CosBeauty Magazine #88

4.
choose the right foods
All those old wives’ tales about eating
before bed are on the mark, but less
important than you’d like to think.
Eating at the right time, your ‘metabolic
window’, conditions your body’s
metabolism to wake up and wind down.
Within this timeframe you can give
your body an important message: in your
world there is an adequate supply of food,
so it can sit back and relax into sleep
mode when it feels the need. Different
types of food can affect how you sleep.
Meals rich in carbohydrates set off a
chain reaction which makes you sleepy.
Carbs trigger the release of insulin,
which increases the level of the chemical
tryptophan in the brain. From there, it’s
turned into serotonin, and serotonin is
a sleep inducer. Eating proteins has the
opposite effect to carbohydrates and can
make us feel more alert. A lunch rich in
protein may well prevent the 3pm slump,
while eating carbohydrates at dinner
should help you to sleep.
‘
Poor sleepers showed
twice the amount of intrinsic
signs of ageing, such as fine
lines, reduced elasticity and
uneven pigmentation.
’
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