason for that is because your bed is a place for relaxation and rest. By bringing your work to bed with you, you turn the bedroom into a place for work. Subconsciously, your brain begins to associate the bedroom with the stresses of work and you think about work when you try to sleep instead of getting rest.

The same holds true for eating. If you eat your meals in front of the television, when you sit in front of it later, your brain is going to think you should be eating. Eat enough meals in the living room, and you end up being one of the many women over 40 who ask, “How can I stop eating at night” when you find your self watching your favorite shows in the evening. If your goal is to lose weight, one of the best things you can do, is to start eating all of your meals at the table.

How Can I Stop Eating at Night – Exercise Earlier in the Day

One of the major problems that many women over 40 encounter, is having to exercise late in the evening. If there is any way possible, you should try to exercise earlier in the day. After you finish a strenuous workout, your body is going to crave food. You have just finished burning many calories and it is only natural that your body wants to replace them.

By exercising late at night you are setting your body up to crave food late in the evening. Squeezing your workout in a bit earlier can go a long way to making sure that the work you put in to lose weight, is not sabotaged by your body’s need to replenish the calories burned. If you have ever asked, “How can I stop eating at night” and you do most of your exercise in the late evening, moving your routine to earlier in the day can help keep those late night cravings at bay.

Constantly asking yourself, “How can I stop eating at night” can be very frustrating. The tips above have helped many women over 40 succeed with their weight loss goals. If you struggle with late night eating, consider the above tips. The problem can be overcome by taking the right steps. Be creative, and be determined, and you can shed the pounds and the get rid of the late night eating.

Tips to Stop Eating in the Evening

Eating in the evening is a problem that many women over 40 have written to me about over the years.  Each of these women has come to me seeking help, and each of them has a different story and a different set of circumstances that they have to deal with.  What they have all had in common is that they cannot stop eating in the evening and they all want to lose weight.

If you have spent any amount of time dieting, you know how difficult it is to stick to that diet all day long.  The hours at work, or dealing with your daily activities, probably are not that difficult, but inevitably, there comes a point in the day when you are no longer busy and get a chance to relax.  The most common time for this to occur is later in the evening. 

It makes sense that after starving yourself all day long, once you get a moment to relax your body automatically turns to food.  If you are one of the many women over 40 looking to lose weight and struggle with eating in the evening, here a few tips that may help you forget about those late night cravings, and get you into those jeans you have been working so hard to do.

Eating in the Evening- Find something to do with Your Hands

Many women over 40 have told me that one of the biggest reasons they find themselves eating in the evening is because they have nothing to do.  When you settle in to watch television for the night a good way to make sure that you do not reach for that bag of chips is to keep your hands busy.  If you enjoy needlework this is a great time to pursue your hobby and help keep you away from the food. 

It has been shown in numerous studies that the busier you are, the less you think about food.  Keeping your hands and your mind busy makes it more difficult for those late night cravings to sneak into your head.

Eating in the Evening- Join a Group

There are many support groups available for women over 40 trying to lose weight.  Many support groups gather later in the evenings, cutting down on the time your mind has to tell you to reach for the piece of cake.  Joining a support group is not a magic pill, when you are sitting at home you still need to keep yourself occupied or you will still find yourself eating in the evening and throwing your plans to lose weight off the tracks. 

The real benefit of women over 40 joining a support group comes from the accountability to the group you come to feel.  Right now when you feel the urge to eat at night the only person you have to answer to is yourself.  By joining a support group designed to help you lose weight, you have an entire room of people you will have to answer too, making the choice to pick up that bag of chips all the more difficult.

Eating in the Evening- Set Rules

Setting rules for themselves is a way that many women over 40 have been able to stop eating in the evening.  If you have tried to lose weight for years and had little success, setting, and sticking, to rules is a good way to help you get rid of the pounds you want to shed. 

One woman recently wrote to me and told me that the trick to helping her overcome eating late at night was to set a rule that she would eat nothing after seven in the evening.  In order to help her stick to the rule, everyday that she broke it, she had to put $5 into a jar that she could not touch until she had met her weight loss goal. 

Naturally, you do not have to follow the same guidelines, but this woman found that losing $5 was a painful enough experience for eating in the evening.  She did break her rule a few times in the beginning, but she paid up and tried to do better the next day.  After her first two weeks, she never broke the rule again.  When she had finally met her weight loss goal, she put the money towards her new clothing purchases.  Setting rules and having consequences for breaking those rules can help you eliminate your late night eating.

If you are one of the women over 40 who are struggling with eating in the evening, the suggestions above may help you overcome those urges.  Your intentions are in the right place and your journey to a healthier and fit life is important.  Keep doing what you are doing during the day, and tweak some of the things you do at night, and the weight will begin to fall off.  Take the steps necessary to make your journey a success.

How to Stop Night Eating

If you are a woman over 40 trying to lose weight you may be wondering how to stop night eating.  You likely know that night eating can stifle the hard work you did all day long to stick to your diet.  I recently received an email from a woman over 40 asking me how to stop night eating.  It is a question that I often get and felt the need to address.

How to Stop Night Eating- A Common Reason for Night Eating

There are many techniques available to help you lose weight while simultaneously curbing your desire for late night eating.  Before I offer a few tips, I would like to go over some of the most common reasons that make someone ask how to stop night eating.  The most common reason for night eating is boredom.  If you are a woman over 40, you most likely have had a busy and, possibly stressful day.  Once the evening rolls around you want to relax and veg out for a bit.  As your body begins to unwind, your mind begins to lose the focus you had earlier in the day.  Your goal to lose weight slips further and further from your mind, and ultimately you end up reaching for that bag of chips or box of cookies.

How to Stop Night Eating- Stress is Another Cause of Night Eating

The other major reason a woman over 40 finds herself eating late at night is stress related.  If you have been wondering how to stop night eating, the answer could be to remove some of the stress from your life.  If you have a family, a good way to relieve some of the stress is to assign some of the housework to each family member.  It may take a bit of time for everyone to get accustomed to doing their fair share around the house, but ultimately the less stress you have in your life, the less likely you will be to reach for your comfort foods later in the evening.  As you know, the less junk you eat, the easier you will find it to lose weight.

How to Stop Night Eating- On to the Tips

1. Do not watch TV late at night – I know this will be difficult, most of us enjoy our television time, but if eating late at night is a problem you struggle with, you may want to replace your late night television shows with working on your favorite hobby.
   One woman over 40, who recently wrote me, said that once she replaced her late night TV watching with her favorite activity (beadwork) she stopped having so many late night cravings.  This particular woman was able to answer the how to stop night eating question by filling her time with an activity that kept her occupied and her hands busy.  By making sure that she kept busy, she was able to break a habit she had developed over the years and enjoy something she loved doing while helping her lose weight.
2. If you just cannot give up your television time, you are not alone.  Do not worry; it is still possible to enjoy your late night television without having to ruin your goals to lose weight.  Instead of reaching for that bag of chips, consider sucking on hard candy.  Hard candy can offer you the sweets that you desire without adding much to your calorie intake.
3. Hide the junk food- If you are a woman over 40 it is likely that you have a house full of people.  With a house full of kids and husbands, it is often times difficult to know how to stop night eating.  Keeping junk food out of the house is nearly impossible, but you can make it more difficult to get to.  Instead of leaving the bag of chips on the counter, store them in a cabinet or some other out of sight place.
   Keeping the junk food out of sight and keeping healthier options in more readily available places around the house is a good way to satisfy your late night cravings without blowing your diet.

If you are a woman over 40 who has been struggling to lose weight, one of the questions you have undoubtedly asked yourself is the often-difficult question of how to stop night eating.  By implementing some of the suggestions above, you may be able to make it easier to control your late night eating urges.  That being said, do not limit your options to those listed above.  All of the tips I offered came from other women over 40, they came up the ideas by themselves.

If you find that none of the above work for you, get creative and find something that will.  Once you conquer your late night eating desires, I would love to hear how you managed to do so.