Many people know which foods can help promote sleep, such as milk and oatmeal, but they don't know that some foods not only hinder sleep but can also cause insomnia. For example, sweet potatoes, with their sweet taste, are a delight to eat, but eating too much of these foods for dinner can easily lead to insomnia. This is because foods like sweet potatoes, corn, and peas produce a significant amount of gas during digestion. By bedtime, the undigested gas can cause bloating, which interferes with normal sleep.
In addition to foods that have a filling effect and those that stimulate the central nervous system, like coffee and tea, some spicy and salty foods, such as spicy snacks and garlic bread, can also affect sleep quality. Spicy foods not only easily cause a burning sensation in the stomach and indigestion, but they also deplete the body's sleep-promoting mediators during digestion, thereby affecting sleep.
Overly greasy foods can also cause insomnia. This is because greasy foods increase the workload on the intestines, stomach, liver, gallbladder, and pancreas during digestion, stimulating the central nervous system and keeping it in a constant state of work, which delays the onset of sleep. Therefore, it's best to keep dinner light in flavor, and finishing dinner before 8 p.m. is more suitable.
Tips:
Foods that promote sleep include bananas, milk, oatmeal, whole wheat bread, daylilies, celery, longans, sunflower seeds, and vinegar.