Turns out NES (Night Eating Syndrome) was actually defined as a legitimate psychological syndrome in 1955, but little research was ever done until the 1990's. As of this time, it is being proposed for inclusion in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
Reading the description of the syndrome is like reading about myself. Basically, every bullet point is right on track with my own behaviors:
People who suffer from Night Eating Syndrome generally:
- Skip breakfast, and go several hours after waking before their first meal.
- Consume at least 25% of their calories after dinner.
- Late-night binges almost always consist of consuming carbohydrates. (Carbohydrates tend to shoot messages to the brain to produce serotonin, which induces sleep.) However, this eating is typically spread over several hours, which is not consistent with a typical eating binge as evidenced by other eating disorders. Episodes of late-night binge-eating can be repeated throughout the night, with many separate visits to the fridge or cupboard.
- Suffer from depression or anxiety, often in connection with their eating habits.
- Affect and arousal decrease throughout the day with the lowest levels being in the middle of night-eating episodes.
- These night eating episodes typically bring guilt rather than hedonistic enjoyment.
- Have trouble sleeping in general.
- Are more likely than the general public to sleepwalk.
I don't sleep walk, as far as I know, but otherwise, that is exactly me. The one that really snapped my attention was the skipping breakfast thing. I know that is a very common dieting no-no and a lot of people do it, but I always have. I've always known that I was skipping breakfast because I wasn't really hungry -- I am still satisfied in the morning from my late night eating. But I've always rationalized it away by saying, "Well, you know caffeine is a major appetite suppressant." Um, yeah. People drink coffee and still manage to eat breakfast.
Also, I have often said that I "binge eat." I don't binge eat in the typical way, but I find very often that my evening "snack" really (at least calorie-wise) becomes the equivalent of another whole meal, or even two whole meals. I can easily consume 1000 calories before bedtime, and almost always it is through, "many separate visits to the fridge." Even though that is not typical binge eating behavior, I have always felt that is what it is, and I have struggled with it because I truly feel sometimes that I can't control it.
The real problem for me is that the situation is counter-intuitive. For example, when I was doing Weight Watchers, I would save a lot of my "points" for night time, so I could still get my late night satisfaction and not go over my points allotment for the day. This always let me to being hungry during the day though, or eating food that wasn't what I really wanted like an all-veggie salad with no dressing as my main meal of the day. Sure, it's low-points (on WW) but it also wasn't satisfying me, nor was it delivering the protein and carbs that I needed to get through my day, which in turn caused me to load up on bread, cheese, crackers, dips, etc -- all those high carb comfort foods that we all love -- at night. Sure, I technically stayed on my "diet" but not really. What I was (am) really doing is justifying and accommodating my binge eating. When I eat more during the day, I really am able to better control the late night eating. It's just a matter of doing it. Those old, conditioned behaviors are hard to get on top of.
Above, I have linked to Wikipedia.
Here is the actual scholarly research: International Journal of Obesity
And here is a related study about NES being related to Depression, Weight Gain, Low Self Esteem, and Sleep Disorders: From the Wiley Online Library
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