Asleep in the métro
I never have anything to eat if I am going to be driving, it would be dangerous.
When I was in highschool, I studied Russian, and we all loved our Russian teacher. As she was the only teacher of Russian in the school, after a while, we really got to know her well. Whenever she gave us a test, we knew that she would get bored and fall asleep. I am not kidding you. I remember the way her eyelids would drop, her eyes would roll up and down, how you could see she was fighting sleep, and how she finally fell asleep. And THEN, her naughty pupils would start cheating. Yes, me too!
At the time, I thought that she was just old. Now I wonder if maybe she suffered from the same ailment as myself: she had had something to eat and it made her sleep.
Once, about ten years ago, I had promised my students to show them a Hitchcock movie after studying a couple of scenes with them. I showed them the video, right after lunch, sat at the back of the class with them, and… fell asleep. When I woke up, the students were totally absorbed by the suspense in the movie, but I knew that at least twenty minutes had passed when I had been in deep sleep. Of course, this wouldn’t have happened if I had been teaching, but sitting in a chair, I just couldn’t fight it.
I don’t think it has anything to do with age since I have been like this for years, but I am afraid it’s not going to get any better with ageing…
Have you ever tried caffeine-enriched drinks ? Sincerely, I don’t know anything in the world as disgusting as it is. But I can testify that, after such a drink, there’s no way to sleep… even with a Bebert couscous in your stomach ! 😉
Cheers,
YLB.
I can drink 3 cups of strong coffee only to fall asleep and burn myself with the 4th after eating. I have tried 5 hour energy and several other drinks and “cures” only to find no help in any of them. I will say that the 5 hour energy worked the best of anything I have tried but only posponed my sleep for a little while. (Maybe another 10-15 minutes VS nothing at all). Thank you for your advise though!
My experience with coffee and diet coke tells me that caffeine doesn’t work on my post-sugar sleepiness. It’s probably a metabolism thing. Maybe post-eating exercise would help, but I always seem to be sitting down after I eat. I notice in your examples, Claude, that you and your teacher are sitting in darkened rooms when the after-meal drowsiness overcomes you.
hi i get sleepy after eating anything, not just sleepy though, also really fatigued as well. i have to lay down even if im in public. its embarrasing. i was wondering what chemical the body releases to make us tired after eating. anyone know? my doctors have no clue.
I’m struggling with this “sleepy after eating” thing right now. I ate an apple yesterday and 10 minutes later passed out on my friends couch for a half hour. I eat anything with wheat in it and I get dizzy.
My research (in my case) leads me to these possible causes:
Candida Albicans
Gluten Intolerance
Good luck.
Try eating a small handful of walnuts with your apple next time. What’s happening is that you are only eating carbs and you need the protein to go with it. I am a type 2 Diabetic and have suffered from this sleepiness for years until I was diagnosed!
get your blood sugar tested im the same and im getting mine tested
I get overwhelmingly tired one hour after breakfast and lunch. I drink several cups of coffee prior to the onset and it doesn’t seem to make a difference. I get up from my desk and try to walk when the urge to sleep hits me, but have actually had my knees start to buckle as I walked.
Hi, i was surfing the web looking for further info on my condition when i saw your blog site, read the comments, and i can tell you tyhat you are suffering from Insulin Resistance, (also known as, Metabolic Syndrome or, Syndrome X).
My advice is to see your Medical Practicioner, and read the copious studies and papers on the web, hope this helps.
I have felt the same way as you have… And its really imbarrassing, I try not to eat something big like a salad and I have to take a nap, even if its for 15min. and I will wake up feeling refreshed and ready to go on with the day… I also have mentioned this to my Dr. and clueless. I have even tried energy pills with ephedra and my nap over comes anything…
I have exactly the same problem. About 15min after eating I fall asleep. Or at least get really sleepy. I always lose strength in my legs, feel totally exhausted and don’t care the slightest bit if I am in the middle of something important like going to a meeting, etc. I have studied my condition intensively for about half a year. What I have noticed while reading about different health conditions is almost all of them mention blood sugar/insuline/diabetes. I’ve done a thorough Polysomnography test. The diagnose was a mix of narcolepsy and hypersomnia. But the diagnose is more of an assumption, because the test did not show really strong & clear signs of narcolepsy. I also recommend looking into Mycoplasmosis/Mycoplasma Infection, Ureaplasma Infection, Lactose Intolerance, Gulf War Syndrome, Parasites. Also, try experimenting with different kinds of foods… I’ve noticed that anything refined or sweet (like icecream) makes my condition much-much worse.
PS! If someone has a thought about what’s going on with me, please share it! Thanks in advance!! 🙂
Also check out the references on Candida Albicans. In short, you may have a diet too high in processed sugars and simple starches that has led to excessive yeast in your system. The yeast has created a problem called “leaky gut” and the partially digested food particles are entering your bloodstream causing you to get sleepy.
The cure is simple enough: take some probiotic dietary supplements and switch to a diet based more on protein and less on carbohydrates. Anything high in fat (ice cream, fried food) or starches/sugar (candy, cookies, potato chips) cause the reaction?
Be warned that you will likely feel worse for a few days as the yeast starts to die and your body has to process out the waste products.
Dear Cris,
Try to drink a planty of water after 20 to 25 minutes of your food.Not at once just small in amount like 2 to 3 sip after every 4 to 5 minutes for regarding time so that you will feel better.I am not physician but i controle my same condition in this way.
Reason:
Your food shouldn’t hold your lever section for long time as you will get dizzy.Water will digest it to your stomech soon and you’ll feel better.
It is refreshing to see that I am not alone! After eating any meal, small or large, I fall asleep within 15 minutes for at least 30 minutes. I DO have sleep apnea – use a machine at night, amd also have hight blood pressure and diabetes. I have been gaining weight so fast I can’t keep myself in clothing! Ireally need help BAD and soon – any other suggestions would be appreciated!
Try to change your life style…
1. Take walk in the morning and evening as well for 15 to 20 minutes.
2. Drink water before your meal
3. Take your dinner 2 hours before your bed.
4. After your meal, don’t sit, lay down or do any work.Leave free your mind for mini. 40 minutes (As harmones play vital role in digestion).Then you can do you work.
5. take planty of water but after 20 minuter of your food and only 3 sip after every 4 to 5 minutes.
hope this will help
I also get very tired after eating. I find that if I fast during the day, I do not get sleepy and I have a lot more energy. I then eat a very large, but well balanced meal at night before bed. Getting used to the feeling of hunger during the day is the only bad part. Think of prehistoric man, hunting and or looking for food all day; he would eat most of his food at night. Endure the hunger as a “badge of courage” of sorts. I promise you will feel better, have more energy, and lose weight.
I have to agree with Gemma….drinking normal amounts of caffeine but starving all day (and then eating at night) is the only way to guarantee keeping my energy at a normal level throughout the day. Just yesterday, I was at a lunch meeting, and thought I’d be okay with lettuce, tomato, and cold crab, and my usual (safe) coffee with cream….but while I was sitting there, the brain fog set in before I had even finished the salad, and it was all I could do to stay focused on the conversation, and keep my eyes open until I could escape to home and practically pass out. Although I only needed to sleep for about 45 minutes, it was still very disruptive to the day.
To be fair, however, I do have to say that usually I am able to “maintain” if I just eat a plain lettuce salad, with maybe a teeny teeny bit of feta cheese, and no dressing. So maybe it was the crab, or tomato that did me in. In no way do I attribute this condition to eating “excessive carbs”. In my case, protein and nuts can be the culprits as well.
Anyway, good luck to all finding a way to deal with this…whatever it may be.
Diana
I have the same problem and have found myself waiting to eat until I get home from work. I am currently unemployed now and at home a lot now. I am going to have to wean myself from eating all day. I take an hour nap every time I eat. It doesn’t matter what I eat.
The only thing that prevents me from falling asleep is very active exercise.
“Brain fog” — that’s a great way to describe it. I feel it coming on I know I have to take a nap. Seems to be worse now (age 66) than even a short while ago. Today’s breakfast of banana, a bacon and egg sandwich with butter on whole wheat bread, and coffee brought it on.
I stopped eating an entire banana…I might occasionally eat half of one. I would get so sleepy that I did not thin it was safe to drive to work. My trigger seeems to be anything high on he glycemic index. I will try the probiotics though.
I am really concerned. I can sleep for hours. Sometimes I haven’t even finished my meal and I just need to lie down. I hope I find out soon what this problem is.
I rejoice to read this! I also have been hunting down the reason for this ailment, which has gotten progessively worse the past few months. My doctors put me on Lexapro for a while, thinking it only and anxiety issue . . . that worked sometimes, but not really. I need help. My thanks to everyone for a few more avenues to peruse . . .
Everyone,
You have nothing to worry about! Feeling sleepy after eating is because of two reasons:
1) Copious amounts of blood leave the brain in order to aid the digestion process of the digestive system which can result in fatigue or tiredness,
2) If you’ve had a meal which contains 30%-60% carbohydrates, starch, or sugars, this causes a rise in blood sugar and as a result insulin is released into your body. This in turn creates a chemical called trytophan which is the same chemical released that tells your brain to take a nap when you’re feeling tired.
Kunal Gandhi
Rubbish Sir! (Ma’am?)
There is a fundamental difference between the entirely natural sluggishness of oxygen deprivation or dips in blood sugar after a meal and what these folks describe.
These people are talking about losing their ability to remain awake, to the point of knees buckling, being afraid to drive, or even being forced to become prostrate in public (the emotional charge of the embarrassment alone should be enough to waken one up!).
First of all, if you’ve ever watched an energetic thin person eat, you’ll see they eat till they feel full, then get up and run around like nothing has hampered them. While I will accept that an obese person isn’t going to suddenly have extra energy for eating, that’s entirely different from being too exhausted to drive.
For most of these folks it sounds like insulin resistance, which can even kick up on fatty foods that are relatively low on carbohydrates. You can *try* doing deep slow breathing for 5-15 minutes before you eat (to get some oxygen into the blood) and again for 5-15 minutes after you eat (I’d do it sitting down as it can make you a bit lightheaded)…but this will only go so far.
You may also wish to ask your medical doctors to read up on D-Ribose sugar. You don’t need a prescription to buy it in most countries, so you can go ahead and just get some – but you shouldn’t dink around with your blood sugar without an MD’s supervision anyway.
I too get very very sleepy after I eat……I feel energized all day long and then when I eat…….that’s it for me. I’ll lay down for about 15 min to an hour and I am ok for awhile. It’s embarrasing. I thought all this was food allergies. Also, I have a yeast problem. I’ve been dealing with this for years though. Sometimes it’s worse then others.
Kristy
I am the exact same way! I have been really looking into food allergies, and I’m about to check into seeing an allergist. These symptoms are crazy, and people just think you are a hypocondriac if you say something isn’t right with how tired you feel. I have really been researching gluten sensitivity, because I have some additional symptoms that go along with this problem as well. Maybe one of these days we will figure it out.
Good to see this sharing of info. I have had this problem for years of getting EXHAUSTED after eating anything, even bacon and eggs. If I eat before 4 pm I get sleepy and exhausted. So exhausted I don’t know if I will even have enough energy to breath.
I have been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia and was only border line with hypoglycimia. Gluten definately doesn’t help, but is there gluten in Oatmeal? That really cleans my clock.
I do feel like this is a food allergy, but which food is it? Yeast and Gluten make me hurt in the bones and also make me very tired.
Any help to get feeling better would be great. I am presently trying to get Social Security Disability I am so bad off.
I have the exact same problem. Also have Fibro and hypoglycemia. Only when I wake up after a “food nap” I feel shaky, have a slight headache and am sick to my stomach. It usually will last allday. Lately I have tried to stick to fresh fruit and vegies with a spoonful of peanut butter for protein. Although it seems to get better I still feel lousy. I also notice that when I include any bread I feel worse. I am at a loss. Good luck with the SSD.
Never eat store bought bread. One time about three years ago I was craving some cheese sandwiches. (I had already cut down on bread as a result of bloating after eating bread.) Any way I had cheese sandwiches for lunch and dinner…I was dizzy for 24 hours after eating the bread. Then I heard someone complaining on the radio about some “new” additive added to bread which could cause all kinds of problems. So I read through my ingredients label and sure enough…the new additive was in it. I have not bought bread since.
I’ve got this problem too, and I’ve had it for years. I’ve learned to eat a small lunch (which isn’t always effective) and then have a bigger dinner. But really I’m just forestalling the inevitable. Sure enough, after dinner, I can sleep for hours. It’s a real problem during the day time, when work requires productivity. I’ve found doing interactive, physical activities can help ward off fatigue. But if I have to read after eating, and this is usually the case, I’ll invariably fall asleep.
I get so sleepy after I eat I feel horrible. I have been diagnosed years ago with
fibromyalgia but I think this might be a sugar problem. Although it doesn’t matter what i eat.
Hi,
If anyone is still reading this they might want to check out this link regarding the effects of neurotransmitters. I find this very interesting. I am going to experiment by limiting my calories and eating mostly lean proteins during the day and limit the carbs until the evening.
“Research on the connection between a person’s mood and the food he or she eats has revealed what many people have long believed, that eating a certain food can influence a person’s mood—at least temporarily. Research by Judith Wurtman, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), has focused on how certain foods alter one’s mood by influencing the level of certain brain chemicals called neurotransmitters. While many other factors influence the level of these chemicals, such as hormones, heredity, drugs, and alcohol, three neurotransmitters—dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin—have been studied in relation to food, and this research has shown that neurotransmitters are produced in the brain from components of certain foods.”
http://www.faqs.org/nutrition/Met-Obe/Mood-Food-Relationships.html
Best Of Luck!
Kind Regards,
Irene
This all looks pretty familiar to me. The problem started when I was 15, im now 32. Iv found three helpful catagories: diet, exercise & candida treatments.
diet is the difficult one: food intolerances can be difficult to nail down. milk protein gets added to so many things. I have just started college and now Im
practicing hatha yoga (the exercises) is probably the most simple, effective thing you can take up to improve health. Find a teacher that suits your ability, a class should be physically demanding.
Chinese exercises (qigong) approach the same problem in a slightly different way. I find static- standing pole exercises can be done to quickly dispel the tired feeling after eating lunch. finding a teacher is not so easy as in yoga, and im not impressed by the large amount of text on the web. the principle is to stand upright with mental lightness & alertness, but the bare minimum of muscle tension.
Candida treatments are fairly well documented on the web, so i wont go into them here.
I also fall asleep 15 minutes after eating. I feel very guilty about doing this because this happens after
I eat a snack of say ice cream or two pieces of bread with butter when I come home from teaching. However,
it doesn’t really matter what I eat I pass out. Since the age of 12 I’ve felt this way, and when I was
in my 20’s was diagnosed with candida and hypoglycema so I know what I am suppossed to stay away from. Do I
listen, no, because I am addicted to sugar. Sugar Is nasty. If you want to read something that will help you
with this there are two books I recommend by the same author (1) Obseity, Cancer, Depression by F. Batmanghelidj, M.D. and (2)Your Body’s Many Cries for Water. I pray that you can fight this. God Bless. Patricia
15 to 30 minutes after eating I fall asleep. I have done since my late teens, although it happened before this too. Things got so bad that I used to sleep for 18 hours a day. And If i couldn’t lie down to sleep I would fall asleep even standing up at work! Then I discovered that if I didn’t eat breakfast, or anything else during the day, the problem didn’t arise. The problem, I thought at the time, was refined carbohyrates. In fact it happens with all carboyhrates refined or complex – wheat and grains make the condition even worse. However, by shear chance I happened to try another diet (for other reasons), and I found that the sleepiness after eating probelm vanished completely. I switched to a raw food diet. Now the problem doesn’t exist. I also found that to a lesser extent even protein, if cooked, is also to blame for this sleepiness. If food has to be cooked (or processed apart from being blended), then I shouldn’t be eating it. Contrary to what one might expect on such a diet, an increase in intestinal gas for instance, it just doesn’t happen! In fact it is the other way around. It takes about four days to work completely. And even although through eating copious amounts of raw fruit and vegtables eaten as is or blended first (and exceeding my previous calorific intake), my weight loss has been dramatic, and for the first time in years I feel alive, fit, healthy and awake.
Well, since I hate eating raw vegetables, like a cow, I would simply prefer a pill. Somebody know one?
i have a problem of the excess gas in the stomach and always sleep after eating cooked food please do you have solution to that
It can be simply the amount of digestive processing involved in taking in the Nutrients. You want to see a real energy shocker. Drink a glass of whey protien and this will usualy give some energy not to long after drinking it, although maybe a little tired for some of you for a short while. Okay, try a Green Drink with Spirilina, Chlorela and so on. This will usualy provide energy with little fatigue. Now, try one after the other and watch the crash and burn. Add in B Vitamins and Minerals to that mix and you will head straight to your bed.
All of these things are supposed to provide energy, but a high enough concentration temporarily suck it out of you, and I believe this is simply because you are depleted relative to what your taking in. Just as a body cannot gain more energy from rest then it posseses, a common problem in Chronic Fatigue, the processing of things that should provide energy can have a similiar effect. Your body only has so much capacity to digest and process nutrients. This effect usualy shows up on Sugars first, then onto regular carbs, and finaly Protiens. I just had nothing but a half cup of Whey Protein and my vitamins. Took me down for 15 minutes. At night, after a Protien Dinner with Carbs in it, I am frequently out on the couch for 3 hours.
I am beginning to wonder if the meat we are eating has some serious genetic changes taking place due to eating, GMO corn and soy. and all of the massive amounts of antibiotics, and other chemicals the livestock are consuming? Meat used to give me energy, fill me up, and I was satisfied. I switched from beef to lamb…and the lamb I had did not do this. So I tried again…but it didn’t taste the same…and bam I was tired. Sok my next experiment is purchasing an entire organic mutton. I’ll see what happens with this! Even raw vegetables make me sleepy!
Here is something quite interesting. I come from a long line of meat eaters. but my children and grand children HATE meat. How do we explain that one? I crave meat but have eaten very little of it this month.
I know people who are ill who have more energy than I do. I just don’t get it. I’m planning on having hormonal testing, parasites, nutrients and minerals, and on and on until I can find out what exactly is happening. When I do have energy I have a lot of energy…but it only lasts until I’m hungry or have eaten.
Oh, and I forgot to add a preaty simple concept. When your eating, your taking in Energy. The body must use energy to process it. Think about how long it crashes you versus what you would get out of it energy wise latter on. The hunter that would sometimes go for days without killing something to eat. He probably crashed when he finaly got something in his stomach also.
The worst thing you can do is sugar. It is a net loss. It will crash you out completely unless your seriously healthy and have a big reserve to burn those negative calories. If you have a candida problem, it makes it even worse. Both feeding Candida, and killing Candida have the same effect, which is they put off a toxic gas that enters your blood stream and is very similiar to alchohol. Your depleteing yourself in energy reserve, and your essentialy making yourself somewhat drunk and will be somewhat hung over latter. Anyone see the parallel between the reaction of sugars, Candida and getting drunk on the effects while you do it, after you crash and how you feel getting up? Its a hangover.
Does anyone get tired while reading a book or paper etc. I seems that it doesn’t matter how awake I am before sitting down to read I always get tired. It doesn’t even have to be after a meal. Any answers.
It might be your vision…or your reading style. Do you lie down in bed to read or do you sit straight in a chair with the book in you hand or on the table? I sometimes think how we use our eyes makes us tired.
I am 53 years old and in excellent health, as far as I know. In the past 3 months I have developed a bizarre “condition”. Within 10 to 30 minutes after eating I “fall-out”…it is almost a “narcoleptic” reaction. It doesn’t seem to matter what foods I have eaten. I have fallen asleep in restuarants! It is unaffected by caffeine! Moments before I “fall-out”, I have a very slight dull headache…not even enough to warrant an aspirin; but have noticed this happens. In reading “across-the-net”, I tend to think this candida thing warrants looking-into. I have pretty much eliminated the sugar & refined foods theory! I have tried to talk to several doctors about this and they do not seem concerned! Very disheartening, because this condition is affecting not only my sleep pattern but my entire life!
I dont get tired after i eat, but i did notice tonight, that if i eat anything with lactose in it, i get a kind-of drunk feeling about me. I ate a bun tonight (home made, with yeast and milk and stuff) and about 30 minutes after, i felt like i was drunk; i had a hard time standing straight (or still for that matter), i slurred, when people talked to me they sounded like they were speaking gibberish, and my driving took a drastic turn for the worst!
No idea what this is, but I have noticed it once before too… I ate a chicken salad with cheese in it, and a bit later, i felt drunk, same symptoms as listed before, but i was with a group of friends, so i didnt notice it as bad as this time (by myself)
this all to me is tooo familar. .
none of the doctors i see seem to be concerned with my falling asleep after eating. its not just eating either its water too. my husband and i had a theory that it was ice water in restaurants but no . . we tried me eating just plain chicken same thing.
the greatest help to me is just not eating. Dont get me wrong i LOVE LOVE LOVE food . .im in no way an anorexic person. (doesnt help weightloss anyway body just stores food) but its the only way i can stay awake all day. i am alittle tired but i have more energy then i ever do with food.
(slight problem is the sick feeling i get instead hunger) but i do eat at night then pass out 5 to 15minutes later and stay asleep unfortunately sometimes in my food . .
oh little note. that three hour diet thingy worked JUST a little bit not much. the small small snacks help sometimes as long as they arnt “crap food”
I have the same problem. In my last job, after eating lunch I would have to go and sit in the ladies toilets for ten minutes with my head on my knees trying to stay awake. It is a particular problem if I eat bread, pasta, cakes or cookies. If I eat half a packet of cookies at home then I am out cold asleep for an hour or more.It affects my mood too and if I’m not sleeping I feel grouchy and irritable afterwards.Its reassuring to hear that I’m not the only person with this problem.
I’m so grateful to have found this site. My friends and family think I am insane. I have had test after test to figure out my extreme exhaustion and pretty severe depression after eating virtually anything/everything. This has been going on for over 20 years. In many ways, it has ruined my social life. I have fixed this problem like many of you, by just not eating until I get home from work so I can stay alert and do my job. Then I crash after that one meal. My doctor is trying Wellbutrin with me for the neurotransmitters and it is not making
a dent. A friend is suggesting going to an Endocrinologist. Will that help?
I get the same thing – it’s a heck of a lot worse if I have something from Greggs, however, my eyes lids feel like they have lead weights on them when I am taking in information also – wierd!
Would be nice to know if there was a cure for this.
Mak
Thought this may help:
http://sleepdisorders.about.com/od/causesofsleepdeprivation/a/sleepdebt_2.htm
Mak
I’m so glad I found this. I’m struggling with this also. I will look into the things you all have suggested and see the doctor a.s.a.p! Thanks: )
Well, i’m just sitting a my desk in work with the heavy eyes and had late breakfast 10am and its only 12.20 midday, feeling really sleepy. So here i am checking the internet. I had to go fasting this morning (getting my thyroid and lipids (cholesterol) checked. One thing is that i have noticed on this site is that many of you have gone to the doctors but have many of you been tested for an under-active thyroid gland. It would be interesting to know if this is the case. I understand all your symptoms, but its a bit weird lately that in the last six months (i have suffered in the past with an under and over active thyroid gland) my thyroid has been normal and i have been taken off my medication. I did find that when i was over-active, i had all this energy, needed very little sleep and had a voracious appetite. No weight gain, in fact loss weight. No sleepy feeling then. When under-active…lethargic, heavy eyes after eating and feeling like i could sleep after every meal plus weight gain even when eating healthily. Right now i feel like i am under-active so it will be interesting to find out what the tests reveal next week. I’ll come back and let you all know. Take care for now, Paula x
Also, when we consume a meal which contains carbs, they’re converted into sugars. Our blood glucose levels increase, which is the cause of the initial hyperactivity. But the body’s homeostatic mechanism then comes into play in order to lower the glucose levels. In doing so, the glucose levels go down below the “baseline” before coming back to normal. This is the reason why the drowsiness goes away after a while.
I had this problem bigtime, and I got rid of it and feel SOOOO good all the time now.
Try going gluten free for a few days. No pasta, bread, cookies, soy sauce, cereals (even Corn Flakes and Rice Krispies contain gluten from barley malt). If your sleepy problem dramatically improves, you may have gluten intolerance or have Celiac disease.
Then get back on gluten and ask for a blood test for antigliadin antibodies.
Finding out I had Celiac changed my life for the better – the improvement in my energy is SOO worth the difficult dietary change.
There are gluten free cookies, etc. – you just have to go to a Whole Foods type store to buy them.
Hiya, well i’m back again to inform you all that i’ve now got my results for my thyroid test and cholesterol test. Thyroid level is 11.5 and cholesterol 4.7. Both results are normal. I am now convinced it has to be a combination of sleep deprivation and carbohydrate intake. Anyway, i am feeling alot better since i have mostly been eating a lot of vegetables and chicken/fish. Also on Wednesday night last (Wed 26th Sep07) I went for an 8 mile walk. I felt like a million dollars apart from the muscle fatigue the next day. When i ate pasta yesterday (Sun 30th Sep07), I did feel tired and believe it or not fell asleep on the sofa at home. It must take a lot of energy to maybe digest this type of food. Does anyone know of this? Last week when i decided to cook some stirfries, i didn’t feel tired and was able to face the evening with cleaning and ironing. I even went visiting some friends. Its really strange, i do think diet and exercise and sleep have a lot to do with this feeling you get after eating. Today for lunch i had a fillet of chicken with side salad and felt good too. Not at all tired. I wonder though, can the body do without carbs full-time? What did the cavemen do way back when they had to hunt for food? Didn’t look like they ate a lot of carbs now did it! Ok ok, bet they starved a bit too. Aren’t we so lucky to be able to put our hands in the fridge or cupboard and just reach for something to eat! Any feedback would be good, take care folks, Paula
Wow! I can’t believe I found this thread. I have suffered for yrs w/this prob.
I have to run for an appt. but will be back to add some of my own experience and keep this subject alive.
Later, Jr.-hope there’s some more info/people checking in.
Hey, YOU can’t believe you found this thread? This problem has been an issue for me for over 2 years. I have been late for appointments, missed important events, simply because I ate a meal, a realativley small one and passed out. At times I did not even have the energy to put my plate away after a meal, just crashed where I was. I hold off from eating if I have to drive or have an important meeting because I know when I eat..it’s over. My friends and Doctor don’t understand this. I also feel this has something to do with carbs, bread, chips…yet my doctor says my blood tests are fine. I’ve just woken up from one of my comma sleeps and am fed up! PLEASE HELP!
Hi everyone, what about his. I have suffered for 10 yrs. But mine is also including palpitations, very fast, which make you feel like crap. This is when I attempt to do ANYTHING after eating. Sometimes if I have a coffe while out and then get up to move or walk. Wow it happens and I can only lay down. I have had many tests on heart etc. All find nothing spectacular. Only a murmur,slight. Doctors just don’t seem to address the real issue. Only tried to put me on beta-blockers, even when I told them it only happens when I have the digesting issue. I will not take these drugs if nothing is wrong with the heart. But I suppose they didn’t know what else to give me !!!
I am also scared of going very far, or to eat out, or even have a coffee with a cake. Any one else like this? S.
Try not eating any bread, or any other pre packaged processed foods.
If the readers and responders have not heard of Dr. Mercola, Visit Dr. Mercola’s site. Just type in Dr. Mercika into your search.
Jen, Try avoiding simple carbs/sugars. If I have oatmeal and toast, I will fall asleep afterwards.(I’m toast) If I have a salad, I will be energized and clear-headed! Same goes for corn flakes or cream of wheat.
You might have an allergy or intolerance to sugar and/or wheat.(or gluten) Try having just a green salad for a meal, and see how you feel. That will give you some idea of the problem.
Things got so bad for me that I got hooked on pain pills to get over the fatigue/depression that resulted. This only exasperated the situation big time!
Try the salad only and check back. Good luck…..Jr.
I’ve been dealing with this since I was a teenager, and I’m 50 now. Just in the last 2 years I decided it must be food intolerances, so I cut out gluten and dairy and chocolate, and saw a great improvement in energy level, not falling asleep when I’m driving, not feeling like falling asleep every single time I sit down. Occasionally I experiment with one of these foods to see if they still bother me (actually I just give in to the cravings every once in awhile), and the results are pretty dramatic. Even on the restricted diet I still have problems if I have to sit in a meeting after lunch, however.
I have had this problem (is it really a social problem? oh those day people!.. they want you awake all day – LOL). I get very tired and sleepy 5 to 10 minutes after eating and want to sleep. When I can sleep (I only work 3 days a week) then I do, and it is the most restfull sleep ever. I sleep better after eating and it’s a GOOD sleep. For the most part it’s been with me all my life; changing diet never altered the eat/tired process at all. If I have to work during the day, I simply do not eat in the morning, and have a yogurt or light lunch. Not eating all day and eating well at night hasn’t harmed my health. Sleeping after eating hasn’t harmed my health. I think it’s normal for some people. Hip Hip Hurrah for us! We’re an odd bunch maybe, but if we’d just quit worrying about it and enjoy our oddities, all would be fine… wouldn’t it?
Oh BTW, I’m 57 and for those that think coffee or tea can help.. haha, I can have two cups with dinner and nod off immediately afterward.
How did radio active iodine fallout interfere with your system? I, too lived near the test site in Las Vegas in the early fifty’s.
Paula.. I just read your post. Yes, I am hypothyroid, always have been and take levothyroxine or whatever fad suppliment the doctors have deemed best this year! Euthroid, synthroid… etc, armour, the combo T3/T4 pills whatever… I’ve had hypothyroidism all my life, keep a pretty close check on the levels by testing, and think it was caused by nuclear testing (radioactive Iodine fallout) around Nevada/Utah in the 1950’s where I lived as a child.
Ok, I feel like a real post-hogger, this’ll be my last post, I promise. There’s a cool site to determine your exposure to fallout from nuclear testing in the USA depending on where you lived during certain periods — http://ntsi131.nci.nih.gov/default.asp — (after 1971 there is no risk of exposure) You’d be surprized how much of it drifted off into other states.
I also fall asleep after eating. I am an insulin dependent diabetic and thought it had something to do with my diabetes. I have been falling asleep between one and three hours after I eat since I was 13. All of my doctors just tell me “oh everyone needs a nap”. I even had one doctor tell me I better stop telling people about it or someone might take my driver’s license away. I am about to graduate from nursing school and don’t want this problem to affect my work life. When I pass out, I could be asleep for hours and when i wake up my blood sugar is really high and I feel nauseated, heavy and I have a metallic taste in my mouth. For the longest time I thought I was having seizures, but that was recently ruled out as was narcolepsy. I have never fallen asleep driving, but I fall asleep in every single one of my classes, anytime I am sitting down reading or even charting during my clinical hours. I feel like I need a babysitter to keep me awake and to keep me from killing one of my patients by sleeping on the job. I am so glad I found this site, but I wish I knew a way to help myself. I have to eat carbs to keep my blood sugar up. And i also have to eat three meals a day so not eating is not an option for me. If anyone comes across any ideas please post them. I am starting to feel like I went to four years of college for a job I can’t work.
I’ve had this problem too. The ONLY time the sleepiness disappeared was when I was on the Atkins (or any low-carb) diet. It was the most amazing feeling ever! I had energy throughout the entire day. It was sooo nice to be able to eat without falling asleep or feeling sluggish. It definitely has to do with the carby foods.
I’ve had this problem too. It does not matter what I eat how much I eat or when I eat. I usually never make it through a meal because its like i black out while eating……no alcohol or drugs involved. I just notice getting sleepy while eating next thing i remmber is waking up in my plate or if laying on couch eating snack food still in my hand example…..apple, popcorn, cookie or carrots doest matter. If I am out in public the urge becomes so great to sleep and my eyes so heavy i can fall asleep standing up. If I feel it coming on and try and force myself to stay awake it becomes physically painful and I loose the battle anyway. I used to be a nurse. Very diet oriented so I know Its not eating the wrong thing. Its just the act of eating. I have suffered from this for many years im 43 now and its just getting worse. I have had many tests een been put into hospital for a week of observation ect and that cant figure out why. Its a very scarey feeling knwing you are going to go into a coma like state if you eat and not have any recall. I dont eat out or during day if by myself or have to drive socialize ect. It has affected every part of my life. I have seen many specialists. I am lucky i one aspect the have not given up they keep trying to get to root of problem……Hopefully someday…..GOODLUCK TO YOU ALL
Sue, I can’t make it through some meals either. Sometimes I have to leave the table because I get so drugged feeling. I can’t find a similarity to what I eat and the times it happens. Usually it is at evening meal but I eat dainty in earlier hours. I wanted to give you my email if thats allowed heartwoman1@hotmail.com. Would love to see what else we share. I can’t find hardly anything on the web about it. It hasn’t always been a problem. I do have joint pain and muscle pain. Hope we can connect.
A problem so embarrassing when I would eat out with friends. After the meal. we would be having a leisurely coffee while talking about things and then my chin would fall down. my eyes would close…my friends would wake me 15 minutes later with “Time to go, time to go.”
After medical tests, the doctor diagnosed “sleep apnea”. The treatment is well documented on the web.It’s worth trying.It helped a lot!
I am so happy I found this website because now I don’t feel so alone. Over the months, almost passing out with fork in hand has become progressively worse. I’ve had my thyroid checked, blood work done, CT Scan, all came back perfectly normal. Dr. kept putting me on different anti-depressants which was only making me sleep more. I went from sleeping about 12 hours a day to 18 hours a day! I kept telling Dr. that I didn’t feel depressed, but I felt SICK ….like someone would just drain the blood from my body. I get so tired after I eat that I literally can’t hold my head up. I can feel it hit me and I know I have about 10 minutes……then I pass out and wake up feeling like I’ve been in a month long drug-induced coma. Sometimes I can wake up, eat…..and I’m out again. Not for a few minutes, but sometimes 6 hours later! I just caught on a few weeks ago that what I eat has been the problem. Now I barely eat and I feel great..but I’m STARVING! Seems carbs make it way worse. I have not worked in 2 months because of this. My sleep pattern is wrecked! Hope to find the real problem soon. Good luck to you all!
I have this problem too. It started about 7 years ago. I become exhausted before my 30 min lunch is over. I know it is diet related because I don’t always eat at the same time, due to my job, but it is a given it will happen. I mean my body feels like a ton of bricks and my brain just shuts down. I have been dx’d with narcolepsy and hypopnea, and also gastroparesis and insomnia! What a blend huh? I have tried taking foods out, putting others in, no results. So for now, I drink a slim fast and starve the rest of the day! Good luck to everybody!!!!
I have a similar problem. I have become scared to go out to eat lately.Instead of feeling like I’m falling asleep though I feel like I could really black out. I have to stop eating immediately (even if I am still hungry) and just sit there. I can’t talk or hold a conversation because I feel like I’m on the verge of blacking out. I have been diagnosed with orthostatic intolerance. ( Slow return of blood flow when I stand up) etc. and some of the info I’ve read say that people with this condition must eat small meals because the blood goes to you stomach when you are eating and trying to digest and that takes away from what is available to go back to your head and other organs. I don’t know if this is the same thing or something different. But it is scary and annoying and frustrating.
does anyone else feel like they might have a seizure or black out? not just a sleepy feeling. I have not had a seizure but I feel like it has been right on the verge of one. It is a miserable feeling.
I’ve suffered off and on with the apres-meal sleepiness issue for decades. I also frequently feel weak, irritable, and just sort of overall “strange” and “light” before a meal on some occasions if I have not eaten for several hours. Not sure how to describe “light” other than I don’t feel strong but rather sort of “wobbly”, and I don’t “feel” the blood pumping throguh me, and I feel ever-so-slightly off balance, things like that. In the worst cases, I would even say I am in effect almost an entirely different person/personality before I eat than after. At times a meal has made me feel like I have been drugged — with something powerful enough to put me out. I believe for me it is very likely an issue of blood sugar, though I was tested a couple of times many years ago and I seemed to be in the normal range, but not optimal. I notice it gets worse in the winter when I spend much more time indoors and inactive, eating more unhealthy food. I’ve been having definite sleepiness problems after eating recently, so I changed to eat only salads, lean protein and vegetables, and I have NO sugary sweet stuff. I also take long walks whenever I can. I already feel better after only 3 or 4 days — not great, but a bit better. The problem is that once I get to feeling better I tend to go back to my old ways of lots of sweets and snacks and little exercise, and the cycle starts over. My advice to every single one of you who does not know of a specific problem and is experimenting with self-treatment — Try this – very limited amounts of processed carbs and sweets (including white bread, pasta, etc.), lots of lean protein, and decent amounts of fruits and vegetables. And, a lot of exercise. I don’t mean strenuous exercise. I suggest doing something much less strenuous, but do it for a lengthy period of time. Long leisurely walks work wonders for me, and I can even make it intense if I want to do so. Coincidentally, I’m writing this 30 – 60 minutes after I ate lunch today, which was a “big salad” (a la Elaine Bennis), and I have felt only a little drowsiness. Everyone has different biochemistry, and with food allergies, celiac, diabetes – and I’m sure there a multitude of other ailments – it is so tough to know what is going on with oneself and how to treat it. I think you start with the the basics – diet and exercise – and go from there.
Hi;
It is so good to meet people who are experiencing this. I am self-employed so this falling to sleep after I eat is costly in terms of time management. I sometimes fall asleep while I’m chewing and can sleep for a many as 3 or 4 hours. I do much better if I don’t eat. If I am facilitating a weekend treat _ Friday thru Sunday – I just don’t eat. When I don’t eat, my energy is high and my thinking is sharp but food drag me and puts me to sleep. It more like a drug. I’ve slept in my computer chair for a many as 8 hours, If during that time, I wake up, I can’t get up and go to be because I am in such a state of sleep. I never know what foods are going to trigger the sleepiness. I eat. I’m awake then I’m sleep. Most of the time there is no warning – not time to transition. I go from one state to the other. It use to be related to just carbohydrates but now it everything. I’v been a non-meat eating vegetarian for 30 years. I’ve done raw foods. Anyway, just talking this with you is so helpful. Thanks! Have a good day.
Take care
Y
“ask for a blood test for antigliadin antibodies”
I took this test and it came back high. There is a possibility I have Celiacs. The next step was a biopsy of my small intestine OR stop eating gluten. I chose to stop eating gluten. This is my second day gluten/wheat free. I still had two crashes today, breakfast and lunch. Should I see a difference yet?
-J
Hi J;
I joined this celiac group. As a result, I stopped eating wheat and gluten but after a few days, I was falling to sleep after meals. I think its because many of the gluten free-wheat free foods are high in carbs and sugar. Much of the sugar is natural but my body doesn’t seem to make the distinction, I feeling pretty discouraged this morning because I had a reaction to food yesterday and I am feeling the effects now which is means I’m not getting much done.
I never had the test. My last name is “uninsured.” The people in the group who’d had the test, still had to figure out how to manage their diets. I’m not putting the test down. I’m just saying it seems not to be definitive. I’m really sick of this. Thanks for lending your ears.
Have a good day. Take care
Y
In my opinion, most eat-and-sleep disorder is caused by adrenal fatigue syndrome. Adrenal insufficiency can express itself in many ways. Many of the related symptoms and conditions described by other posters on this site are no doubt related to a common underlying cause. The adrenals can affect other glands, emotions, immunity, digestion and many other organs and functions. I have read that the most under-diagnosed condition is adrenal insufficiency. If that is not true, it must be close. When adrenal insufficiency becomes severe it is called Addison’s disease. When I was 12 my godfather was sitting on the floor in pain. I asked him what was wrong and he rubbed his back and said he hurt there. And I said ” oh, the problem is your Kidneys”, and he said, “no, higher.” I said, “What’s there?” He said, “The adrenal glands.” But his doctor did tests and found nothing wrong, and he did not know what to do. So I got on the phone later and talked to a man at the health food store and told him the story and the man told me my godfather had Addison’s disease and recommended a naturopath. He also recommended lots of potassium. I told my godfather. His wife gave him bannanas. Not long after he shot himself dead. One cannot treat Addison’s disease with bannanas. And one cannot always trust what the doctor tested for, or how he read the results, or how accurate the test is for all of the many, many adrenal hormones. There are hormones still being discovered. Endecrinology is complicated.
hope this info is helpful
scott
I am 63 and this condition is relatively new with me, starting a year or two ago, but now has become chronic. I don’t just get sleepy after eating, I literally feel drugged, weak, and totally exhausted and unable to function and MUST lie down. And I sleep for anywhere from 2-3 hours, and although I get up, I remain sleepy for the rest of the day. I have fibromyalgia and thought possible this might be chronic fatigue syndrom. This is really interfering with my life as I have things to do. And in all honesty, it can be dangerous when driving, etc. I have had to pull over and sleep because I literally can’t stay awake. It is embarrassing and people think I’m lazy!!! I’ve tried B12 and chromium, drinking strong coffee, and considered asking my doctor for diet pills because they rev up your metabolism. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Carolyn
I, too, have something of the sort. its awful. After I eat (as all of you) I become COMPLETELY exhausted, like a total fog over my brain and body. I can barely walk, I stumble into things, and my eyes involuntarily close. It isnt “tired” its like…a complete and total body sedation. Its so debilitating. So if I dont eat all day, I’m shaky and my heart pounds, but at least I can move. Later in the evening it seems I can eat a huge meal if I like with mostly just the tired symptoms that comes as expected with eating alot of food. I honestly dont know what to do. And I know it isn’t my thyroid or blood sugar level, as I’ve had those tested. Oh god.
I have a thyroid complaint. “Hashimoto'” which means a form of autoimmune hypothyroidism. The body’s antibodies destroy the thyroid.
It is found by testing the thyroid antiboidies in the blood. When tested mine were very high but my TSH, thryoid stimulating hormone, test were so called “normal” for along time. I am on 175mm Levoythyroxine and have a high T4 and an abnormally low TSH and T3 and feel fine normally but sometimes get a feeling of weakness in the legs and tiredness after eating.
My diabetes tests are OK. Sometimes it is relieved by eating a cracker.
My Doctor says all my tests are OK but I wondered if it could be anything to do with the adrenals. I do take corticosteroids sometimes for my asthmas and wondered if there could be a connection. Does anyone out there know if there is a connection?
Do not eat wheat! There is a connection between thyroid antibodies and wheat if you have Hashimoto’s. Coffee can be a problem for some Hashi’s patients, too. Hope this helps! 🙂
So, starting off i would like to say what everyone else says. I have the same problem. I am 21 years old, weigh 155, workout at least 3 times a week(running 3 miles at least), am 5’10”, and i have a time consuming lifestyle but manage to get 8 hours of sleep a night. So here are the symptoms
Mojor:
Exhaustion 15-60 min after I eat.
Headache and drowsiness
excessive fatigue
migraines
Minor:
anxiety
increased sex drive
inability to think clearly
mood swings
depression
dizziness
poor memory
muscle weakness
irritability
Now to make this clear, the symptoms that I really want to get rid of are the Major symptoms. I believe more than anything that this is a sleeping disorder, because I haven’t been able to get a regular nights sleep since i was 13 and I am now 21. Also its not that I dont get enough sleep, but when I don’t get enough, then the fatigue kicks in twice as hard.
What I have found is that I can eat anything and not have any symptoms if i eat it and have a beer with it. I have no idea why but whenever I have to stay awake and dont have the time to be physically active then having a beer will help me with that. also coffee doesnt work but rockstar and enviga do work. Coffee actually makes the situation ten times worse and no matter what…15 min after i have even the smallest amount of coffee i feel like complete shit.
For me I have found that the Remedies for this condition are
beer(only if it is late and you are hungry)
enviga(is addictive)
rockstar(is addictive)
The reason why I am posting is because I am looking for other possible remedies that are not alcoholic or addictive. And for anyone who wants to change their diet, all you need are proteins and carbohydrates. Any extra calories are the calories that put you asleep.
PS. Thanksgiving sucks…two years ago i slept for 46 hours out of 48. For the two hours i was awake, i was eating.
Hi guys,
I have had a similar problem for a few years however not as severe as what some of you are experiencing. About 6 months ago, I visited a Naturopath to begin a weight loss program and she explained to me how when we eat a lot of carbs our insulin levels drop and therefore become tired. By cutting down on my carb intake (no bread, pasta, etc) and only ate carbs through fruit and veg, and eating Low GI foods, this dramatically helped my tiredness after eating, esp in the afternoons. Perhaps visit a Naturpath and discuss this with them further. Regular Dr’s don’t really get into this as much as its not “standard medicine”! Having said this tho, I still have a problem of feeling extremely sleepy when reading a book (I can only get through a max of 2 chapters) or when I am driving long distance! Any suggestions? Thanks…..and Good Luck!
well, same as everyone, I too get tired after eating.
Diagnosed w/ Celiac 5 years ago but didn’t follow gluten free diet completely, just some.
Gained about 15 lbs in a year.
Re-diagnosed, now have followed GF diet completely.
Gained 10 MORE lbs in the last year.
Thyroid problems? Maybe. Getting checked next week.
I’ve had this problem for a long time. My strategy for dealing with it is to take a micro-nap. I’ve found that if I close my eyes for no more than 7 minutes–in fact, as long as I pass into a real “sleep” state, which can take as little as two or three minutes–I can then function at full capacity another six to eight hours. I can usually snap awake after a micro-dream on my own but I also set a cell-phone or wristwatch alarm to ensure I don’t go into deep sleep. Anyway, that seems to reset my sleep clock or flush the insulin or whatever. Try it, I swear by it.
For a while I found that a very brief nap would help … as you say, it ‘resets’ the sleep or insulin thing. In past years I spent many hours typing while sitting on the couch, so if I even lay down for a few minutes it would somehow freshen my brain.
I do the same – unless I’m actually sleep deprived (as in, have got less than about 6-7hrs the night before) this tends to work for me too. If I’m actually tired as *well* as eating, then I can be out for hours. It’s all so inconvenient though!
But I must say, finding this thread has made me feel a lot better. My friends and family all seem to think I’m weak, lazy, or they say, “Oh, I get tired too,” but they don’t understand that it’s not just feeling a bit tired! Anyway, I need say no more; you all understand the feeling I mean!
Would be nice to know a cure though. I find that I fall asleep no matter what kind of food I eat – bread, fruit, veg, meat…
HI, I’ve been reading this after going to my Docs. She’s quite helpful but has absolutely no interest in even discussing the food aspects of any health issues I might have.
I had this problem on and off in big long bouts for nearly 30 years.
Tested for Narcolespy and told I was mildly depressed. Told them to stuff that diagnosis (as it was in the days of that being preceived as a ‘mental disease’)
Would fall asleep after going to the works canteen and reduced problem by not eating there at lunch. Did spend a few evenings watching video credits with the boyfiend and falling asleep after a meant to be romantic meal.
Was ‘diagnosed’ as sub-clinical underactive thyroid and the medication worked well apart from the weight gain I was suffering.
This bout has been around for about a month but I have just twigged that it coincided with a bout of bad gas. I have been meaning to get some lactobaccillus sporengei but it was out of stock. I gave in an bought some Yakult today as a stop gap even though I get mild arthritis flare ups in my finger joints.
Reading the comments on Candida and the energy needed to digest food, I am hoping that my problem is actually an absorbtion issue.
Maybe I am not absorbing the right stuff as my gut flora is out of wack and I need to strip my body of stuff to deal with digestion and it is too slow to allow my body to regulate insulin properly.
I rarely eat gluten, carbs alone and can get the problem with a plain bowl of salad.
Off to do a week’s testing. Thanks for all the posting of symptoms everyone. If I don’t fix this the medical profession have no chance, bless ’em.
Got same problem here… so bad that I can barely finish a meal without crashing out… especially if it carb-rich… Biggest difficulty for me is that I have Borderline Personality Disorder, so when that post-eating slump hits my mood just goes through the floor… It’s having such a really bad effect on my life…. Tried pretty much everything, but the only thing that works is not eating.
Hi all, for me, I have the same condition.. fall asleep about 1 hr after eating. I have been allergy tested and my falling asleep coorlates to my being allergic to certain foods.. a lot of them. It is very hard to avoid everything that I am allergic to (milk, wheat, soy, and many other foods. Good luck..
I too have been experiencing all of the symptoms described by all of you. I get so tired and the brain fog drives me crazy. Doctors don’t have a clue these days. I was extremely fatigued today after eating brown rice and red kidney bean caserole. No gluten or wheat!!!! Was so incredibly tired. A soon as I ate my dinner I perked up enormously. Any suggestions as to what this could be?
Same thing happens to me! Brown rice is the second worst culprit besides gluten.
I am so glad that I found you all. I am also fatigue and sleepy after meals, specially when I eat breads or sugar. So, I eat it only on weekends when I have time for a nap.
Years ego I tried cleansing diet, that lasted 25 days, and then after loosing 26 lbs, I felt like 20 years old again (I was about 42). I could run tree flies of stairs and my body felt so “clean.” The diet was very hard to stick to, but I did it. For breakfast I had only fruits (the simple sugars provide quit energy), for lunch starches (like brown rise) and leafy greens, and for supper, again leafy greens with protein (salmon or tofu). Nothing from animals; no dairy, no eggs, no meat, no spices, no tea or coffee. All the fruits and veggies are organic. Everything was steamed, not cooked. It doesn’t have any taste but it is only 25 days. And of course 64 oz per day – water. Nothing processed or refined. At the beginning I was hungry most of the time, but after a week or so, my body adjusted, and it was OK. Also I did yoga, and some Japanese stretching.
After 25 days, you can add spices, onion, garlic, herb or green tea, and some coffee, but stay away from processed foods, and non-organic produce. Also remember, the meats and the produce in the supermarkets are full of chemicals and all of it changes our bio-chemistry. So, all the problems that you mentioned, with neurotransmitters, hormones, enzymes, are strongly connected with chemicals that we eat, and at the same time we alter our bio-chemical balance. Once we out of balance then all the allergies start affecting our health. If you stop here for a second, and think that we are a part of nature, don’t you believe that we should be in harmony with it? If so, why so many people are allergic to natural things (pets hairs, feathers, pollen)? We should be allergic to chemicals that are in processed food, or all the plastics, polyesters and similar artificial products that are surrounding us. If prehistoric people would suffer similar allergies, we wouldn’t be here.
This diet is hard, and I am thinking about doing this again, but with my family it is even harder, because they expect traditional home cooked meals. We are eating as good as possible, none of my family members have any allergy but still there are some things that we should eliminate from our diet. Unfortunately we are weak, and bad habits take over very often.
I hope that finding you all will give me the strength to start this diet again, and then I will let you know if it worked.
Pills are easy quick fix, but I am afraid, that while fixing one problem they create another.
Hey, I just found this thread doing a google search after my noon hour “nap”. It seems at least 50 other people in the world have the same problem as I do. 15-20 minutes after eating (doesn’t matter what it is I eat) I find myself literally passing out. It’s like I’m drugged.
I’ve had this problem steadily for the past 10 years or so. It’s cost me jobs. It’s nearly caused me car accidents. It probably contributed to the break-up of more than a few relationships. My kids get frustrated with me. I get frustrated with myself as I only see them a few hours a week and a lot of that time I’m sitting there on the couch sleepy, dopey, or just plain out cold. I don’t want to do things with them when I’m like that, all I want to do is sleep. Then later after they’re gone home to their mom’s again, I feel terrible, like I wasted pressure hours. Yet it’s not my fault, is it?
I’ve had all kinds of tests done, from sleep tests to diabetes. The sleep tests came back normal. The diabetes test showed me with slightly high blood sugar, but the doctor recommended me to control it with regular exercise. I’m not even on insulin.
There seems to be an awful lot of suggestions here though, some of them contradictory. The one suggestion I read seems to be what’s going on with me–insulin resistance. I did a search on that and it seems to be exactly what’s happening. All the symptoms are there. I am overweight by about 50 lbs or so (possibly as a result of this condition as well as aggrivating it).
What I noticed really helps is keeping active. Keep moving after you eat. Keep on your feet. Go for a walk. The sleepiness hits hardest as soon as I sit down, whether it’s to watch a movie, work on the computer, or drive my car. If I avoid sitting, I’m not overwhelmed by it as much. I need to get out for walks, at least half an hour a day. I need to build muscle and lose fat so that the sugar I take in doesn’t “drug me”. It takes discipline to get into a diet and exercise plan, but the frustration of having pieces of my life stolen from me with excessive fatigue will build my determination.
Wish me luck.
One thing I have found helpful is when eating carbs such as breads or pastas (which are what bother me) also drinking a water that is spiked with extra oxygen. You can get them at a lot of health food stores now. There are several different brands but the one I like has 10 times the oxygen one normally finds in water. The best are in glass bottles as that is suppose to cause them to hold the oxygen better than if they are in plastic bottles. Try it once and see if it helps.
I have suffered from extreme tiredness in the past, especially if I ate carbohydrates lunch time, I would often just go back to bed and sleep all afternoon. I had blood tests at the doctors but nothing was wrong, even though my mother and sister have an underactive thyroid which causes fatigue and weight gain, I apparently haven’t got that. So I went to a private clinic in London to have other blood tests because I started reading alot of health books especially by Patrick Holford who specialises in health. The clinic I went to took blood tests for vitamin concentrations in my blood and it was found that I was severely lacking in B Vitamins (which are the energy vitamins) and Zinc also I had seratonin tests which were low. So I was advised to take a great deal of the lacking Vitamins so now I do, I take 100 grammes to 200 grammes of all the B Vitamins every day plus a very good multi Vitamin, plus 5 HTP for seratonin, all these extra potent Vitamins I got from Holland and Barrett or ordered from the net, but you should look at Patrick Holfords web site because you can order from links with his site. Anyway I have alot more energy now and never go back to bed in the afternoon, I also try not to eat carbohydrates lunch time. B Vitamins are robbed from the body if you have alot of stress or drink too much alcohol and there are alot of other things that take B Vitamins out of the body like the contraceptive pill and smoking. For everyone out there who gets tired alot of the time like I was I really recommend doing a thorough research on these vitamins and having blood tests through clinics that specialise in these type of blood tests. Also drinking alot of water can give you more energy, if you are tired try drinking a couple of pints of cold water, it could be that you are dehydrated, this also causes fatigue.
Best wishes
Ann
Wow love your post because i think thats my next step if these blod tests im waiting for come back negative.
My tiredness/ exhaustion isnnt only food related but food definitely agravates it and im not happy wth diagnosis of fybro myalgia or chronic fatigue.
It annoys me that doctors wont just do a full test straight away, ive suggested it a couple times.
i also get fairly chronic muscle pain aswell but it comes and goes in severity.
irons fine, im fairly slim, no rheumatoid factor, no diabetes, i have an active job and im fit- so i think a lot of ppl here have different factors causing their tiredness, i just wish we could figure out what!!
my ENA levels and any trace of glandular fever are being tested atm since i tested positive for the ANA blood test
Thank goodness I’m not alone with this! Just surfaced after a bowl of cornflakes sent me semi- concious for the last hour & half. I’m 44 and have suffered with this since childhood. As a child I had a raging thirst, particularly after carbs, then after school lunch would be feeling semi concious and totally unable to do anything other than doze off or stagger to the drinking fountain. All tests for diabetes and throid problems came back negative. I’ve always struggled to lose weight, resorting to a bowl of greens a day in order to keep in shape when air hostessing and after a candida diagnosis in my late 20s, embraced the whole alternative route, with radical changes to my diet including cutting out dairy wheat etc and sticking to a low sugar diet. This worked for a bit, but any stress or viral illnesses and back to square one. I’ve had endoscopies, a hydrogen test at Addenbrooks (they give you a sugar solution and measure the hydrogen levels throughout the afternoon. Mine were off the scale ( and that was on a day when I was feeling good!) There can be an anti social element to this (if you know what I mean!!) and my stomach often burns. I see a resonance homeopath and have spent a fortune just trying to maintain a reasonable state of health – frustrating as in many other ways i’m as strong as an ox and was a keen horsewoman, with my own horses which i am now having to contemplate giving up as when i’m well i can cope, but its sheer hell trying to cope at times like this. 6 years ago I was also diagnosed with fybromyalgia – interested to see this seems to be a fairly common component of this problem. It seems to point to a malabsorbtion or metabolic insufficiency which means the whole chemical process is faulty and food is not being absorbed or used correctly hence sleepiness, muscle pain, bloating etc. Surely some enlightened doctor must be working on this – one shouldn’t have to starve in order to feel well! Any advice would be gratefully received!
HI. I see I’m not alone. My sleepy feeling after eating wasn’t always like this until 3 yrs ago. I noticed after eating cereal, drinking milk that I’ll get this dizzy feeling, headache, weakness and extremely fatigue. To the point I would have to lay down. I would fall asleep and wake up refreshed. The sleepy feelings(along with the other symptoms) would come on after 10-15 of eating foods such as the ones above and oatmeal, cheese, fried foods. But mostly it seems like it will happen worse with foods with milk like cakes or starchy foods like pasta. I can’t even eat these things anymore. My Dr. is clueless. Then why is she a DOCTOR THEN. After reading stories from this blog, I have a better chance at solving this problem with or without my Dr.’s help. I am so glad this blog is up here. I feel better already knowing that I’m not alone in this. I am going to try that Gluten free diet that was posted on here and I will be back to let You all know if it worked for me. Thanks again for the site.
I have had this issue since I can remember (45 now). It has profoundly affected my life. I get extreme, unpleasant fatigue starting with breakfast (after having felt great upon waking up). It feels like I have lost my legs, I feel spaced out, exhausted and I feel a heaviness in the blood. Doctors say my blood work is excellent. I’ve tried different diets but I’m still not sure what the problem is. Definitely feel better without caffeine. I at first though it may be gluten (and dairy) but then some of the very worst offenders for me were gluten free grains (like quinoa or buckwheat). Oatmeal for me is really bad too. I “solved” my problem like many others here by fasting 3/4 of the day. This is really no solution as one does start to get hungry after a while and its easy to binge. I think the only solution is to just test food individually and gauge the reaction and create a diet from that. For me it seems any kind of grain will trigger a crash except for rice but rice doesnt agree with me for other reasons. The worst grains for me are the ones without gluten. Potatoes dont give me this effect as long as I dont eat too many. Sweet potatoes and high natural fructose foods will also crash me. And then sometimes eggs or too much fat makes me feel crappy too..I don’t know maybe its food allergies combined with some type of carb intolerance – but its not all carbs – soda, which I don’t drink much of for example, doesn’t crash me at all. No problem at all with sucrose or HCFS (however natural fructose from fruit or fruit juice gives me hypoglycemia).
Hi Guys,
Thank you for sharing. I suffer the same.
Today I almost went to sleep driving after eating just 5 minutes earlier.
Finding this site lets me know that I am not alone. I have lost relationships and spent thousands of dollars in my attempts to get better.
Thank you for letting me know that I am not alone and that it is not “all in my head”
Nadira
This is Nadira again. I forgot to share with you what seems to work for me. This is truly experimental experiences. Two Hoodia gel caps with meals seem to help me stay alert and lose weight. Also a product call MiracleBurn with hoodia and patented advantra Z seems to work if I take it first thing in the morning before meals. The address for this is as follows:
ExcellNow, LLC
302A West 12th St. #276
New York, NY 10014
http://www.miracleburn.com
The medical doctor wants to put me on Provigil. I rather use the holistic protocol vs. the chemical medicines which seem to simply create another disease called “side effects.”
Hope this helps someone. Glad you are there.
Oh my gosh, its nice to finally see that I haven’t went entirely insane. I have suffered with the exact same problem for about 10 years now. It has really become very bad in the last 2 years. I read every one of these post and just kept saying to myself “That’s exactly what I do.” I find after eating I fall asleep. It doesn’t matter what I eat. I can eat a full course meal, or simply a bit of a saltine cracker and out like a light I go for 15 minutes to an hour. Then I am full of energy until another morsel of food or a drink hits my tummy and it all starts over again. I find that after I eat I am not physical tired, just sleepy. So sleepy that no matter what I do I can’t stay awake. I just have to lay down and snooze for a few. I laughed at the post about the woman going to the toilet because I thought “Oh my, someone must have noticed me sneaking off to the restroom everyday at work.” I just sit there on the potty for 15 minutes so I can snooze and make it through the other half of the day. It has come down to me just having to not eat all day until I am at home so I can sleep. The weight gain has taken a dramatic affect on me. I have gained about 100 lbs in the last year or so.
Only time I had control of this problem was when I was taking a prescription diet pill. I would take the pill in the morning be able to eat an orange in the afternoon and then eat a healthy supper and still be full of energy at 3 a.m. the next morning. Lost about 100 lbs. on the pill, but also became very sick. Started having lots of heart problems, even think I had a mild stroke. So off the pills I came, and back to the sleepy after eating problem. Only thing I have found is that if I do eat, then I make myself sick after eating, I don’t get sleepy. But thats another problem within itself so I just deal with the sleepiness. I get so tired of being sleepy. Does that make sense to anyone else with this problem. Your not really tired physically but just sleepy.
I just wish that the doctors would take us seriously when we say something is wrong. I think my family has just decided that I am a nut case. I am so depressed from all of this. I am just sitting back sleeping while my children are growing up. I just wished I had the energy to get up and do something with them. I am fine if I just give up food for the day. But then by night I am so out of energy from not eating all day long, that I start having dizzy spells and blacking out from lack of nutrients after a day or two.
I pray every night that God will lead me to find someone who will and can help me with this problem.
I am afraid if I don’t find help soon that I will lose another great job, and end up being so over weight that I will be an embarrassment to my family.
Thanks for sharing everyone. Just reading the posts is very therapeutic. I’m 53 years old and my condition is just worstening. Sleep has always been just a moment away for me. But, I always thought it was because I’ve lead such a busy life and was on the gon all the time. But, now that my life has slowed down, my sleping after eating has sped up. Not good. I’m going to try the complex carb and lo……You may not believe it but I just woke up in the middle of typing. This is getting too serious. I hope my complex carbs work out. Hang in there every one. Let’s pray and keep the faith that we’ll find answers–right answers. May God bless us, one and all!
It’s absolutely normal…that is why we used to have siestas afew generations ago. So go for it!
A short light lunch, followed by a 20 minute nap, you’ll feel more refreshed and you’ll be more alert than slogging through 8 hours straight.
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn9272&feedId=online-news_rss20
Hi everyone, read through your posts and noticed no-one’s put forward the solution that solved my sleepyness. To cut a long story short I’ve suffered from this and thought it was insomnia. Spent all the time trying to treat it but now think I’ve found the solution to my problems. If this helps one person I will be delighted.
* Switch your carbohydrates to LOW GLYCEMIC INDEX foods and cut out, as much as possible, refined sugar. This is KEY, this should stop your mid-morning / mid-afternoon cravings AND you shouldn’t feel sleepy . Have a decent amount (NOT excessive) of protein in your breakfast/lunch to try and prevent a carbohydrate binge (don’t lie, we’ve all done it) – my breakfast is Tesco healthy muesli and depending how I feel I add things like nuts or fruit along with milk (all types are low GI) or yoghurt (certain yoghurts have more protein and are still low fat) – make sure you drink some water around 10mins beforehand though – you need to re-hydrate after a nights sleep and you’ll also need water to digest your lovely breakfast (some of which will be contained in the yoghurt/milk but for me personally, its not enough). If you need to snack, get some salt-free nuts or low-fat/high protein yoghurts or eggs – yes nuts are high in fat but carbs create fat if you eat them excessively on regular mid-morning binges, prime example is an office worker who’s not using up the energy the carbs are giving your bodies, it is therefore stored, as fat. Bread is probably the worst culprite for sleepyness after eating for me so I’ve cut down consumption and bought Burgen low GI bread which seems to have solved the problem. High GI foods create a larger spike in your blood sugar making you buzz initially then suffer a plateau as it returns to normal meaning you feel really sluggish and lethargic. Eating low GI foods, in my personal experience, leads to less hunger and a more slow, consistent energy release that fuels me until my next meal.
* You need carbs even if you are an office worker. You need to find your optimal amount, this will take patience but don’t go without carbs like fruit and veg and starchy products etc – you need a) the vitamens and b) the energy. The GI index is your friend, find something you like in the low (or medium at worst) range and switch it. If you are also trying to diet, only switch your foods don’t cut consumption, let your stomach be your guide. Sugars in fruit and veg are fine, it’s the manufactured/refined stuff you need to cut out, this, while not wholly responsible, is prevalent in a lot of those foods that cause sudden blood sugar spikes (and logically so). For example an apple or pear is a great mid-morning snack that (if you’re really hungry) alongside a small amount of protein like some monkey nuts will sort you out until lunch hour.
* DRINK WATER – i cannot stress this enough, I mebbe should in hindsight have put this first lol. A hydrated body is a happy body and food requires water to break down so try and drink some before a meal and only sip small amounts with a meal if required to try and speed up metabolism – more food => more water. Hydration cured my insomnia, I have probably less hours in bed but wakeup refreshed and if I wakeup mid-sleep I just drink a little water and head back to Zzz land. If you feel sleepy after a meal let it settle for 15-30mins then start water consumption until it goes away. I find easiest way to gauge hydration is a very slight yellowness to urine, anything darker and you need more H20. Any other drink with sugar like obviously soft drinks, tea/coffee with added sugar are just gona make you feel woozy so c’mon do without them – I previously didn’t like water but that was because of my constant sugar cravings so now, like breathing, it’s just natural to me.
Don’t let tiredness – after meals or whenever – ruin your life, make a pledge for at least a week but preferably a month doing these things and hopefully you’ll come out of it feeling awesome. Good luck to those with the willpower to try it. =D
Oh meant to say, that I’ve also found that if you find yourself, for whatever reason (eg. social pressure), eating sugary or high GI foods, to some extent, you can counteract this through a little exercise and water, using up the energy that it has created so you feel less sleepy – the more you’ve eaten the less chance you can counteract it obviously. Not always possible esp if you’re an office worker but a good backup plan if you need it nonetheless.
Ok — Wow — I found this simply by a reoccurring symptom and I’m amazed at the theories — “I fight sleep after eating anything” is my problem. While fighting the sleep I came here and actually perked up because my brain was turned on by the theories. So here’s another theory — Candida ..yes (but to fight the candida) Take GARLIC supplements..Garlic will kill off Yeast, and help balance the toxins. Take ACV (Apple Cider Vinegar organic) will balance out the chemicals in the body as well.
Fibromyalgic symptoms and all of the other stuff are great diagnosis’s too, however, most doctors will keep treating you with pills and ignore these painful symptoms. Then after you get off the drugs you’ll be more exhausted and fatigued.
It’s my belief also that because our meat/vegtables/water/dairy products are all being contaminated with drugs we are walking pharmeceutical time-bombs and actually getting drug doses with our meals. Kids are fresh to the market, and probably don’t have the buildup we’ve ingested through years of consumption. So — perhaps we’re more polluted and as grandma use to say — get a good physic in you (clean that colin)…get the Geritol out of the cabinet and modify your diet. As a person that gets tired from eating everything, I want to say that I also notice this more on darker and cloudier days — so Sunlight has an effect as well (hence Vitamin D and Melatonin levels). Sugar/Insulin/Fibromyalgia/Sunlight/Melotonin/VitaminD — Drugs in the water/food — boy — good luck getting in balance — I think we’ll be seeing this problem increasing for quite some time.
I’ve had the sleepiness problem for years too. Extreme sleepiness or brain fog after meals. What worked for me was the South Beach / Glycemic diet. It teaches you to blend fast burning foods with slow burning foods so you don’t get a blood sugar spike and roller coaster. In an emergency if you are getting sleepy at work, eat some protein like peanuts to snap out of it. If you can exercise more, it should help reduce your sensitivity.
Its good to read suggestions and comforting to know others are trying to find a way to prevent sleepiness. I work on managing the depression triggered by this but I have been having a hard time. Monday night I had a couple of table spoons of steamed squash, stirred fried tofu and a glass of vegetable juice. Guess what I went to sleep chewing and slept for three hours, woke up achy like I had the flu and with stiff joints. Its like being attacked by food. And it doesn’t matter what I eat. Coffee seems to be the one thing I can drink – other than water and tea – that doesn’t knock me out. I don’t eat sugar – refined or otherwise, don’t drink alcohol, no meat, pasta, potato, rice or much of anything else. A few spoons of rice or 1/2 cup of blueberries – doesn’t matter. My body does not discriminate. I eat and I sleep. Sometimes, I wake up with food still in my mouth. I weight a few pounds over 100 and am 5. 7 I have energy plus when I don’t eat. So my solution – don’t eat when I have to get stuff done. I’m self-employed so the brain fog that comes with this doesn’t help. Eating is not suppose to be complicated. But what does suppose have to do with it?
Anyway, I’m just venting – don’t have anything new to add but I do appreciate all of you because talking with people who don’t experience this is frustrating. In their caring, they offer “all you have to do” solutions. And its not that simple. I wish it were.
Have a good day everybody and take care
I too get the impression that just ANYTHING I eat is likely to trigger this. For a week or so I was eating bacon and egg for breakfast and it was fine — then suddenly I had the same effect from it.
If it involves a release of insulin, then this might relate: someone with a blood sugar problem reported that every day their system seemed to release the amount of insulin it had needed the previous day. Ie, if he had a carby lunch on Monday, then even with a non-carby lunch on Tuesday, the Tuesday insulin would match the amount it took to process the Monday lunch.
Willie Mae;
You absolutely right a siesta can be physically and psychologically restorative. But people who are so drunk with sleep 15 – 20 minutes after they eat, they can do anything but sleep are not taking a siesta. People are losing their jobs, straining their personal relations, feeling depressed because they can’t maintain a reasonable level of functioning. Its emotionally draining when you plan your day and at the end of it realize, you’ve accomplished very little because five hours of sleep was the price you paid for eating a balanced meal. I’m not suggesting that you are tying to make light of what is a very serious problem for some people. But I do think your comments reflect a lack of understanding. For those of us who struggle with this, there is nothing to “go for,”
Have a good day.
Take care
Y
Hi,
I was looking up why I’m so tired after eating and I happened upon this site. I haven’t talked to my doctor yet but thanks to you all 🙂 I now have no doubt that this is linked to my other health problems. I am severly overweight at 300 lbs, am lactose intolerant, and have a terrible case of Irritable Bowel Syndrome which tends to steer towards the other extreme end of the spectrum: diarrhea instead of constipation. Everything I eat aggravates these problems. I find it helps if I exercise some but then when I crash I crash hard and then no matter where I am I have to run for the restroom. I am a teacher and you can imagine how frustrating this is.
Falling asleep as I am reading this blog! Just ate chicken and cooked veggies and strawberry crisp for dessert. Maybe it was the sugar in the strawberry crisp. But this has never happened to me. At 47 I am now finding myself for the first time falling asleep at my desk working — always after I have eaten lunch. I drink lots of water and I exercise. I have Grave’s disease, but have had it for 10 years and it has been in control. I truly believe my reaction has something to do with the body producing Tryptophan because my drowsiness feels like it is drug-induced! I will experiment with raw food, but I haven’t found that what I eat at lunch controls my need to sleep. I will report back if I find something!
Well thanks to everyone here, I have a lot of areas to start searching. I too have problems with extreme sleepiness after eating some meals. I haven’t been able to narrow it down to one. I have been tested for thyroid and diabetes and all came back normal. I do think its allergy related though. I will feel like I’m drugged. I sometimes barely remember getting to my bed, as I lay there, I can feel whatever chemical it is being released going through my blood and I can feel my heart beating. I will go into a drugged sleep and its difficult for anyone to wake me up. I laid down Saturday evening and slept 5 hours and forced myself to get up. Luckily, it doesn’t happen every day or after every meal as some of you report but it scares me because I feel like I’m overdosing on something and I don’t know what it is. I have mentioned it to my doctor but all he did was the bloodtests and then told me they all came back normal. If I figure anything out, I’ll definately come back and tell ya all.
Recognizing the problem and finding this blog has been a help. I have noticed that many have said that food high in carbs is a culprit.Use of vitamin B and garlic pills might help. I will try the vitamin B,apple cider vinegar,garlic pills and try to cut out carbs. After having a lunch of pizza made with sugar in the sauce,I might as well have taken a handful of sleeping pills. I was knocked out for about an hour an half.
I will use the suggestions from various bloggers on this site and hopefully my situation improves.
I would like to include lettuce and tomatoes in my diet on a regular basis ,but whenever you flip the boob tube on,they are warning you against buying fruits and vegetables because of some kind of disease.
Ecoli,or whatever.
I’ve had the same problem for a very long time, since I was a little kid. The only thing that really helps me is fasting. When I fast, my energy is very good, and my thinking is very clear. The problem is is that I eventually have to eat and then I usually binge because the hunger builds. I’ve tried different types of eating schedules (5 small meals, protein with breakfast, 3 meals a day)and diets (low carb, low fat, lots of carbs).
I’ve found that lower carb generally works better but only for a short while as I find the diet horrible and after a few weeks of it I feel generally depressed. Most carbs, even so called low glycemic carbs, give me the fatigue/crash. I find oatmeal, quinoa (non gluten), buckwheat (non gluten) and wheat to be the worst and potatoes to be the least exhausting. I can’t eat fruits at all as they give me a great hunger combined with hypoglycemia – that shakey panicky cold sweat feeling but with crazy hunger.
Exercise is bad too. Gives me a ravenous appetite and usually depression within a day or two. In any case, it causes me to gain weight so I try and stay away though I like to stay active.
Coffee and caffeine as well gives me a ravenous apetite so I avoid.
This is quite interesting, since recently I am experiencing the same condition after a meal. I follow a health diet, low carbs, exercise a
few times a week, avoid process sugars( that’s the worst, puts me into sleep coma), and sleep 6-7 hours a night…I mentioned it to my doctor who claims I have nothing to worry about since I am healthy. But I have found it to be unpredictable and embarrassing, where I have to stop what I am doing and nap for 15-30 minutes, then I am full of energy again. I thought I had figured it out by removing carbs and sugars for my diet during the day, but that does not always work. Anyhow good luck! I have my physical soon and I will insist my doctor run some test this time to make a diagnosis. If my results are successful I will let you know. In the mean time be careful and like me, don’t eat and drive:)
Rick
i have this same problem
i can’t even make it up a flight of stairs
i have to lie down a good portion of the day
that was until i went 100% raw vegan
now i have so much energy i just take off
running down the street sometimes for no
reason at all 🙂
raw food saved my life
also
make sure the water you are drinking is fluoride and chlorine free
check you home water for lead and arsenic. always use a water filter.
for information on water toxins use youtube.com
type in fluoride, chlorine, lead, arsenic, drugs in water
you can also use google.com
most bottled water is just tap water
you have to make sure the bottled water you are getting is actually spring water
and try to get it in glass because plastic bottled water has plastic toxins in it which causes cancer
they actually spray a highly toxic spray onto the inside of the plastic bottle before they fill it with water
also when buying your veggies make sure they are organic
the farmers market is the best place to buy
and also make sure your meat is organic and not grain fed with pesticides or injected with hormones
they are now starting to radiate food in the usa
this kills the nutrients despite their claims it only kills a little
it also turns your food into something that resembles cancer under a microscope
best case scenario is to go raw vegan and start your own garden
watch out for putting your garden in planters or wood that is treated with anything though
it seeps into the soil and is highly toxic
Hi, miki moo, after reading all the blogs. There is one main point here. ALL SORTS OF FOODS SEEM TO CAUSE THIS. NO AMOUNT OF DIET VARIATION SEEMS TO BE THE ANSWER.!!! So – look at the broader picture. It must be something that is added to food (or water), as any food seems to affect us. But not everyday ? So you may absorb the culprit on one day and not on another. BUT I would bet that most foods contain such a lot of chemicals that we will hit them at some time of the week. I have suffered like this for years, but NOT all my life?? so somewhere along the way, something came along to cause all this. Any food can cause this problem with me, so it is not high carbs. As chocolate 70% dark – has no effect. So it’s not sugar then !
The only people who seem to have found a solution are those who have reverted to raw veg.lifestyle. So there is a BIG CLUE – lets all try to make a note of this, and see if we can find the answer. I am going to check out my water supply via Google, like miki moo suggests. Good luck everyone. Sheila
I have the same problem. I had a horrible response to foods that where high glycemic (white bread, white rice, white flour, white potatoes and white pasta). I would fall asleep anywhere because my body was decreasing in sensitivity to insulin year by year. Now 32 my condition is called PCOS which belongs to a family of metabolic issues (Syndrome X and Insulin Resistance). PCOS has some cosmetic and fertility issues linked with it (acne, facial hair, darkening of the neck, armpits, and groin to name a few) These put you at risk for major health risks. If you are gaining weight more on your upper body then realize that this is the result of excess insulin impacting the metabolic function of you major organs. Switch to eating foods that break down slow (complex low glycemic carbs). Use the list from fifty50.com to plan your meals. Shop on the outside of the store aisle because all the whole foods are found there. Try not to eat anything packaged, canned or bottled. All these things have undergone a process that preserve them for shelf life (added sugars)). Also check out http://www.insulitelabs.com because it will help you to see the value in nutritional support of your body, because your body is metabolizing sugar in a different way which impacts fat distribution.
Also a great deal of you are complaining of the same problem (men and women). We must realize that a lot of the testing that is done for insulin resistance does not properly measure how long your pancreas keeps producing insulin in order to regulate your blood glucose back to normal. The doctors take the very basic glucose tolerance testing and fasting blood glucose until one year you discover that you have Type II diabetes. Your doctor may say “you’re healthy” but only you know how horrible you really feel. Then one year they want to start you on insulin because your pancreas is overworked and can’t help you do what it is supposed to. Eating a diet rich in Omega 3’s, vegatables, low saturated meat protein, olive oils, brown rice , brown whole grain bread (limit) and no artifically sweetened things (ie splenda, equal, pink stuff, and diet drinks). My pantry is now empty. NO Prepackaged SNACKS. Opt for a protein bar. I shop for frozen and fresh everything (veggies, meats, fruits,etc.). Become a nibbler eating 3 meals and 3 (fruit veggie or yogurt snacks). Please drink your water. Commit and you will not be sorry. Long Life and Health to you.
“how long your pancreas keeps producing insulin in order to regulate your blood glucose back to normal.”
That fits with my experience. At the worst times, it seems like once the process gets triggered, then it has to run a couple of hours or so, regardless of what I do or do not eat in the meantime.
By the time it has run its course and I suddenly feel ‘clear’ — I’m hungry again.
dealing with the same thing for 2 years now . can wake up , drink a pot of coffee , get wired , eat a handful of ritz crackers and want to lay down and sleep for 3 hours 1 hour after i get up . so ieat no carbs . but i discovered something wonderful about six months ago. what ever is in a gnc mega mens tablet seems to help about 60% of the sleepiness even with eating some carbs. try it . it may work for you .
I found this discussion when Googling “fatigue after eating.” I see that some individuals simply write this problem off as being a normal reaction to eating starchy or sugary food which breaks down into tryptophan. This is the same as eating turkey on Thanksgiving or Christmas; turkey contains tryptophan, and normally everyone gets sleepy after a turkey dinner.
As logical as that explanation sounds, not all individuals become overwhelmingly fatigued after eating. I eat more or less the same types of food I have eaten for years. Yet, when I eat the same foods now, I become so fatigued I am forced to lie down—right, even breakfast, following a full night’s sleep.
One individual posted that insulin resistance, or metabolic syndrome can cause sleepiness after eating. “Many people with insulin resistance get sleepy immediately after eating a meal containing more than 20% or 30% carbohydrates” (“Symptoms of IR, #5;” Insulin Resistance; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insulin_resistance). Symptoms and features (for metabolic syndrome; “Symptoms and Features;” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolic_syndrome) are:
* Fasting hyperglycemia — diabetes mellitus type 2 or impaired fasting glucose, impaired glucose tolerance, or insulin resistance;
* High blood pressure;
* Central obesity (also known as visceral, male-pattern or apple-shaped adiposity), overweight with fat deposits mainly around the waist;
* Decreased HDL cholesterol;
* Elevated triglycerides.
Symptoms of IR (“Symptoms of IR;” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insulin_resistance) are:
1. Fatigue.
2. Brain fogginess and inability to focus. Sometimes the fatigue is physical, but often it is mental.
3. Low blood sugar. Mild, brief periods of low blood sugar are normal during the day, especially if meals are not eaten on a regular schedule; they are normally raised by mobilization of glucose into the blood from stored glycogen made from blood glucose previously taken by liver cells. But prolonged hypoglycemia, with some of the symptoms listed here, especially physical and mental fatigue, is not normal. Feeling agitated, jittery, moody, nauseous, or having a headache is common in insulin resistance, commonly with rapid relief once food is eaten.
4. Intestinal bloating. Most intestinal gas is produced from carbohydrates in the diet. Insulin resistance sufferers who eat carbohydrates sometimes suffer from gas.
5. Sleepiness. Many people with insulin resistance get sleepy immediately after eating a meal containing more than 20% or 30% carbohydrates.
6. Weight gain, fat storage, difficulty losing weight. For most people, too much weight is too much fat. The fat in IR is generally stored in and around abdominal organs in both males and females. It is currently suspected that hormonal effects from such fat are a precipitating cause of insulin resistance.
7. Increased blood triglyceride levels.
8. Increased blood pressure. Many people with hypertension are either diabetic or pre-diabetic and have elevated insulin levels due to insulin resistance. One of insulin’s effects is on arterial walls throughout the body.
9. Depression. Because of the deranged metabolism resulting from insulin resistance, psychological effects are not uncommon. Depression is said to be the prevalent psychological symptom.**
Those who have metabolic syndrome generally are “older, obese, sedentary, and have a degree of insulin resistance. Elevated blood levels of glucose — regardless of cause — leads to increased glycation of proteins with changes (only a few of which are known) in protein function throughout the body” (“Metabolic Syndrome,” Wikipedia).
“Insulin resistance is often found in people with visceral adiposity (i.e., a high degree of fatty tissue underneath the abdominal muscle wall – as distinct from subcutaneous adiposity or fat between the skin and the muscle wall), hypertension, hyperglycemia and dyslipidemia involving elevated triglycerides, small dense low-density lipoprotein (sdLDL) particles, and decreased HDL cholesterol levels” (“Insulin Resistance,” Wikipedia).
So, those who have a predisposition to Type II Diabetes, have elevated triglycerides, decreased HDL cholesterol, high blood pressure, as well as being a bit overweight are among those who experience severe fatigue following a meal. I also have a hypothyroid, and it contributes to the fatigue.
Food alone will not cause such profound sleepiness, although it will exacerbate the problem. Yesterday, after breakfast, I had to lie down because of the overwhelming fatigue, and I slept for another 2 or 3 hours! And, as I said before, that was following a full night’s sleep. My hope is that my medication that I started a few days ago for hypothyroid along with the Omacor that is taken to lower cholesterol levels will correct this problem after I have taken them long enough.
Those who are not being treated with medication should seek medical attention and proper medication. This problem is not small. It has a very real impact on one’s ability to function, and if one works outside the home, it can interfere with job performance.
I hope those of you who have this problem will seek treatment if you have not already done so. Hopefully, treatment will help us to feel closer to normal again!
Many blessings to you and yours,
Maggie
same problem as everyone… I have monkeyed with the carbs, etc, but still have the same narcoleptic tendencies after eating, large/small/anything. A 12-min. nap works pretty well to “reset” as Geedavey said, but am also experiencing ongoing decreased mental accuity & distractedness.
I’m 40 years old, good health, regular exercise, eat balanced diet, but this has been an increasing problem over the last 8-10 years.
At least the posts have given me some leads to pursue with my MD.
I have had this problem all along and I found the following:
When I take a regular breakfast like everybody else around me, I feel sleepy (zzzzzz….), Since I had milk in my breakfast Coffee, I thought I had lactose intolerance, I removed milk, still the problem did not go, I removed coffee itself, still the same, I tried to replace every food I would eat for breakfast with something else .. No result.
Then…
I started cutting the volume of the food..(Little by little …)
By now I have found a critical volume suitable for my height and weight,
which is just enough to keep me active until lunch ..(r the next Meal)
Also this volume is different for different foods (But over time I was able to approximate …)
Also the lunch had to reduced in volume too..
So I take a small snack in the evening..
and a good dinner with half of the volume replaced with fruits..
I also try to drink lot of water in between (while I am not eating..)
Occasionally I would forget my eating schedules and would spoil my brisk day..
Can any one tell me if I have a CRITICAL CALORIE BARRIER or something?
I have had this problem for years too, it really effects your life more than people realise, When I go out for dinner with friends they virtually hold a sweep stake on what time I will fall asleep. I’ve not yet sort professional help, but I do know that sugar based foods a major issue for me. Icecream, orange juice, chocolate, biscuits, cakes all have the same effect. I may be diabetic, its in my family, but reading this blog has been fascinating and now I’m not so sure. Anyway, I’m sorry I can’t offer any amazing medical cure but I agree the sentiments of most on this site and agree that Sugar is a big factor, and quantity of food is a big factor. It seems wrong to stave yourself in the day to stay awake, all the common advice seems to suggest that Breakfast is the most important meal in the day . . . sure . . . if I want to go back to bed.
Well, I’m like everyone here pretty much, but I am treated for diabetes II and it works. I still have the exact same problem for several years that has been described here. My doc now knows but doesn’t have any idea how this could be happening and within the forum there are several things I know he never thought of (although pretty exotic). Thanks to all here and if I find my cure I’ll certainly pass it on here in another comment.
I have a nephew in his mid twenties, who does not have a drowsiness nor a sleeping problem with food. Whenever he eats and after he feels irritable. He does not over eat and he has a perfect weight. Is there any information out there on this problem?
Thought I was on my own until I found this site! I can relate to almost everything written, and it has put into words all the feelings I hadn’t been able to explain to my family. If enough of us share the symptoms someone will surely come up with an answer one day … Clearly there’s a chemical reaction – it seems as if metabolism takes place too fast – and it’s linked to stress. Do others find the problem goes away when they have the flu, or are too ‘down’ to care BEFORE they eat, or if something unexpected makes them laugh, or if they’re away from ALL their responsibilities? Does feeling low after eating lead from tiredness to sleep then being irritable/angry and unreasonable? In my case this period is also accompanied by high blood pressure and a burning sensation in the stomach. Of particular interest – when practicing the only ‘solution’ (starving until at least lunchtime) – do others go through a 10-15 minute stage of constantly having to cough and clear their throat? Others may also have found that taking a small amount of sedative shortly before breakfast mostly removes the symptoms that usually follow – unfortunately you can still feel tired, but in a way that can be overcome if you keep yourself occupied. This of course isn’t according to medical advise since such products tend to be addictive! A multi vitamin tablet can work wonders in the evening, but only seems to make the problem worse if taken in the morning. The condition is linked with the depression that often follows and an anti depressant may help for a time, but I’m not convinced this is the root of the problem. Until there’s a cure the best I can recommend is to drink a can of diet cola soon after getting up, eat NOTHING before lunch and as little (protein only) as possible before the end of the day.
“Do others find the problem goes away when they have the flu ….?”
Yes! When I’m sick (usually with a sore throat) and would like to sleep, I’m wide awake all day and part of the night!
OMG! I can’t believe it/ I thought I was all alone. I have had this problem for many years. As a 32 year old mother of five this problem is not good. I have asked my doctor and his solution was “well the, don’t eat.” I don’t unless it is time for me to sleep. Coffee seems to help. However if I have eaten something I can not drink coffee. I am sitting here right now waiting to go pick up two on my children and ate a donut. I am trying to keep my eyes open. There has got to be a solution. My sixteen year old had the same problem. If he eats lunch he will fall asleep in his next class. I can not eat a thing, NOTHING, without falling asleep. This is wacked out crazy! My solution… eat nothing, drink lots of French Vanilla coffee and when I’m stuck eating pray I make it home safely to pass out.
Hi, is it possible that our food supply is contaminated (either accidentally or intentionally)? I think it’s strange that many people have either acquired the condition in the last few years or it has worsened in the last few years. It’s been about 2 years since I started having problems. I have identified a few restaurants that set me off…where i usually eat rotisserie chicken. Before I finish the meal, my pupils dilate, my eyes get glassy, my eyelids get droopy, looks like I’m on drugs to those around me, I feel stoned and drowsy. All I want to do is sleep like it’s a mission or order. I can’t hold a conversation. I can’t stay awake for anything. I get home and pass out on the couch.
This mostly happens with dinner. I usually dine out…but…
Last week, I started a diet (Nutrisystem)…I’m about 30 pounds overweight…but active. I know Nutrisystem is processed food…but you eat a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables with it. To my total surprise, I had energy all week…absolutely NO eat-sleep episodes. My knee that usually feels stiff (like an old injury) every morning, stopped hurting. I was a bit in shock at the change.
After 7 days on the system…I decided to “treat” myself by dining out at a “healthy” place last night. I had rotisserie chicken and veggies. On the way home, my partner said I was acting spacey. I had something really important to work on when I got home, I sat down in a chair…and just fell asleep with paper and calculator in my lap. Then, I moved to the couch 2 hours later. Then, my partner woke me up 3 hours later to move to the bed, where I fell back to sleep immediately and had nightmares the rest of the night. I woke up from bad dreams at 5:00am and moved back to the couch for another 2 hours. I looked like a “drunk” when I woke up…like I had a night on the town.
Anyway, I’m back on Nutrisystems today and feeling fine tonight. At least, I will be able to track my “triggers” better now that I’ve found a diet that makes me feel good.
have any of you noticed if this effect occurs more often during the day vs. the evening? i’ve learned to ameliorate this effect during the day by eating much smaller meals — 200-300 calories & avoiding sugary food/drinks. but i’ve noticed that in the evenings i can eat “normal” meals & not feel so sleepy. big meals still kill me though.
nomad
I found this wensite by researching (of course) the same problem. Although mine happens randomly and seems mostly with protein based foods when it happens. I am also a celiac and for those of you who think celiac may be an issue and want to try limiting gluten I have some advice to help.
GLUTEN-FREE ADVICE:
It may take 1-2 weeks strictly gluten free to see real results and will keep getting etter for even a few months.
The diet must be adhered to. Anye gluten intake will cause a reaction even if you don’t seem to feel to bad the next day. In other words, celiac is for life and damage you can’t see can happen to your body even with small amounts of gluten.
Wheat free does not mean gluten free. Barley and rye also contain gluten. Oatmeal should also not be used unless you buy gluten free certified oatmeal. While oats don’t contain gluten, in the US food supply they are usually contaminated in the field.
The hardest thing to do is REALLY eat gluten free. Every single can, condiment, piece of ham, etc. is suspect unless the label actually reads gluten free. If you are going to eat foods that do not have their label marked the only things you an be certain of are fresh fruit and vegetables, and non-injected, unseasoned meat, fish or poultry.
Some aexamples of hidden gluten are:
Soy sauce (usually on the label)
Canned beans (some have food starch derived from wheat as a thickener)
Frozen chicken breasts (some are injected with stuff to help retain moisture that may include proteins from wheat)
Shredded cheese (usually has an unknown starch added to prevent pieces sticking together)
Additionally even reading labels is a challenge. Items like glucose, dextrin, and vegetable protein can be derived from many sources including wheat.
If you would like to do this seriously, download a list of GF foods and gluten containing additives from a reputable Celiac site. Good sites update their lists frequently as many manufacturers change their ingedients depending on whats available.
One place you can look is the celiac forum on delphi forums http://www.delphiforums.com/
Another site is http://www.celiac.com/
Good luck to all. Keep up the research.
I also experience this extreme fatigue, loss of motivation, depression, and difficulty concentrating after eating. This problem is quite debilitating and makes it very difficult to function from day to day. Like many of the above posters, I thought it was celiac disease because I was having gastrointestinal problems (I used to have diarrhea, bloating, flatulence, and abdominal pain, but now the issue is that I have a bowel movement about once a week). However, the fatigue after eating happened even after eating foods that were clearly gluten-free, like raisins or rice pudding. Then, of course, I came across the so-called “yeast syndrome” and went on the yeast-free diet, but that didn’t do anything either. I admit that I might be a tad stressed (but honestly, who isn’t in our society?) and could certainly use a few more hours of sleep and more regular exercise (so can everyone!), but it just doesn’t seem natural to get THAT tired after eating. For some time, I alleviated the problem by eating absolutely zero carbs (e.g. turkey, lettuce, and eggs), but I got painfully constipated and thus couldn’t stick with the diet.
I have spent a lot of time researching possible causes of this problem. I’ve been worked up for a bunch of conditions that might cause such symptoms (e.g. iron-deficiency anemia, thyroid disease, diabetes), and all of the tests have come back normal. I think it’s unfair to blame doctors for not knowing the cause because the fact is that a lot remains unknown about human physiology. I am a pretty firm believer in allopathic medicine, so I try to avoid reading alternative medicine theories as much as possible. However, since Western medicine doesn’t seem to have an explanation, I have been left with no choice but to speculate.
At the moment, I wonder if mercury released from silver dental fillings are a possible explanation for this problem. I admit that this sounds pretty bizarre. After all, the majority of the anti-amalgam sites on the web seem pretty outrageous, and multiple epidemiological studies have failed to identify any risk in the use of amalgam. In my opinion, though, this theory makes sense on a few levels. First, everyone experiences this problem after eating. When you chew, mercury vapor is released from your fillings, and this release is accelerated by an increase in oral temperature (e.g. when drinking hot coffee). This release has been documented by numerous studies, and the FDA has recently agreed to caution pregnant women and children about the mercury in amalgam. Granted, the amount of mercury vapor is relatively low – that is, it’s not like putting a pool of mercury in a beaker and then breathing it. However, if the vapor is released 24 hours a day for the lifetime of the filling, theoretically the mercury could accumulate in organs like the brain, thyroid, kidney, and so on. Mercury has been associated with fatigue in general, not just after eating, so maybe it’s a possible explanation.
Of course, a good proportion of the population has amalgam fillings, and it doesn’t seem like this problem happens to everyone. In fact, a lot of people have mouths full of amalgam and seem perfectly healthy. Maybe a combination of lifestyle factors like stress, poor nutrition, and other environmental factors make certain individuals more susceptible to mercury vapor. Of course, this is all speculation, and I am by no means recommending for anyone to get their fillings removed. In fact, doing so actually releases more mercury because the dentist has to drill the filling out. Plus, if you tell your dentist that you want your fillings out for health reasons, he/she will refuse because dentists can have their licenses revoked for such practices (e.g. Hal Huggins). It is, however, something to think about.
Along the same lines, we are also constantly exposed to heavy metals thanks to industrialization. Lead, aluminum, cadmium, and other heavy metals are found everywhere from electronics to the air we breathe, and I guess they could theoretically accumulate in the body if they are not excreted. So if one is say, constipated, or has some sort of nutritional deficiency (e.g. zinc is required by more than 200 enzymes in the body, many of which function to sequester and eliminate heavy metals, e.g. metallothionein), maybe the metals can’t be excreted. So to tie this back to fatigue after eating, maybe if someone is already overloaded with heavy metals, the body can’t clear the mercury that’s released from chewing, and hence you get tired after eating.
Let me just reiterate that this is entirely speculative and might be completely wrong, but I am pretty desperate for a definitive answer, so I’m just throwing it out there to see what everyone else thinks. My alternative explanation is that it’s “all in my head.” If anyone has experienced this previously and now has figured out a way to alleviate the problem, I would greatly appreciate it if you could share with the rest of us!
Thanks SOOO much guys for posting!!! It’s nice to know there are some people out there who can relate to my experience.
After every single meal I get totally sleepy and fatigued. I am actually on 80 mg of Adderall (4 * 20mg) a day to treat this sleepiness problem and it still hasn’t helped completely. I thought this was psychological or psychiatric at first, but I am now convinced that this is definitely due to what I consume. I called my doctor today and scheduled a Celiac Disease test. If that comes negative, I’ll try to modify my carbohydrate intake. I need to find a solution to this problem b/c I can’t seen to do anything unless I don’t eat all day. Not sure what the exact problem is, but if I have any luck I will definitely re-post and let you all know. Thanks again to all of you!!!
L.S
I THINK ALL ABOVE DISCUSSED DISORDERS ARE MAINLY CAUSED BY DISRUPTION OF OUR NEUROTRANSMITTER SYSTEM .
RESEARCH SHOULD BE UNDERTAKEN IF THE CONSTANT RADIATION ,ELECTRIC AND FREQUENCIES EXPOSURES FROM WIRELESS ROUTERS ,LAPTOPS ,MOBILE PHONES ARE INTERUPTING THE NORMAL NEUROTRANSMITTING SYSTEM AND CAUSING BLOCKAGES OF OUR NEURO/ENERGY SYSTEM.
APPRECIATE READERS COMMENTS
APPIE
OK, I’m the person who wrote the crazy comment about dental fillings. After reading how ridiculous my comment seemed, I tried thinking of a more logical explanation for getting exhausted after eating. I now firmly believe that my case was a result of sleep debt. It seems like common sense, right? If you feel tired after eating, that’s because your body is telling you that you need more sleep. If you sleep for ten hours a night and still have this problem, maybe you need to be evaluated for a sleep disorder. Sleep deprivation also decreases insulin sensitivity, resulting in a surge and subsequent plummeting of blood sugar. Therefore, when you eat carbohydrates, you might get symptoms of hypo- or hyperglycemia if you are really sleep deprived, especially if you also don’t exercise regularly. As for the dental amalgam situation, I was reminded of Paracelsus’ statement, “The dose makes the poison.” That is, yes mercury is poisonous, but so is water at a high enough dose. I’m not saying sleep debt is the only explanation, but it’s definitely a good place to start.
Fred
Maybe the mercury theory is logical. For me, the problem has got worse with age. I am over 45 now. Now even if I eat grilled fish or lean chicken and vegetables, I fall asleep after 15 minutes unless I am walking around. Even if I eat NO luch at all, I fall asleep because of tiredness around 1pm, especially if I am watching TV, I switch unknowingly like a light bulb being suddenly switched off. Sometimes this happens even without the sleep debt but my body refuses to sleep more than 6-7 hours a night – this is after vigorous exercise & sunlight for an hour and carbs at night, otherwise ‘it’ (the body) sleeps less. To avoid sleep debt, i have to have a half sleeping pill after waking up at 4pm so fall asleep again and re-awake at 7 or so. I fall asleep very quickly at night but wake up after 5-7 hours even when the bladder is not full, there is no noise and a perfect a/c is in the room. Tested for everything – not even mild apnea, no blood pressure, no diabetes, both fasting and glucose response sugar levels are normal, BMI is 22 and weight steady for the last 25 years (with effort though!), good fitness (exercise every day without fail), eat very little refined carbs (and only at night!), no narcolepsy. Basically, in the morning I just have egg whites and nuts with tea, then the whole day teas, coffees and nuts (note – almonds & walnuts have good cholesterol) and one piece of grilled fish or chicken, that’s it. Eat a balanced meal at night then fall asleep on the couch watching TV. That is my life. I do have a lot of dental fillings. The sleep debt is there whether I overwork or not – even when I work much less hours with low stress or am off work this happens anyway. The GI theory helps marginally in that if I ate rice or bread at lunch the sleep would be just too uncontrollable. This problem has adversely affected my career, now I am too afraid to take a job that requires me to think hard 8am-6pm 5 days a week.
Best of luck but this our life until there is a real diagnosis. If sleep debt is the correct diagnosis, we need a cure for that!!
Have had the sleep after eat or even sleep while I eat problem for years. Doctors have no clue and suggestions have not worked like eating a little at a time several times a day. I have gotten so bad that when I start eating I wake up with my head in my plate. I get plenty of sleep so that is not the problem either.
I have suffered from this for yrs. too, and i found out that extreme fatigue was was caused by the food we eat, which causes low stomach acid, so that is what the root cause would be. So i started eating healthy such as veg and fruits and lean meat cured it for me feel alot better. So when your eating processed food and alot of spicey food or alot of sweets what it does to the body is depletes the acid in the stomach which causes low acid symptons of low stomach acid are, heartburn, gerd, stomach ulcers,one of the signs for this is alot of belching that means you have low stomach acid. Alot of doctors won’t tell you this they tell you the oppisite which is to much stomach acid so they put you on prevacid and other stomach medicine and that makes it worse cause then it depletes what acid is in your stomach.
Hope this helps, god bless you and everyone with this issue,
Fascinating to read all of these personal testimonies. I, too, have suffered from this for 11 years and for me and many of you, it’s food intolerances/allergies and/or Candida Albicans. My number one culprit is any kind of sweetened food followed by grain products (particularly whole grain wheat and oats). Fruit (fructose) is the worst offender. I also have trouble with milk (lactose), diet soda (nutrasweet/Splenda/sacarin), even Stevia. My doctor told me that if I’m having trouble with all of these sweeteners than I have Candida Albicans (overgrowth of yeast in the gut). I don’t get sleepy if I avoid these foods and eat only vegetables, meat, fish, eggs and nuts (although the mold on nuts bothers me). The problem is that I like all of the things I shouldn’t eat and it does not help my health.
I’m in this club, too. Blood tests say I’m normal, but I’m 46, and symptoms have worsened since September. I fall asleep after even the least amount of carbs. All veggies aren’t created equal, either…I can eat green beans grown in my own garden and not fall asleep, but the frozen baby green beans from the store put me to sleep, so their sugar content must be slightly higher. I’ve switched to only low Glycemic Index foods, and usually it works (not always, but enough to function normally most of the time). To slow the glycemic reaction, I try to balance every food with fiber, fat and protein, and to eat foods known to slow the absorption of insulin (peanut butter, vinegar/pickle juice, cinnamon). A study was done where people took two tbsp. of vinegar about 2 minutes before each meal, and the results confirmed that vinegar slows the glyc. reaction. I feel instantly better when I drink pickle juice straight from the bottle, and if I feel sleepiness coming on, I try to beat it by drinking pickle juice (or eating a pickle–dill, not sweet, of course!). Doesn’t always work, but it does sometimes. I also keep portions small, and just eat one kind of food at a time, with 1/2 hour or so before I eat something else (longer for protein). It means I am eating constantly, but it really helps. I take apples with me when I leave home because they seem to combat hypoglycemia without making me sleepy. In fact, I pack a full day’s supply of food when I have to leave home, including 1 or more insulated cups of tea.
I drink almost nothing except green tea all day long, with milk and agave nectar (a miracle sweetener! it’s natural, raw, made from cactus, and low on the GI). I can have a full glass of milk a day if I put a few tbsps. at a time in my tea…it adds up over the day to about a glassful. The only fruits I can eat are apples and prunes, because they are high enough in fiber that they limit their own insulin absorption. If eating food together, I eat the veggies first and then the meat, because meat takes longer to digest so it needs to stay in the stomach acid, but I keep the portions pretty small. If I have to thicken stews or gravies, I use spelt flour which is lower on the GI, but only use a little. A handful of pearl barley in soup or stew seems to be all right (barley has the lowest GI of all grains–can’t have rice in any form, or any other grain at all, not even oatmeal). It is critical to keep the bowels moving (1-3x a day), so I use ground flaxseed in everything I can. But work up to it slowly, or you’ll have a miserable month of gassiness before your bowels get used to all the extra fiber in your diet.
Here’s what works for me: Breakfast: scrambled eggs (with a little cream or cream cheese mixed in, or topped with sour cream and a spoonful of my own zucchini salsa made with agave), two strips of turkey bacon cooked very crisp (if there’s extra, I save it for a snack later). Snack: apple. Snack: 2 or 3 peanut butter truffles (high in fiber–see below for recipe). Snack: chunks of cheddar cheese. Lunch: A little bit of whatever we had for dinner the night before. Snack: celery sticks stuffed with cream cheese. Snack: pickles. Snack: more peanut butter truffles. Snack: 2 or 3 prunes. Dinner: Broccoli (about the only green veggie that doesn’t put me to sleep) with mayonnaise (full fat Hellman’s or Best Foods); homemade stew with herbs, garlic, onions & celery (can use carrots for flavor but don’t eat them) and a small amount of wine. Or Prego spaghetti sauce cooked with a lb. of hamburger and a tbsp. of red wine, served over cooked spaghetti squash. Or hamburger patties topped with cheese. Or steak/chops/pot roast/fish, etc. Dessert: Squash pie made with agave (pumpkin is too high on the GI, but blue Hubbard squash tastes better anyway, or butternut if I can’t find Hubbard), or brownies made with agave and a brownie “flour” (I make it out of whey protein powder, egg whites, flaxseed meal, etc.) and a dollop of agave-sweetened whipped cream on top. Snack: peanuts.
I am experimenting with agave in baking, and it can be substituted for honey 1 for 1, but finding substitutes for grain flours is harder. So far I only have a chocolate “flour.” Still, not bad when I thought I could never have any of this stuff again! When I have a sleep crash, I make a note of the culprit (like the beer I put in the stew once–red wine so far is fine but beer is all carbs). I also try weird things that turn out pretty good, like chopped green olives mixed with cream cheese and rolled up in romaine lettuce leaves.
Everyone is different, some can’t have dairy or eggs or other stuff due to allergies, some have gallbladder issues with fat, etc. All you can do is try one food at a time and see if it works for you, and don’t make assumptions based on previous diets (not all fat is bad–animal fats and some oils like olive, coconut, sesame, etc. are good, for example). If you’ve tried gluten free and it hasn’t worked, maybe it’s not the gluten, but rather the hidden carbs in the rice or soy flour or other gluten free ingredients. If you’ve always assumed you had an allergy/bad reaction to chocolate (unconfirmed by an allergy test), maybe it’s the sugar, not the chocolate. Use the elimination diet (start with only the things you know you CAN eat, adding one new ingredient or unprocessed food every few days, watching for reactions) and be careful. Your own acidity level could determine a lot of what you can eat (you may need to acidify or alkalinize your pH by eating a sour or basic diet–vinegar or lemon juice for some and milk or baking soda for others).
Here are a couple of recipes to try:
Chocolate Peanut Agave Truffles
2/3 cup natural (unsweetened) crunchy peanut butter
3 tbsp. flaxseed meal
4 tbsp. dry milk powder
3 tbsp. agave nectar
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. fine sea salt
1 1/2 oz. unsweetened baking chocolate, melted
2 tbsp. chopped pecans (or other nut that works for you)
unsweetened shredded coconut
Melt chocolate and mix all ingredients together. Sprinkle some extra dry milk on top until mixture is the consistency of soft fudge. Form into walnut-sized balls and roll in coconut. Cover and refrigerate (but can be left out for several hours).
Brownie “flour” substitute
2 scoops chocolate whey protein powder (unsweetened)
1 tbsp. unsweetened peanut butter
1/4 cup flaxseed meal
4 egg whites
1/4 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
Preheat oven to 350F. Spray or oil a 9×9″ pan. Mix all ingredients together and spread in pan. Bake 20 minutes or until edge starts to pull away. Remove from oven and cool for an hour. Turn oven to 200F. Cut into 1″ chunks and spread on large cookie sheet. Bake for 2 or more hours, until hard and dry. Remove from oven. When completely cool, grind chunks in food processor until flour-like consistency. Store in freezer. Makes 1 1/2 cups of chocolate “flour” substitute. Use in recipe below.
Brownies for the Sleep-prone
2 oz. unsweetened baking chocolate
1/3 cup butter
3/4 cup agave nectar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
2/3 cup “flour” substitute
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
Preheat oven to 350F. Grease 9×9 pan generously with butter.
Melt chocolate and butter. Beat eggs with agave and vanilla, and add chocolate mixture. Stir in “flour” substitute, baking powder and salt. Pour into prepared pan, and bake 25 minutes. Serve with agave-sweetened whipped cream.
Like others have said, it’s good to know I’m not the only one with these symptoms. My family has been very patient, and even likes to eat my way now, though I do cook things for them that I can’t eat. My husband asked the other day if I could make more of those peanut butter truffles, as they keep him regular (sorry, TMI), so I make them about every other day. I have to say that they seem healthier, less acne-prone, and less moody since I’ve had to change my diet, which might be what God had in mind.
Oh, and speaking of acne, I tried oil-pulling with refined sesame oil (google it for more info) as a detox regimen, and it seems to be beneficial for dental and skin health…not sure about my organs yet, but I’m sticking with it, since it’s not doing any harm and I like having whiter teeth and not having my monthly break-outs. Best wishes to you all in finding solutions that work for you.
Please everyone, check whether the food that does not affect you, came from your garden (without pesticides though) or from a supermarket. It is NOT mercury fillings, I had mine out years ago as I thought it was this, some web sites will suggest anything. WHERE DID THE FOOD COME FROM THAT YOU ATE a nd WHAT WATER DID YOU DRINK. I don’t know for sure, but feel the real answer is in that direction. I have palpitations after some foods as well. I can have one of the latte coffee that you get from coffee stalls and CRASH. I check the mix on the packages they use. !!! NEVER AGAIN. Keep trying everyone. Sheila
AAAAAAA!!! I have a similar problem! Im 28, healthy and strong. Im not a vegeterian but I hardly eat meat at all. I can eat beakfast and dinner with no problem but lunch sometimes kills me! I can bearly think at all after lunch, have no clue why this happens. Today I ate rice, beans and vegetables (and a normal serving) and 15 minutes latter I turned into a potatoe. I slept 7 and a half good hours yesterday. What the hell is this??
Cheers!
I don’t usually have this problem but today I slept 6 hours right after eating a VERY heavy meal. The meal was very high in carbohydrates and I could not concentrate after 10 minutes and fell asleep right in my chair. Maybe I just had the acute version of what many of you suffer chronically.
Good luck!
Hey guys I used to have this problem really bad and some how it’s decreased for me in the last year or so. I haven’t cured this completely but found ways to curb it short term and long, I would love to know if they work for you as well 🙂
Short term cures… ice water + lemon. One slice is usually sufficient for me. But mix according to your size and muscle mass. People with less muscles need more lemon…
Long term: Eat an orange or apple or both everyday. Make a commitement and do it. I suggest adding Kefir(a type of yogurt). Get the plain kind and mix with Milk. Tastes really creamy and kills the Candida good. Next most important thing is getting enough fresh air. I know it’s cold out there but you really need good air where you work and sleep. Excercise/workout OUTDOORS many gyms have really bad air and you will notice a difference by doing it outside. People who hate excercise, try to leave the window open and do deep abdominal breathing when you have time, but this needs to be done at least 10 min a day or longer.
The best thing that really worked for me is jogging. 10min every other day will wipe out most of the issues you’re having now. The key is to jog past the stage where your muscles feel really nasty..usually the first 3-5min, that’s most of the toxin coming out and you’ll feel really good.
I hope this helps.
Getting tired after eating is a shortage of protein. Pure and simple. Lack of protein causes all kinds of blood sugar abnormalties.
A flight attendant I know of had horrible blood sugar problems. A doctor told her to eat 7 almonds every four hours. He said to give this 2, 3 or 4 months (can’t remember now!) She took them on the plane with her and ate them religiiously every four hours. She did this everyday and when she hit month 2 or 3, it was just like the doctor said. Her blood sugar problems completely leveled out and she’s been fine ever since. Anytime your body drops you after you’ve eaten, it’s a sign you need more protein. Fasting is the worst thing you can do in a situation like this. I highly recommend to everyone the 7 almonds every 4 hours. (I think 2 hours would even be better because they tell hypoglycemics to eat every two hours.)
The best book you can read about this is the healthfood classic from the 1950’s – 70’s “Adelle Davis” “Let’s Get Well” and “Let’s Eat Right.” She says that people don’t begin to eat enough protein. Adell Davis stresses balance – not an all meat diet or all carb. She also said this cures weight loss problems. She told the overweight individual to eat all the protein rich foods they desire, meats, eggs, cheese, and other foods that provide a balance. Initially, some of the people gained weight but then two or three weeks into the program they would call her and complain that they couldn’t eat as much – and then dramatic weight loss would follow. I find it amazing that everything is stressed in the healthfood world but protein! While vegetables and fruit and grains are essential, protein is literally what keeps you going. As important as vegetables are, you don’t feel lethargic if you’ve skipped your vegetables one day but you do if you’ve skipped a meal. Adelle Davis recommends 100 plus grams a day. For people under stress 200 or more. Try counting your protein grams sometime. It’s harder than counting calories! You won’t BELIEVE how little protein you take in.
I am beginning to speculate that, at least in my case, getting exhausted after eating might be largely psychosomatic. After trying to “figure it out” for years, I have noticed that I do not get as tired if I do something fun and/or stimulating after eating. On the other hand, if I go to a boring class or try to study uninteresting material after a meal, I get an intense urge to put my head down and close my eyes. And, in fact, that is what I end up doing on many occasions, much to the chagrin of the professor or the people around me in the library being distracted by my snoring. And, like others have described, I could circumvent the problem either by not eating or by not eating any carbohydrates.
Feeling a little sleepy after eating is actually a normal physiological response. Eating naturally actives your parasympathetic nervous system, which can be functionally described as “rest and digest” (as opposed to your sympathetic nervous system, which is “fight or flight”), and therefore people tend to feel drowsy after a meal. This reaction seems to happen to a substantial portion of the population, as typing in “tired after eating” into Google produces 19,700,000 results. What is perhaps more telling is that many people around the world take naps (e.g. siestas) after meals, although this custom is not typical in the United States because sleep is vacuously associated with laziness.
Notwithstanding the prevalence of this problem, many people who have commented here (myself included) seem to experience postprandial fatigue that is far more severe than the typical drowsiness that the rest of the population deals with. So the question is, why? Well, in my case, I think it might be due to dysthymia or some sort of emotional problem. One day I realized that, even if I somehow found a way to feel alert after eating, I probably wouldn’t want to sit down and read some boring textbook or sit in a lecture hall with 300 other people listening to some monotone professor read off of his PowerPoint slides. I also realized that I was enjoying eating way too much. In fact, I didn’t really enjoy doing anything other than eating. There were days when I would have a hearty lunch, like a sandwich, side of pasta, and a salad, and then I would eat like 1000 additional calories of packaged cracker and cheese sandwiches when I got back to my room. I absolutely loved carbohydrates and could easily eat half a tray of Fig Newtons, three peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and so on. Incidentally, eating carbohydrates almost always put me in a “food coma.”
Eventually, I noticed that my symptoms (hyperphagia, hypersomnia, feeling of heaviness in the arms and legs, being really sensitive to rejection, loss of interest in virtually everything) were all characteristic of a type of depression called atypical depression. Atypical depression is different from major depression in that vegetative behaviors are exaggerated instead of minimized. People with major depression usually sleep less, eat less, and are anxious, so I guess that’s what makes atypical depression so “atypical”. So from here, I came up with the following far-fetched and probably wrong explanation (but I’ll just mention it for what it’s worth). One study from researchers at NIH (“Organization of the stress system and its dysregulation in melancholic and atypical depression: high vs low CRH/NE states”) showed that patients with atypical depression have low levels of corticotropin-releleasing hormone, a hypothalamic hormone that stimulates the adrenal glands to secrete glucocorticoids (e.g. cortisol). Such a deficiency could theoretically lead to low cortisol levels, and this could in turn lead to increased insulin sensitivity, since glucocorticoids normally antagonize the effects of insulin. If this were the case, then a person with low cortisol would experience a sudden drop in blood sugar after eating (especially carbohydrates), because insulin’s effects would be exaggerated. And this in turn fits with the whole idea of “idiopathic reactive hypoglycemia,” a condition in which patients feel tired, irritable, anxious, and/or dizzy after eating. Incidentally, this condition is also associated with emotional problems (see “Suspected postprandial hypoglycemia is associated with beta-adrenergic hypersensitivity and emotional distress”) and doesn’t seem to have a physiological basis (except in “alimentary reactive hypoglycemia,” i.e. dumping syndrome that occurs after gastrectomy or gastric bypass surgery). The paper written by the NIH researchers also said that norepinephrine is somehow affected by low CRH. This suggestion is consistent with the catecholamine hypothesis of affective, which suggests that low catecholamine levels (e.g norepinephrine) are responsible for to mood disorders like depression.
OK, well I don’t want this comment to turn into an essay, so here’s what I have been doing to fix the tired after eating problem:
– drinking coffee
– always trying to balance carbohydrates with fat and protein
– eating chocolate
– trying to do something else that is enjoyable to relax besides eating
– avoiding the following: Googling “tired after eating” and then wondering if it’s being caused by “candidiasis,” “mercury toxicity,” “fluoride poisoning,” “food allergies,” “toxic bowel,” and so on, and so on…
– similar to the above, not visiting alternative medicine web sites
– doing stretches and deep breathing from time to time
This is just what I have come up with to explain my own particular situation. I would definitely recommend anyone experiencing extreme fatigue to see their doctor to get screened for the usual culprits (e.g. anemia, thyroid disease, diabetes). But, if the lab tests all come back normal, then I would definitely consider emotional problems as the cause of postprandial fatigue. I actually had a doctor tell me a few years ago that my GI problems were being caused by depression. I proceeded to visit several other doctors who looked for some physiological explanation of my non-specific symptoms and came up with nothing. I thought that the first doctor I saw was just being lazy at the time and was making up a diagnosis because he didn’t know anything, but now I think that he was right the whole time. It’s been difficult to admit to myself that my symptoms probably stem from psychological problems, but now that I’ve written what is now an essay, it seems like that’s a reasonable explanation. And I am willing to bet that at least some people experiencing fatigue after eating also have some sort of affective issue.
[[ “idiopathic reactive hypoglycemia,” a condition in which patients feel tired, irritable, anxious, and/or dizzy after eating. ]]
But what I feel after eating does not have those negative emotions; it s a comfortable, cosy sleepiness, just too extreme and at the wrong time of day. Mine fits more with the ‘trytophan’ theory.
I know someone who had eat-and-sleep disorder and he took 400 mgs of potassium before each meal and the problem went away. I myself have eat-and-sleep disorder associated with adrenal fatigue syndrome and when my potassium levels get low the eat-and-sleep gets worse and when my potassium levels are higher it gets better. Of course, my problem is more serious than most and one cannot fully treat adrenal fatigue with just potassium and nothing else. There is a whole diet and supplement routine to treat this problem.
Yes, I am the numbskull that misspelled bananas and endocrinology in a previous post. Have you ever hit the submit button and then thought shortly after, “oh no, I think I misspelled that”? Or re-read it after hitting the submit and THEN see the mistakes? It reminds me of a large eraser my mom once had; the eraser said, “I never make misteaks”.
good luck peggy, yvonne, steve, fred and all the rest.
scott
I recently tried 1200 plus mg per day of potassium myself and my kidneys hurt, so I can safely say it is not safe to do that, and that is unfortunate because I actually did have some improvement in my eat-and-sleep disorder. My friend that took the 400 mgs per meal told me he reduced his dosage because of his kidneys, and now I see the wisdom in that. He also told me that he eventually switched from potassium therapy to a prescription drug for addison’s disease called Cortef. He claimed the Cortef helped the eat-and-sleep disorder. I am reluctant to try this option because Cortef is a steroid drug.
Eventually, I may give it a try, but I want to exhaust all natural alternatives first.
scott
A couple notes about my last post. The guy who treated eat-and-sleep disorder with potassium did gradually adjust and reduce his dosage to help prevent any potential kidney problems. The long term maintenance dosage probably would not have to be as high as his original loading dosage of 400 mgs per meal. But everyone is a little different. I’m sure a doctor could run tests to see how the kidney’s are doing.
Blackstrap molasses has 337 mgs potassium per tablespoon. Good stuff.
As I noted in reply to #123, I recently tried someting like 400 mgs or more per meal and it was way too much for my kidneys. I am adjusting the dose way down, but I need to experiment a little to see what I can handle. Maybe only 100 mgs per meal or so, I don’t know.
Some other approaches:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_coma
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postprandial_dip
Debunking a myth: neurohormonal and vagal modulation of sleep …
It is widely believed that postprandial somnolence is caused by redistribution … such as melatonin and orexins and also promotes central vagal activation. …
http://www.journals.elsevierhealth.com/periodicals/ymehy/article/PIIS0306987704003081/fulltext – 31k – Cached – Similar pages –
by KA Bazar – 2004 – Cited by 5 – Related articles – All 10 versions
Debunking a myth: neurohormonal and vagal modulation of sleep …
We propose an alternative hypothesis that postprandial release of gut-brain … such as melatonin and orexins and also promotes central vagal activation. …
http://www.websciences.org/cftemplate/NAPS/archives/indiv.cfm?ID=20043702 – 6k -Cached – Similar pages –
by B KA – Cited by 5 – Related articles – All 10 versions
http://dic.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/10274257
I wonder if there may be some relation between cortisol and orexin? I also wonder if adrenal insufficiency may cause the normal blood compensatory delivery to the brain to not operate normally during digestion as in normal healthy individuals.
I have this same problem, with very similar symptoms. Except I also have absolutely no appetite during the day and the thought of eating usually makes me feel sick. If, for some reason, I do eat, I’m out…literally pass out unconscious. I cannot help it. It’s happened from eating salmon sashimi, which is strictly protein, no carbs. I can drink coffee, tea, water, club soda throughout the day, however if I put milk or cream in my coffee or tea it will be a challenge to remain awake. I have adjusted my lifestyle to completely fasting during the day and then eating a healthy evening meal and perhaps a protein rich snack at night, which works best for me and allows me to have the most functioning hours during the day. Yesterday was all messed up. I broke routine and had a granola bar. Passed out. Then I had an unsweetened coconut ice bar. Passed out. I don’t even recall what happened to precipitate a 3rd bout of sleep, but indeed, I passed out again. When it happens, it’s not like a normal sleep. I cannot easily be awakened.
I had bloodwork done right after a snack one day and my blood glucose showed up as 20. Coma levels. Endocrinologist says reactive hypoglycemia. Since then my blood glucose is all over the place and doesn’t follow any ‘normal’ diagnostic pattern. But it’s never normal. I am celiac, completely gluten free and I grow all my own veggies, if I eat baked food, I bake them myself. I do not eat packaged foods. I do not drink soda or alcohol. When I do drink milk, I drink raw milk. I’m currently awaiting the results from bloodwork,, I’m being tested for porphyria. This may hold some answers. Endo says I definitely do not have Type II diabetes but is testing for late onset Type I, could be my own immune system attacking my pancreas. If I do have porphyria, there could be a connection, in which case she says one treatment option is to try to keep an even but low level intake of carbs/glucose throughout the day, such as by continually sipping watered down juice.
For now, I’ve learned my lesson after yesterday and will not be tempted to eat anything, no matter how small, during the daylight hours. I’d rather function with a little bit of hunger then spend half the day unconscious.
Best to everyone~
I’ve had this problem for a couple of years. It appears to be an insulin problem…too many carbs (over 3 for me), or eating too fast, or eating too much, all make my pancreas produce an excessive insulin response. For some reason (probably a prediabetic condition), my body can’t deal with too much insulin, and has to knock me out cold so that all resources go to using all that insulin to convert my meal to fat. If I exercise within 1/2 hour of eating, I don’t feel sleepy because there’s no opportunity for the meal to provoke an insulin flood–it converts immediately into muscle juice and is used right away.
Blood tests do no good. There’s nothing to measure (or the medical community doesn’t know what to measure yet), as blood sugar isn’t spiking. Probably it’s the flood of insulin that needs to be measured, but I don’t know if there’s a test for that.
Some things I’ve discovered: The Glycemic Index is the best indicator of whether a food will make me sleepy (I can usually eat anything under 30). What I ate yesterday affects if I get sleepy today (e.g., sometimes I can eat peanut butter and be fine, and sometimes it puts me to sleep, depending on what I ate yesterday). Fiber, fat and protein need to be equally present. Adding fiber to something that makes me sleepy can make that food less of a sleep trigger (coconut flour, flaxseed meal). Grazing works better than meals (i.e., spreading a meal out over 3 hours by eating one serving per hour). Small portions are critical, also eating small bites, chewing slowly, taking time between bites. I drink a lot of green tea with milk in it, because I can’t have a full glass of milk (so this way I get my calcium and a small but steady supply of calories). Can’t eat bread, pasta, rice, or potatoes at all, ever. Coconut flour is high in fiber and can be used in place of regular flour (as can spelt flour in small amounts, like coating thin tomato slices for frying).
Foods that I can eat without getting sleepy, as long as I don’t eat until I feel full: Agave nectar for sweetener (this is such a blessing!), thin turkey bacon (because I miss crisp crunchy things), eggs, dairy (cheese, cream, sour cream, etc.), no-crust quiche, no-crust squash pie (pumpkin is too high on the glycemic index), sweet potatoes, all meats, tomatoes, peppers, celery, fresh peas and green beans (not frozen), broccoli (but not cauliflower), asparagus, artichokes, summer & winter squash, turnips, lettuce, strawberries, mayonnaise and mustard (but not ketchup). I make my own zucchini salsa from my garden so I know exactly what’s in it, and I love it on scrambled eggs with sour cream. One of my favorite desserts is a chocolate cake made with coconut flour and agave nectar and served with whipped cream (sweetened with agave) and served with sliced strawberries (also tossed with agave). Or I slice and simmer apples with agave, butter, and cinnamon for an apple pie without crust. Good things are possible, even with an eat & sleep disorder!
No one else has mentioned what I recently found to be the key to the problem for me: histamine-rich foods. These include fish, tomatoes, aged cheeses, soy sauce, wine, vinegar, anything fermented, yeast, processed meats; and histamine-releasing foods: citrus, raw egg whites.
Here’s the theory: somehow, usually after taking antibiotics that disrupted your gut flora, histamine-producing bacteria got into your upper digestive tract. When you eat, the bacteria do too (seem to love carbs!) and they make histamine. Eat high-histamine foods, and it all gets even worse. Your system reacts to the enormous histamine load by furiously producing adrenaline to counteract it and releasing other histamine-counteracting stuff. At that point you have no more resistance to falling asleep than if you had drunk a bottle of Benadryl.
My beasties seem to adore sugar and in addition to all the histamine they produce with sweets, there’s trouble with your adrenals there too. Over time your adrenals can’t stay up to the task of fighting all the histamine dumps. Since eating sugar causes adrenal spikes, eating much in the way of sugar will add to your exhaustion as your blood cortisol completely runs out. It has nothing to do with insulin for me, in fact my glucose tolerance test results were very good. If you think this may be you – if you’re literally facedown on the table after a tuna sandwich, glass of lemonade or plate of pasta – please try googling “low histamine diet” and “histamine intolerance” & maybe it will help you.
Wish I had solid medical evidence this theory is true; I don’t. But it’s held up for me every time I eat a no-no food. You can be tested for histamine levels, though, and I haven’t even bothered. My doctors have pretty much lost interest in doing more testing after so many years of tests and everything normal. I thought for decades I had some truly freaky food “allergies”. They were inconsistent to say the least. Now I realize that the body stress from histamine (and other vasoactive amines) varied day to day.
No cure, sadly, just improvement. I’m still working on helping my gut and tried antibiotics to clean it up. Diflucan for yeast did nothing. Flagyl (anaerobic bacteria) made it worse. Cipro (aerobic bacteria) really helped, but the reactions have been creeping back again lately. Probiotics are essential too, but I found I need to take tons of pills for them to make a difference and I got lazy about doing it after while. Still I’m much, much better now after only a few weeks of avoiding the trouble foods and I hope there’s someone here who will benefit from my long and unfortunate journey.
I can’t believe how many people are going through this. Eating ruins my day so easily and no doctor can figure out why. I am 26 years old and of normal weight, but I have to exercise a ridiculous amount of care in choosing what I eat and although I have identified many of my triggers, I still can’t get it right. Today I am disoriented, foggy, unable to drive safely, bumping into things, etc. apparently due to a couple handfuls of marionberries. I am beyond frustrated. I cannot eat any grains and it seems that increasingly I cannot even have fruit. Even root veggies will give me trouble. I am down to eating just meats, fats, and leafy greens, I guess. I swear my post-prandial IQ is a good 50 points lower when I have a reaction. I become so sleepy and stupid! I feel like I’m on drugs and it’s only getting worse, especially over the past few months.
I do suspect this is related to type II diabetes somehow. But it’s horrifying to think that only twentysome years of processed foods could do this to a body. I’ve always exercised, never been overweight for any length of time… why me?
I have read all the comments on this sleepy situation I have and share all of the above in the different comments. I have had like soop and a sandwitch and boom out I go for a couple of hours. This morning I had some yogurt and a few fried potatoes and getting sleepy. I also have type II diabeties and take about 8 different meds but I know that can’t be it because it never bothered me before so I know it is not the meds. Go to the doctor and talk to her about it. will let you all know what she has to say. I know I can’t stop eating so I guess it is something I have to live with. My family gets a little upset with me but I can’t convinced them it is not my fault. ljk
Hi
I too am a current CFS suffer.. Have have the condition for 1 year due to having candida (systemic yeast infection)
Can highly reccomend a procuct called threelac!!!!!
am 8 wks into 6 month program to ‘cure’ candia and therefore get rid of CFS
So far so good!
try the spit test to see if you are suffering from candia (which will also throw up lots of random food intolerances until you get rid of the infection, therefore causing more sleepyness after eating)
really hope this helps
am personally going to try the starve myself all day trick another user advised in the meantime
I first noted long deep sleep immediately after ( 15-40 min) eating CIci Pizzas. I eat them for months before I discovered they had Glutens and so i quit eating them. no more sleep after eating except for occasional foods, until I started eatying Grands Golden Layers flaky biscuit.
Still it is not clear because some times if does not bother me and sometimes it does.
Its this gluten heavy?
SOLUTION!
I havn’t read through all the comments above(there are just too many) but if you need a solution to this problem you must read this comment. The only reason I’m writing this is because I feel the pain and anguish all of you have been going through. I’ve been there myself but was lucky enough to crawl my way out of it. So listen carefully if you want to get rid of this problem.
I’ll keep it short and simple and say that I know how it feels to fall asleep after having a meal and how many negative consequences it has on one’s everyday living and etc etc etc…..
Since that is out of the way, lets come back to the SOLUTION! (I’m not a medical practitioner so talk to your doctor before taking the advice)
5-HTP will solve the problem.
Infact it will solve alot of your other problems too.
I used to get an acne attack a day before, during and after my period. 5-HTP solved it. No more acne,like ever.
Had joined the gym but lacked in energy to exercise. Taking a pill of 5-HTP 15 minutes before going to the gym, filled me up with so much energy I could keep exercising for a whole hour without breaking a sweat.
Used to fall asleep right after eating. 5-HTP cured the problem. Now I could eat anything, anytime, anywhere, and not even bash an eyelash. Felt energetic and alive all day long.
My reason for taking 5-HTP was not for all the above problems but was to cure my mild depression which it did help with. Because the conditions above had contributed to my depression, when they were gone, the depression was gone.
5-HTP has been truly a miracle in my life. But unfortunately, if you stop taking it, all the previous problems will come back. I’ve tried it and all my previous problems came back with a vengeance. But obviously your body is different than mine and might react in a different way. But there is nothing wrong in giving it a try. Who knows, it might create the same miracle in your it did in mine.
I waited 2 years for my doctor to find out what was wrong with me and to get me out of this hell but there was no satisfactory reply hence no satisfactory solution to my problem. Then I went to an herbal shop,told the lady about my problems, she handed me a bottle of 5-HTP for $16.99, brought it home, started taking one pill in the morning, one at evening and within a week I was a whole different person altogether.
As I’ve said above, your body might react in a different way but there is nothing wrong in giving 5-HTP a shot.
I wish you guys all the best of luck in the world. I’ve been there myself and know how it feels so I feel for you! Best of Luck!
Lala…
I’ve been absorbed reading all your comments. I found this blog by using the search term “extreme tiredness after eating”. My problem is well described by the words written by another sufferer “For some months now every time I eat, within 30 min I’m so exhausted that I fall asleep for hours at a time, with heart pounding/palpitations as well. And this is not your normal tired…it feels like death. Like your life-is-leaving-you kind of tired.” This would dispel those comments by Mr Kamel. Yes we know tiredness after a meal is “normal” but you have no idea how we feel.
We are absolutely certain that we are not experiencing “normal”.
I’ve had this problem for several years myself too and it got so bad I had to give up my work as a dentist. I was afraid I might injure one of my patients either by making incorrect decisions or through clumsiness while feeling lethargic. People often said to me “you look tired!” but that was on a good day! I used to take a 15 minute nap whenever I could – lying on the floor because there was no couch or bed. I’d get up and wash my face with cold water and try to pull myself together before the next patient. It was hard to compose myself. After 20 minutes I’d be almost back to normal. Every day was an ordeal! As it got worse I decided to sell-up and retire even though it was the worst time for me to do so.
I found that I could keep going as long as I didn’t have lunch. By 5pm I was feeling “high” but jittery, probably hypoglycaemic. I found it very difficult to go without lunch so I felt better if I only had an orange or an apple in between patients. A GP once showed me his packet of almonds that he ate during the day. I should have tried that. I take “Equal” tablets (sugar substitute) in my coffee (and have for years) I wonder how many of you take it? Maybe that’s a possible cause of problems? Plus you get that in most diet sodas. Maybe harmless, who knows? From reading all the comments it seems the adrenal gland is very likely a common factor involved in the problem. The psychological factors can’t be ruled out since the brain affectively controls the pituitary gland (the mother of all glands) and I can see why anyone can get atypical depression when they can’t eat what they want!
My job was very stressful, but now I’m retired, I have no stress really but the episodes of sleeping after meals is getting worse. That’s what prompted me to start researching the net. I’m glad I did, now I can go to a doctor with some ammunition (this blog) and say “take a look at this! – this is what I’ve got! I can’t argue about Mercury because I’ve been breathing it every day for 40 years and I don’t think my sleepiness is any worse than all of yours. I had my amalgams removed 20 years ago but only for cosmetic reasons. I wouldn’t be surprised if sleep apnoea is a major player in this problem. You will find a guy on the net saying how his tiredness was caused by his TMJ (jaw) problem. At first I thought he must be a nut-case but he mentions how his dentist made him a mouth splint that kept his jaw in position at night. Anyway he swears that it cured his “feeling tired after meals”. I can only conclude that the dentist did not tell him he had sleep apnoea. I’ve seen a lot of oral devices that are supposed to prevent your jaw and tongue falling back and blocking your larynx. Not many work. This condition certainly prevents you getting a proper night’s sleep. It’s often accompanied by snoring and periods where breathing stops. This leads to a sleep deficit. I remember having a sleep study done. They connected all these wires to my head and chest and stuck tubes up my nostrils. I was so uncomfortable I stayed awake for hours! The nurse (the same nurse that was in “One flew over the Cuckoos nest”) got angry with me and gave me a sleeping pill! The result was inconclusive as you’d expect. They told me to use a C-Pap machine that forces air into your lungs all night. I had to sleep in another room because the machine kept my wife awake. In the morning I felt like I’d just returned from a very long motorcycle ride because “the wind” had been rushing over my face all night. I felt very tired too. Since then I felt the cure was almost as bad as the complaint although in hindsight maybe I should have persevered with the machine. So there we have another item to add to our list of possible causes.
Let us pray that they find a real cure soon.
I want to eat what I like, when I like and have lots of energy!
Not too much to ask is it?
Being a fellow sufferer, I have tried just about everything to get to the bottom of this. I have tried adding, removing, and substituting foods, but for me, it doesn’t matter what I eat, just the fact that I ate. I have tried adding/removing Fruits, nuts, sugars, carbs, protiens, caffeen, coccoa, teas, and so many vitimins, supplements etc.. that it would amaze most people. I have even went as far as not using my cellular phone for several days to see if that had any effect.
My blood work all comes back normal, borderline PERFECT. The only health issues I have are high blood presure (controlled with medication) 5 ruptured discs in my thoracic spine, and arthritis.High blood presure being the only one that has shown up as being a possible connection to this problem.
Like one of the bloggers said, this is not your normal feeling sleepy after a big meal, this is like the life is being sucked out of me. I have tried everything to fight the sleep but nothing has worked. If I eat something, even as small as a cracker with some cheese, I am going to sleep. I may only sleep for from 15-30 minutes but sometimes I have whole days that are ruined because of this. If I was to get up and have even a piece of toast for breakfast, within 20 minutes I am back to sleep. Then would come lunch, supper etc. with the same results.
I have lost over 65 pounds in 18 months because of this. I find it easier to just go without eating until late evening than to make my family mad and sleep on and off all day because of eating. I did need to loose the weight but I also know not eating is not a safe way to loose weight.
I have looked everywhere and have tried just about everything that people have recommended with no success at all. I have asked my Doctor but he either doesn’t think it is serious or hasn’t realized how much this is effecting me.
I also noticed that my enegry level isn’t really in question here. I have plenty of energy and strength right up to the time it hits me and I go out.
Please let me know if you come up with anything else and I will also do the same.
I think it has something to do with stress, the adrenal, fluid balance, salt and ultimately blood volume – these depend on many things including physical activity. I actually have a cortical adrenal adenoma which is growing but it is non-functioning. I can remember years ago how, as the day went on, I used to unfasten the trousers button because I was becoming bloated in the lower abdomen (I think it was fluid – this is now much worse. It feels as I have the fluid but not in right place). At 33 I developed adult acne for which I received tetracycline for months at a time, over a period of about 6 years – this would not have been good for kidneys either! Then, followed the antidepressants, cimetidine and ibuprofen. I haven’t taken anything for a few years and I don’t miss any of them.
I am paying attention to diet, some variety, proteins, carbs, fats, vitamins and minerals (2 -3 times a week) and of course water – I am not paranoid about it, just understanding the basics. No matter what I eat, I need to lay down in bed/sleep. It feels as the body needs to slow everything really down so it can digest. Just laid on the settee and watching tv is not good enough, I need to be flat in bed away from other activities. I also get dizzy, sometimes more than others, when changing position. There are times when I can keep going but it is debilitating. All blood tests are normal but, normal does not mean very much when I cannot keep going.
I have been experimenting with salt for a few years now and I find that it helps in a variety of ways including joint pains. I like the almonds and they are ok as variety – I think they are proteins. I have also become critical of various health claims. For example, someone wanting to live healthy by drinking more water and cutting down on salt could do more damage, especially for someone who does not eat many processed foods.
It might be worth to mention that I found by chance that iron and iodine might help. At some point I developed signs of iron deficiency so the GP put me on iron therapy, although the haemoglobin was 13.7 – I felt that it helped. Then, I had a CT scan with iodine contrast – I had some delayed reactions to it but I felt more active mentally and of course it made me wonder.
Overall, I am reaching the conclusion that functions cannot be restored. It appears that even if blood volume can be restored after years of shortage, the damage to organs cannot be undone. So, it could be just a matter of understanding my body, helping it to keep the balance and try not to stress too much over it.
I am enclosing a link which I found useful to understand how body works. I don’t know how good it is – I am using it just as another source.
http://faculty.alverno.edu/bowneps/adrenalcortex/adrenalcortexproblem1.html
I have had this problem for years..I get tired, brain foggy about an hour after eating…I am at home now so giving into this urge is easy…but I lose at least 4 hours a day sleeping…
I started looking for others with this problem and I tried one thing and I cannot believe how much better I feel…the urge to curl up and konk out is hardly there…
What I did was add cinnamon to my diet..
I found this out on many sites that cinnamon for many helps with insulin resistance..which is what Im pretty sure I am headed towards with my sedentary lifestyle…
My stomach is also huge..it looks like I am 7 months pregnant!!
I have added about two dashes of cinnamon to my morning coffee..put it in my applesauce and anything else that can take it..From what Iv’e read about 1/4 teaspoon per day is good…I have actually wanted to go somewhere other than groceries and picking up my son from school..I can’t tell you how much of a difference it makes!! I hope this new energy..well its not really energy..its just me without the tired foggy brain….
Now this has been only for a week…Ill update in a few more weeks…
I truly hope this helps someone!!!
Vitamin deficiency.. B’s and Ds, hypo or hyerglocemia effect from whatever you eat. Try never to eat grains, bread, rice or noodles or just very small amounts; sub small potato even yams or sweet for starch. Larger meat portions small 1/2 cup everything else at meals to slow digestion; sugar free puddings or jello to stop sweet cravings after meals.. do sprinkle cinnamon whenever you can on food; eat small meals thru out the day and don’t drink coffee unless for breakfast one hour before you drive; or enjoy with dinner when you know you can rest if it adversly affects you. Bottled water with fresh lemon or lime is best, even teas if you don’t sweeten it with sugar. Snack on olives and cheese, no crackers.. or nuts and dried fruits, no more than a childs handful between meals, even a spoonful of peanut butter is good.. go no longer than four hours between eating full meal without eating something. 4 oz V-8 is also good for a perk me up before a meal to get the digestion started. Always eat a protein with any food.
I have done all of the above with no luck at all. I have even done the diabetic monitoring of my blood, every hour for 48 hours, and only learned that I have a VERY healthy system. My highest was 114 and that was after 2 cups of sweetened coffee, 2 chocolate Ho-Ho’s and half of a homemade cookie a friend wanted me to try. My lowest was 84 with an overall average of 89 for the 48 hours. My triglycerides are normal, chloresteral is actually really low with a total (good and bad combined) of 83, sodium was on the low side of normal, and all other scores within the normal range. I take a mens multi-vitamin and it is one recommended by not only my Doctor but also a person who is VERY high in the G.N.C company. I have tried the Atkins diet with a few changes- no luck other than I did loose more weight faster.
I can not eat anything with any artificial sweeteners in it as I am DEATHLY allergic to a few of them. I have to carry an Epi-pen with me just in case a bartender/waitress/chef, makes a mistake and cooks or gives me a diet drink instead of what I ordered.
I really thank you for your ideas but unfortunatly, I have tried them already.
Oh, I do eat whole grain breads and cereals and do not eat much fried foods at all. I do however like my cookies, but even then I eat the oatmeal or frosted oatmeal kinds.
I have went weeks with and without caffeen, sugars, carbs, meats, sweets, and so on. About the only thing I have not done yet is a “cleanse” to see if I have some sort of toxin in my system causing this. I really doubt that I do as this has been going on for almost 2 years now.
Again, thank you for your advise but I have already tried it with no or little luck.
Nate
Many have said similar in previous posts…thank you for helping and doing your research. I am posting to tell you what works best for me. its not a cure but it has helped me manage “it” better.
I have noticed the same symptoms for 10 years and its getting worse! Im 37 now and most people say it affects them about the same age. The best solution that works for me is: Eat the Paleo Plan. Look it up online there are tons of sites eg eat like a “caveman”. Cavemen didn’t farm so NO GRAINS! that means no wheat, bread, no granola, no cereal, muffins cookies, NO SUGAR, i use stevia as a sweetener, NO STARCHY VEGETABLES no potatoes, no white rice, no bananas. NO PROCESSED FOOD AT ALL! If you cant pull it from the ground or kill and eat it with no further processing then don’t eat it (nothing canned)
What you can eat you can eat, you can eat a lot of it: Protein: Chicken, red meats (i eat minimal red), turkey, fish, eggs CARBS: Vegetables, (mostly green leafy), fruit FATS: nuts, good oils, avocado. Dairy to a minimum…I like my cheese! I would play around with the level of dairy you can handle after you get the rest of the diet sorted. Most people are lactose intolerant.
I am typing this because a few months ago, before I started, I went to a friends for dinner and had a serving of heavy cake and was falling off my chair because i was so destroyed. They were laughing because I couldn’t keep my eyes open and they thought i was out drinking the night before..or drank too much then. It was horrible and something that happened to me often.
I have been in business meetings after pizza for lunch and doing everything in my power from not falling on the floor. I have dropped books out of my hand and had major head bobs in front of people. have passed out during conversations. I have left work for 1/2 hour breaks to sleep in my car because I’m head bobbing at my desk. I am a danger on the road if I don’t eat right.
I know this sounds like a sales pitch but I just telling you because I am so happy i found something that works. I feel way better eating the Paleo Plan and its a life style not a diet. I have also lost 20lbs and feel healthier than I have been in years…tons of energy and no passing out. I am sure the paleo eating is the management system. Read up on it and try it out. It took me a number of months to get committed to being strict eating this way. I cant go back now…its a life style change. The key is not to bring anything into your house that you can not eat. If you have a family then they can get on it too because there are so many health benefits from it. Eating paleo will also reduce the chance of heart disease by 80%, reduce cholesterol dramatically etc.
I forgot to mention you should always eat carbs, fats and proteins together in a meal. dont just eat protein on their own or carbs on their own otherwise it goes to storage. You will also be hungrier quicker. The three work together to burn in your body as clean energy (considering the clean source). http://www.thepaleodiet.com/
Just today after another sleepy situation after eating, I determined why I get so sleepy, and even go to sleep sometimes without knowing it is happening. I have a very healthy (not fanatical) diet. I notice the sleepiness more when I have not eaten soon enough because I am too busy. As far as the scientific reasons, I don’t know about that. But today I said I would not do the waiting thing again.
This sounds exactly like the “Atkins Diet” that we have here in the U.S.A.. I have tried this but for me, it doesn’t matter what I eat or even how much, I get so sleepy it is scarey.
I thank you for your comments though and maybe through the combination of all of the comments on this subject, we will find a cure for this.
Actually its not like the Atkins diet. The Atkins Diet is a low carb/ high protein diet. it is meant to reduce body fat quickly but it is a very unhealthy way to do so and the weight generally does not stay off because it is a diet. The diet is not sustainable and people generally go back to their old habits of eating once they have lost the weight. The paleo way of eating is a lifestyle and not a fad diet. It is hypoallergenic and fixes a lot of food related health issues. Eating paleo is not just for weight management but for better energy and has many other health benefits. Its a big change because so much has to be cut out. It took me a year of trying to finally get on it 90% and it has worked wonders in my life. Others I know who eat this way swear by it. take care and I hope you find some solutions to this horrible disorder.
I’m sorry, by the first description I read, it sounded almost identicle to the Atkins Diet. I have been on the Atkins and if a person is to follow ALL of the directions, it is no more unhealthy that anything else we eat. Most people just think that all you eat is protein with Atkins and that is not true. There are vitimins, supplements, and yes, carbs. I did in fact loose weight on the Atkins and I did keep it off until such time I broke and started eating lazagna, spagetti, breads, etc. Even then I never regained all of the weight I lost.
I will check into the Paleo that you have mentioned and see if it is something I will be able to adapt to. Hearing the “lifestyle” part makes me think back to my experience with the Atkins and scares me a bit! LOL
So far, the only thing I have found that keeps me from getting tired during the day after eating is; NOT EATING. I know this is not a safe cure but being so tired I fall asleep at the wheel while driving or at other times when alertness is required is also very unacceptable. It is now 7:20 PM and I have not eaten anything today at all. I have had about 1/2 gallon of water and 3 small cups of coffee so far. I have been up since 6:30 AM. It takes a bit of getting used to and I know it is not at all healthy but I have found nothing else that will work so far.
I wish you the best of luck with this dreaded condition and hope we can find a safe cure soon. Oh, I also found that by not eating, you have to be VERY careful with your prescription medications. Not only will some eat your stomach alive, but some will act like you are getting more of a dose than you should.
I read the book Eat right for your type and I am trying to follow the diet plan that is best for my blood type. The book is very interesting and the eating plan is more a guideline to a lifestyle (there is also the book Live right for your type, very good too) than an actual diet. My plan is similar to the Atkins diet and paleo diet, as type Os should avoid refined sugars and wheat and generally reduce carbohydrate intake and eat proteins and vegetable.
I too feel very tired after meals, I can’t stop yawning and can’t concentrate at all, the doctor wansn’t helpful at all but I think I might have intolerance to wheat and might be insulin resistant. I also sometimes have palpitations, usually when I eat sugars, my worst enemy and I have gastritis too and this diet seems to help. I know many people who follow a diet plan appropriate for their blood type and they all are happy and healthy. I would highly recommend the books.
Serena
I just went to my Dr on good Friday and he may have come up with something. I have to give this guy a lot of credit as he has managed to get my blood presure down where 5 others failed, has managed to help me get my pain somewhat under control where countless others failed. In our conversation, we hit on Testosterone. Being that I am 46 years old and all, this seems a good place to start. I went for blood work and am awaiting the results at this time. I guess this can even effect females. I went to a web site that I saw on TV (after the appointment) and took there 14 question quiz and ended up answering all but 2 in the direction of Low T. I guess there are also several other things that can cause all of the symtoms of low T so until the blood tests are in, I can not really say that I have found a solution.
I continue to suffer terribly from this. It has gotten to the point that I can actually fall asleep WHILE eating. If I have eaten about 1/2 of a sandwich or a half bowl of cerial, I can fall asleep while chewing on it.
Today I had worked all morning and about 330 opened the fridge and grabbed a couple jelly beans without thinking. Within 10 minutes, WHILE DRIVING, I was going out. It took everything I had to remain awake for the 6 mile trip. I have had the same thing happen with cheese, a cracker, a slice of lunch meat, a glass of kool aid, a bottle of pop etc.. I am also allergic to artificial sweeteners so trying a diet soda is way out of the question. I have now tried, no carbs, all carbs, all veggies, all dairy, each for at least one week if not more with no good results to report. The no carb diet did seem to make it a bit less intense but by the end of the second week of that, I was right back to falling asleep within minutes of eating. I have explained this to my Dr and this is what he based the decision to test me for low Testosterone. They took 3 big vials of blood so I am sure he is looking for other things as well. If I get any news at all I will for sure share with the group. That is as long as I don’t eat just before getting online!! LOL I have to joke about it or I would go insane even though it is no joking matter.
Thank you, Nathan, for so kindly sharing your experience. Please keep us updated on any developments if you can.
Well, the bloodwork did in fact say that I was low on testosterone so I am on a 2.5mg patch every 24 hours. So far, (2 weeks in) I have been doing pretty good with the eating and falling asleep part. I still feel really tired after eating but until today I was able to fight it off. I was also in an extreme amount of pain today so this could just be my body trying to force me into taking it easy. I go back the beginning of next month for more blood work and some more tests.
So far I would have to say that the testosterone is helping to a pretty good degree but does not seem to be the entire solution, at least not at the level I am on now. Like I said, I still really feel the exhaustion after eating anything at all but I am able to fight it off a bit better now. The testosterone has also helped in several other areas but I won’t get into that. LOL
I took testosterone injections for about 18 months due to slightly lower levels in the blood. It made me quite aggressive which is out of character for me, maybe because I wasn’t used to feeling like that! It must be just part of being a real male! If you look up the side effects of testosterone therapy you will find a few problems other than just being aggressive. The higher levels of testosterone apparently suppress the natural production in the testes, so when you stop the injections, you go through a eunuch-like state for as many months as you were on the therapy and that’s not good. It’s amazing how much hormones can influence your state-of-mind. Eventually I was back to my old self again. Exercise seems to be always on the list of “what to do” in any case so that’s what I’m doing now, cycling most days for a half hour. It’s hard to stay motivated, but after 6 weeks I’m starting to get rid of the porky look. Losing weight is another major item on the list of “what to do”. The next thing I have found that helps is taking a broad spectrum of top quality vitamins and mineral supplements. I have cut back on carbohydrates since they seem to be the best “sleep-makers”. I’ve also cut back on fats and started eating more vegetables and fruits as recommended by previous contributors. Two months ago I had blood tests that showed all were normal for the basics except for thyroid hormone which was on the bottom end of normal. The glucose tolerance test was again “normal”. My GP was still not interested in making any changes. So he sent me to a physician but he was more useless than the GP. He gave me a half-hearted physical exam and concluded that maybe I had some form of chronic fatigue syndrome. I’m going to try another GP next week and see if he has any answers. I’ll report back on what he has to say.
I am not on the injections but the patches. Not that this will make much of a difference in the end. I have noticed a slight bit of aggression but I used to be this way and know how to deal with it rather well.
Thyroid is one of the tests that I am having done next month as well.
I really don’t know what to think about all of this. It seems to have struck me overnight when it first came on. It was like someone threw a switch! I have tried so many different diets, supplements, read books on different things, internet searches, and to be honest, have found more info right here on this blog than just about anywhere else.
I have wondered of it could be a geographical thing. Are more people effected in certain regions? I am in Northwest Pennsylvania. I do know that Multiple Sclerosis is more common in climates like ours so could climate be a factor for this as well?
I will continue to monitor this blog and will look for more of your posts. Maybe we can find a common denominator that has been overlooked or passed by. At this point, anything at all would be a lifesaver to some and a breath of fresh air to many more.
I was a big fan of the Paleo diet, but unfortunately I pass out after eating any meat. So it was not helping me too much in this regard.
However, the diet did indirectly wean me off gluten, which made a huge difference. I don’t know if I have celiac or not, but I do know that I’d *always* get comatose after any pasta, bread, cookies, etc. I haven’t touched any wheat for 6 months now. Just thinking of pasta makes me sleepy!
I’m also glad I did Paleo because it got me off dairy, too. This helped me solve my gastointestinal “issues” as well as the after-eating sleeping.
SO the biggest culprits for me are:
1. wheat (gluten)
2. dairy
3. meat
(though I haven’t completely quit meats; I just eat it right before bedtime!)
So what do I eat all day?
Fruit (–only have a problem if I eat too much of the sweet variety–)
Salads with LOTS of olive oil
I usually eat both together, because the fat in the olive oil keeps my blood sugar from spiking after the fruit; while vice-versa, the fruit keeps my energy high so I don’t get weighed down by the olive oil.
My blood sugar levels have always been sensitive (like others here), so I pretty much HAVE to follow this system if I want to feel good.
(btw, I got the idea from the excellent Wai diet: http://www.waiworld.com/waidiet/thewaidiet.html )
So far, so good. As long as I stay away from gluten, dairy, and meat (during the day), and make sure not to overeat, I’m good.
And yes, I was so desperate that for several months, I’d also fast all day and then eat a HUGE meal at night, and then pass out. It worked for a while, but I would get so hungry and weak during the day that it was simply not sustainable. I like to keep active and get exercise, so I HAVE to eat to do that.
(thank god for fruits and salad!)
Thank goodness for all of you! I am NOT ALONE or crazy or a hypochondriac! Had this my entire adult life and it is getting worse. I am going to sit down and read every post now : )
I think it’s called postprandial hypotension. I just googled and found a pretty good description of what my boyfriend does (although he just curls up on the couch and snoozes rather than actually fainting): http://www.ehow.com/how_5157781_understand-causes-fainting-after-eating.html
That would work but my blood presure is 100% normal during my periods of this. 120/63 Average
After 2 months of testosterone treatment I will say that my problem is better but in no way cured. My testosterone levels are back to normal but I am still going out after any meals. Instead of being out for an hour or more, I am now only out for as little as 15 minutes and no more than 45.
I have started getting up at 3 or 4 am and eating a bowl of cerial or other healthy breakfast foods and then going back to bed. This way my body is getting what it needs and my problem is not causing daytime issues. I will not eat again until supper or even later if anything is going on.
During the day, even a sack of peanuts and a cup of coffee and I am out cold for at least a half hour. The good thing is, even if I eat a buffet style lunch, I can still be active after only a half hour “nap”. Not that the nap is of my choosing!
I have had my blood presure drop as low as 95/43 but when this happened I was not asleep, nor had I just eaten anything.
As far as your boyfriend taking a snooze after a meal, if he has a choice and can fight it off, he is not having the same problem or at least not as bad as some of us have. Once we eat, we are going out, no matter what. Caffein, energy drinks, exercise, none of these are of any use to keep us awake.
I have been falling asleep after eating for years. I’m better then I’m not. I’ve tried many different things – I’m a non-meat eater for 40 year, No pop, no artificial sugar, no coffee, no white sugar or white products, I juice, plenty of fresh greens and 80% raw diet – that work for a while and then I’m back where I started. People who don’t experience this don’t understand. Yesterday, I ate a Portabella Mushroom that was prepared in the dehydrated and a wheat-free-gluten waffle and salad greens with olive oil. I was out before I could remember I was eating and I slept two and a half hours long than I do in the morning and I still have brain-fog. So, I told a friend, with whom a I a telephone meeting this morning, how I reacted to my meal and her comment was, you obviously needed the sleep. The lack of understanding, which is meant to be supportive, can be very frustrating. I seldom talk with people about this because most people will response as my friend did. I say all of this to say, “Thank You – all of you. I so appreciate having a place to come and read the comments of people who know the Ali- effect that food can have on you. I learn a lot and you all give me hope.
Have an enjoyable holiday
>>> Important info for people who pass out WHILE eating at the end of this post. <<> hypothyroidism (taking 50mcg levothyroxine daily)
>> *severe* Vitamin D deficiency (taking 50,000 IU Vitamin D weekly)
>> a blood clotting disorder of unknown origin, which caused a massive pulmonary embolism 4 yrs ago that by all rights should have killed me instantly…I still wonder how I survived (taking 5mg warfarin daily)
>> Fibromylagia
>> degenerative disc disease
>> myofascial pain syndrome
>> gallstones (I should have surgery for this, but have been putting it off due to being on blood thinner… risks outweigh benefits)
I am a 49 yr old female, recently declared disabled for the above issues. The majority of my life was very unremarkable medically; the worst thing that had happened to me was having my tonsils out in 1980. I was a crazy workaholic who enjoyed my job up until 2002, when things started to fall apart. For someone who was rarely sick, it was stunning how fast my body turned against me, and it’s been nothing but pain and grief (and an unnecessary total hysterectomy) ever since. Fortunately, my blood pressure is very good (100/65), and I’m not diabetic or even pre-diabetic, so that helps to rule out a lot of potential diagnoses.
I am getting extremely frustrated with the GI issues, though. I used to love food, love going out to eat, etc., and now food is essentially unappealing. I have wasted sooo much money buying food I was never able to eat and throwing away meals that were either left unrefrigerated too long or were destroyed by reheating them over & over as I waited hours to feel hungry. Considering how little I eat (especially compared to how much I used to eat), I should be pencil-thin, but instead my abdomen has turned into something that feels completely alien… it looks like I’m hiding a couple of watermelons in my gut, and it feels like it’s made of cement. I’m losing weight in other areas (butt, legs, arms, etc.), but my gut stays huge at best, and balloons even larger after eating. With all the other health problems I have to deal with, this eating/GI problem is incredibly frustrating & depressing. I haven’t been able to sleep in a bed since 2004 because I cannot lay flat on my back or hips. Thinking about spending the rest of my life with that restriction is bad enough (I actually have dreams about sleeping in a bed like I used to), but to compound that with being unable to eat & enjoy food (and yet look like I eat constantly)… well, let’s just say it’s getting more difficult to find a reason to continue this madness.
That said, I’ve started a new campaign with my doctors to resolve this once and for all. Is my gallbladder to blame? If so, it’s coming out. Is there something else going on somewhere in my GI system? I’m having both an endoscopy & colonoscopy to find out. Whatever it takes, I’ll do it, because I just can’t deal with this much longer. As I told my doctor last week, if all else fails, I’m simply going to give up solid food altogether and switch to a 100% liquid diet. I went to a GI doctor for answers 2 years ago, but the best I got was a prescription for Reglan, which I refused to take because of the side effects (good thing, too, because people are now going after the maker of Reglan after developing something called “tardive dyskinesia”).
Two things that I recently found help me with the “eating sleep” (which in my case is probably linked to my incredibly slow gastric emptying and/or post-prandial fullness): I started drinking coffee again (making my own lattes), and if I’m going out somewhere (with someone else driving), I force myself to eat something small (piece of toast, half a bagel, etc.) before leaving. The coffee doesn’t help keep me awake (I can drink 5 cups of coffee and still fall asleep after eating), but it does seem to help move things along in my gut, though I’m not sure if that’s due to the caffeine or because I’m somewhat lactose intolerant; maybe a bit of both. Eating something small & then going out with someone, I’m usually able to keep myself awake (though I may take a nap in the car first)… and doing this at least gets some food in me, so I don’t have to worry about my blood thinner going sideways. Other than that, the only thing I can do is to plan on eating just before I want to sleep (and hope I stay awake long enough to put leftover food away instead of falling asleep in it).
One important note to some of the folks who have posted here: I’ve done a lot of research about this “eating sleep” and have found there are people who fall asleep 10-20 minutes *after* eating (I’m in that group), then there are folks who fall asleep/pass out **while** eating, sometimes after only a few bites of food. It appears as if these are 2 very different conditions, and I recently stumbled upon the diagnosis for the passing-out-while-eating issue… it’s called “Deglutition Syncope” and is a fairly serious problem related to the heart. Look it up online and decide if the symptoms match your situation; if they do, get yourself to the doctor asap with a printout of the info. Hope that helps some people receive the medical attention & care they desperately need.
If & when I find out more, I’ll be back with another post. Until then…
My apologies… my 1st post got garbled because of the “>>” I used. The beginning of the post SHOULD read as follows:
Important info for people who pass out WHILE eating at the end of this post.
Like many others here, I too have found the only reliable “cure” for whatever causes me to drop off is to just not eat, at least not anything more than a bite or two of whatever. Liquids seems to be okay, though a smoothie/milkshake consumed too fast can also knock me out. What makes things even more aggravating is that a gastric emptying test done on me last year showed that it takes *forever* for solids to pass thru me… a “normal” person needs approx. 90 minutes; it takes over 500 minutes for me. And so far, no one has been able to explain why. The only “good” thing about the delayed gastric emptying is that I rarely feel hungry and have gone as long as 4 days without any desire to eat. The bad thing about that is not eating screws with the blood thinner medication I take, so while I’d be happy to only eat once a week, I usually have to force myself to eat something every day in order to avoid having my blood get too thinned out. That one time I had not eaten in 4 days landed me in the hospital ER because my blood was like water and I was in danger of internal hemorrhage.
What I have been diagnosed with (and am on medications for):
Hypothyroidism (taking 50mcg levothyroxine daily)
A very *severe* Vitamin D deficiency (taking 50,000 IU Vitamin D weekly)
A blood clotting disorder of unknown origin, which caused a massive pulmonary embolism 4 yrs ago that by all rights should have killed me instantly…I still wonder how I survived (taking 5mg warfarin daily)
Fibromylagia
Degenerative disc disease
Myofascial pain syndrome
Gallstones (I should have surgery for this, but have been putting it off due to being on blood thinner… risks outweigh benefits)
And then: I am a 49 yr old female…
Sorry for the goof!!
I don’t usually fall asleep, but I feel physically weak and have a hard time breathing and have rotten brain fog when I eat. If I stick ONLY to carbs, the problem goes away. But if I have ANY protein, the problem is horrendous. Right now I’m pregnant, so I have to make sure to have protein, but what it does to my energy and breathing is really hard. I have IBS type C and I think that the reason this happens for me is possibly tied to that because my body processes everything so very SLOWLY.
To all of you who get tired after you eat the cause and cure of your whole life’s problem is one word. You can read about these symptoms in Marie Goodwin’s book, “The cause and cure of RLS” or you can take sodium out of your diet. If you don’t know how much sodium is in your diet then you have too much. Sodium will paralyze you, confuse you and make you aggressive. No one product you are eating has a lot of sodium “maybe” , but all of it together is loaded, especially if you are tired after eating. A high energy diet is what you are looking for. Fruit, almonds, raw veggies diced up and sprinkled over your meals even over your cooked veggies. Good luck on feeling better. I’m 50 and this is your answer, you need not look any further.
Mike in Mississippi
I only wish this were true. I have been tested for every blood level known to man now and all are within the normal range with sodium actually below normal as with chloresteral and triglycerides. I have tried eliminating every food group, eating only from each food group, etc..
This is much more than just a bought of laziness or anything most people understand. I have actually got Doctors that have the same problem studying this and so far they have only just begun to find anything at all that could be the cause. Low hormones can cause some of these symtoms and the correction of that problem has had some success in some patients. Others this does not apply to and even increasing the hormone level in them has not helped so this may only be the tip of the iceberg. The tiredness we are talking about here is more than just the sleepy feeling after Thanksgiving dinner, this is a feeling of similar to being on the edge of passing out. No amount of caffein or energy drinks will eliminate this.
Thank you for adding to the blog as who knows, maybe a tiny bit of advise like yours will someday be the answer we are looking for!
Hi everyone, first of all thank you so much for this page! I found this by an internet search and can’t believe how informative it’s been. After the issue being almost ignored by doctors more than once and feeling like there’s something really wrong with my amount of sleepiness, I’m relieved to find I’m not the only one! Thank you. I get tired often, it’s also after food. I used to think it was just tiredness but recently I found if I go hours without eating I won’t notice so much, then I eat, 30 min.s, I want to sleep! I agree with above comments about eyes feeling like they have lead weights. Well, I have spent ages sat here reading the first 72 comments, going to have to take a break because I’m tired now and I think you all know what it’s like to try to read like this! Definitely will come back to read the rest, can’t believe all the people and that the thread’s still active – I’ll definitely be regularly checking this so I hope people can keep updating us.
I’ve been to doctors for blood tests and often get chuckles or a brush-off comment when I talk about it. I’ve had the standard blood tests – hypothyroid, blood sugar and another I can’t remember – more than once and all come back fine. I say to my partner I sort of wish they did find what’s wrong with me (though that sounds bad) so I could treat it and have it cured! I’ve had the problem since my teens, in my 20s now.
Anyway, I read a lot of comments about doctors not knowing, not helping or even telling you it’s normal to get tired. I just wanted to add something that I found enlightening and I didn’t know and hopefully by passing this along it might help someone else in dealing with getting healthcare.
I live in the UK (England), first of all. However, I know this applies to the US as well under a slightly different name I think. I’m doing a degree in ‘Biomedical Sciences’ and coming to the end of it now. The name sounds too fancy, it’s studying human illnessess and a lot of research about them! I chose the degree after a few years out of education just because it sounded interesting. It’s a very job-orientated degree to train to be a Biomedical Scientist, a type of job under strict regulation by the Health Professions Council in the UK, which governs other ‘allied health professions’ like radiology, physiotherapy I think, etc. Anyway, before my degree, I was under the impression (which I’ve found a lot of people have) that doctors, or GPs, are these very knowledgeable health experts that you go to, they figure some things out, read some books, and fix you. Well, in theory – I haven’t ever actually seen this. Well, I found out that actually they only know how to diagnose physical problems, like wounds, etc. For symptoms that need testing (no visible illness), they only know to request certain generalised (usually-fixes-things) tests based on common symptoms. The tests they take, or get nurses to take, or are taken in a hospital (Eg blood, urine, cerebral-spinal fluid, really all sorts, you name it they sample it). These tests get sent to the labs which are completely ran by Biomedical Scientists (BMS). They do some tests, originally by hand but increasingly now by machines, the BMS look at the results and tell the doctor what illness you have. The doctor honestly doesn’t diagnose you. If the tests are unknown, they tell the doctor that and he tells you it’s a mystery or sends more tests a way in hope of getting lucky there. I was so surprised about this – I hope I’m not telling you all things you know!! Basically, doctors really aren’t that in-the-know about illnesses. Not that I needed to tell you all! Particularly if they’re internal, about blood levels or body chemical levels, etc. I’m not trying to big up BMS, I don’t think they know much either, they just run tests and type up the diagnosis, they don’t know your symptoms or who you are, it’s just predictions. Their reasons for the diagnoses they make are only based on what research has found so far and there’s plenty that researchers don’t know. The more I study, the more unknowns I find…
Anyway, so sorry this has turned out so long. I’m nearly finished my degree but won’t be a BMS myself. I will be qualified but it’s not for me, plus I’m concerned what I will be able to work as because of these health issues everyone here has – it really affects daily life and functioning. My reason for typing all this is I want people to realise doctors really don’t know! Don’t doubt yourself as one of the best people to observe and diagnose yourself, don’t just accept a diagnosis or a load of drugs they throw at you (even if the diagnosis is right, which it might not be, often the drugs doctors give you aren’t a brilliant treatment anyway). I hope I’ve helped people in some way – I just want people to be more enlightened about how (not)knowledgeable doctors really are. I really think solving health issues like this is a difficult journey which maybe we need to solve ourselves. Good Luck everyone and sorry again for the long post!!
eating only apples during the day, i felt great-had tremendous energy, quickwitted, felt, really wonderful-just “broke” it with a bowl of oatmeal and peanut butter(how long can i eat just apples, i told myself), and within seconds of eating, i feel crappy-spaced out, low energy, depressed-been having this my whole life-what the hell to do-eat apples all day?-well, until i figure it out, i guess that’ll have to do-but—i sure am glad to see–it aint just me!!!!!
I suuffered with extreme fatigue for years after eating. Went to many doctors and hospitals for this and the “Fibromyalgia” and Arthritis. I slept every afternoon and was tired all the time with a heartrate that had to be controled with medicine to slow it down.
My GP recently asked me if anyone had addressed my Vitamin D levels. My response was “Why?” Well because they are less than 1/3 the minimum level they should be. He further stated that it wasn’t a big deal. I said can we get the level up. He said we probably could but it won’t mean much. I ask that we try and so I started taking 50,000 IU Vitamin D weekly for 4 months. I actually had two doctors prescribe this at the same time so I took it twice as long as they thought was necessary. Sure enough the Vitamin D levels went up to just under the minimum requirement and now I take 1000mg/day. It is still creeping up monthly.
Well, after 17 years of suffering with the continuous fatigue, it is gone. That is right. GONE!!! I even threw away one of the blood pressure medicines and will soon kick the other one to the curb. No more fatigue. Heart rate at 64 beats per minute. And I am 56 years old. I think back and wonder, was this really necessary. Why didn’t someone catch this sooner? I don’t know but I do know that I am much better. Thank God and my GP.
Oh my gosh, I thought I was really weird. After eating, I get so sleepy, it is like being drugged. I cannot stay awake. It doesn’t seem to matter what I eat. I have tried changing things around. Oatmeal with brown sugar, or honey even does it. It just doesn’t seem to matter. Even fruit. I hate it. It gets so bad that I got in trouble at work for falling asleep. So, like others, I avoid eating if I know I have things to get done. Recently I started putting other random things together and wonder if they are connected. I also experience rapid irregular heart rate sometimes after I eat, and over the last 6 months have had pnumonia and a severe asthma attack. I don’t have asthma though. I woke up at 530 unable to breath and coughing up blood. I wonder if all of this is related. Anyone else having simalar issues ?
I was thinking about all the people who have the same problem. We say it is like we are drugged and no matter what, we cannnot stay awake. Like so many, I also go into a drugged sleep for 20- 45 min, then I am fine, and like so many we all avoid eating most of the day. So, my question is this. Why has noone been able to put this all together. Why, if we all have the same problem can noone figure out what it is. Their has to be someone who knows what we all have and how to help us. I read on here about eating fruit, nuts, protein, carbs. I have tried it all. I am not overweight, I work out 3 times a week, I avoid alcohol, ( although that is because I have an allergic reaction to wine), I don’t drink anything with caffeine, I don’t smoke, so the only thing left is a medical issue of some sort.
I have asked several Doctors now and have had blood tests where they draw it every hour for 24 hours, had a 24 hour urine collection, have had everything that can be checked with a blood test checked, and no answers have been given. I did however experience a brief time that I had less of a time with this. The only thing different at the time was I was placed on a steroid. For several days, maybe even up to 2 weeks, I thought that this was going to be the answer but it turned out not to be. I went back and tried to think of anything different that I did or didn’t do during that time but can not come up with anything. I am back to eating once a day in the late evening so I do not fall asleep during daily activities. The only GOOD thing about this problem is, if I have a night that I am having trouble sleeping, all I have to do is have a couple cookies, a piece of cheese, a pop tart, some fruit or veggies, really anything at all and out I go for at least another hour.
It gets real tough on days when I have a lot of physical activity as my body gets drained fast. I have now noticed that even a cup of coffee with either creamer or sweetener can make me drousy but black doesn’t seem to.
Good luck fellow sufferers and please post any new solutions to try or recommendations that have serious thought behind them.
My drowsiness problems always start with grains..not only gluten (wheat) but brown rice, oats, and other grains. I had gone gluten free and alot of my health problems and drowsiness went away, but then I started taking a gluten free vegan Brown Rice protein powder and my problems came back immediately (very sensitive reddish roacea type skin, hives, weak ankles, general bloating and inflammation, unable to walk without hurting) I am a runner so I know something is wrong when I can’t even walk a mile.
I know it is not a carbohydrate issue cause I can eat a plain baked potato and I feel completely fine and actually energized. Fortunately, I also am fine with corn. So corn tortilla is a staple that replaces bread and flour.
Corn torilla + two slices of roast beef or pastrami + slice of sharp chedder cheese and an apple keeps me oddly full and no longer sleepy.
Hello to all, Apologies for the long post, I do hope it helps some…
I just found this site during some extensive research over many months. When I found this site I was searching for these keywords “Low T” + “Sleep Apnea” + “reactive hypoglycemia”. Which are 3 of the most prominent symptoms I am experiencing lately. What an eye opener to find this blog. Thank you to all who contributed and noted their symptoms. It was key in me putting mine together and finding a solution that worked for me.
I have since controlled my symptoms (one of which was falling asleep or just feeling plain exhausted and depressed after eating something) by using a carb/sugar free diet. In my case for this symptom anyway, some of it involved sugar/carb free supplements (drinks, bars etc to satisfy my “sweet tooth” mostly).
The reason I decided to post is I believe I have found a link (at least in my case) for all of the symptoms I have experienced. Which is sugar sensitivities (reactive hypoglycemia or insulin resistance, not sure which exactly), Low Testosterone and Apnea. Along with general exhaustion, depression and anxiety. Real nice bunch of symptoms .
I used to be a moderate to heavy drinker (3-4 drinks per day avg usually before bed sometimes much more, sometimes less) and worked at a job that is HIGH STRESS, both for 8+ years almost daily. It seems the mix of those things along with a poor diet due to time restrictions and lack of exercise has put me in similar situations as the rest of you. After many months of doctor visits (each attempting to put me on some sort of anti-depressant and/or Hormone therapy) and my own testing with diet and exercise I found that, at least in my situation so far, it is a mix of life long hypoglycemic issues, a hormonal issue and/or adrenal fatigue. My body just had enough with trying to keep up the pace my mind had set for it (by the way I am a type A personality – which is absolutely no help in a case like this ). I have had all sorts of blood tests and the only thing that was showing up was the low testosterone issue. Blood sugar test (fasting) was normal, liver enzymes and white blood cell counts were perfect along with all sorts of other stuff. All normal… or at least within a normal range. Cholesterol was a little high but not a real concern.
I have taken these very detailed steps over a couple weeks (discovering each over several months of trial and error) and for the last 7 days I have been almost completely symptom free.
1) Quit drinking alcohol daily (stopped completely for a couple months first) – I still have a few once a week or so now but I eat good protein while drinking and follow the day after drinking with my new diet (more on that later).
2) Took a sleep study – My fiancé noticed I would snore a lot and stop breathing for extended periods of time while sleeping. Told the doctor, he issued a sleep study and now I have a CPAP. Mild to moderate apnea was discovered. Important note – this issue seems to be a “chicken or the egg” issue in that I am not sure if drinking brought on the apnea producing low t (and its symptoms) or the drinking brought on low t causing the apnea. In either case the 1 of 2 parts of the central issue was “chronic” drinking and not sleeping well. I use the CPAP every night now and although I am not completely refreshed in the morning, I feel a TON better than I did prior. Oh and no sugar or carbs before bed. Protein and a high fiber fruit (apple) have worked the best for me. I have had much more sound sleep along with being able to sleep a straight 7 or more hours now. Before I was lucky to get 5 and could never get above 6 and half on a good night.
3) Exercise every other day – I perform a mildly intense type workout with pushups, pull ups, weights, crunches and light cardio every other day with evening walks in between. Nothing super intense but enough to get a little sweat going for a good 20 minutes or so – Another Important note – I ALWAYS eat something small with lots of protein and very light carbs (Atkins peanut butter protein bar with water) 30 minutes before my work out. That is the only way I do not feel exhausted and extremely fatigued during or after the workout. Then an hour after the workout I eat a good meal. Protein and veggies (dark green veggies (fresh spinach, asparagus, broccoli) and animal protein – chicken, fish even steak and hamburger)
4) Reduced my work (employment) load and decreased my stress level – I am doing this with extreme will power and a lot of self talk. I just say to myself “will what I do at work even matter in 100 years?”…it actually could matter but the thought of it not mattering helps me give up the worry and concern. Believe me when I say that for a type A personality like me this is by far the most difficult. Quitting drinking was easier . The stress from work would put my body in a constant “fight or flight” mode all the time. To the point that I would fall asleep and wake up every couple hours thinking about work. Bad bad bad stuff.
5) Changed my diet to an Atkins type diet – I have always been 165-175 pounds since I was 18. Even though I do not need to lose weight, a no/very low carb diet has helped tremendously. I started the diet in maintenance since I am only trying to maintain my weight not lose weight. This is the part that may be the most different for each of us experiencing these symptoms. Some people can’t handle all that protein with no carbs, others need something else or need to lose weight. This is where my discovery and testing for several months brought me. It may be different, of course for everyone else but it is a great place to start. Follow it to the letter for your weight and needs, again, at least as a place to start.
6) Stay positive – This is really something that is hard to do as well but it helped me to be driven to figure this out. I enjoyed the journey to find answers. Even if it would have killed me, I at least tried to have fun learning and experimenting. Its different for some people that may not enjoy research but I remember one day laughing to myself in the midst of intense exhaustion/depression symptoms and saying “well, the M & M candy diet doesn’t work, on the to the next”.
I go to the doc in a couple days for my testosterone test again (3 months from the last one) to see if all of this has helped that. All that I have found and read says that moderate exercise and high animal protein and vegetable diet helps increase testosterone levels and decrease cortisol levels (The stress hormone). ..along with decreasing stress and of course alcohol consumption. I will let all of you know soon what I find out. One thing I do know is that my get-up-and-go is back a bit so here’s to hoping my T level is improving at least.
Now this is not the final answer. I am still experimenting and bringing things into my diet a little at a time and I am still smoking and drinking caffeine, which both are a real No-No during this but…all of the above has made a huge difference. I truly hope it helps someone else and I would love to hear if some of you have any other ideas I can try.
Best to you all in your search.
Cc
My recent experience has been somewhat similar. What has recently helped is herbs that promote insulin activity: bitter melon, gymnema.
My impression is that while my system is processing carbs well enough to keep the actual BG in normal range after eating, the processing is a strain to the system, putting a drag on other functions. With the herbs, the same pattern still happens, but the drag is less severe and shorter.
PS. Also I get drowsy after even a non-carb food if it’s large or solid and heavy and makes the stomach work a lot. Also sometimes drinking something acid helps. There are a couple of good Wikipedia articles which talk about such factors other than carbs.
I will look into the herbs thing…can you give a bit more detail? Maybe some links and stuff I can go through to learn more about this?
FYI – After 2 months of all that I have been doing above (and really only two weeks of the diet) My T level went from 440 to 510…woo stinking hoo
going two more months and hoping for another good rise in T levels. I will follow up.
The only herbs I have tried so far for about one month each: gymnema (‘sugar destroyer’) and for the next month switched to bitter melon. Both come in 1-gram capsules and recommend 1 capsule per day. Both seem to give me about the same results helping the drowsiness. If I have too much carb or sugar at a meal, there’s the same pattern of drop in energy,but it’s not as deep and doesn’t last as long. Instead of a 2 hour nap to recover, I can just sit and rest a few minutes to half an hour?, or over-ride it by jumping up immediately to do dishes or some simple chore with body movement.
During the same time, I tried to switch to ‘slow carbs’, ie away from wheat and rice products to millet,quinoa, etc. Look up ‘glycemic index’: this is a measure of how fast the carbs get processed. Mendosa’s diabetic site has a very complete list. He also has a useful factor called ‘glycemic load’ which combines the amount of carbs and the speed of processing.
Gymnema and bitter melon are traditionally used in Asia to treat diabetes. Apparently it’s not clear whether they increase insulin production or help the insulin work (ie decrease ‘insulin resistance’) or both. There are warnings that diabetics should be very careful with them because they might bring the blood sugar too low (‘hypo’).
Look up the various functions of insulin, and look up ‘insulin resistance.’
I found this too.
A few years ago I experimented with not eating carbohydrates. The effect was immediate, not sleepy, more energy.
A real killer experience was the first Christmas. I didn’t eat the carbohydrate. The potatoes, the bread sauce, the christmas pudding… While everbody else slept in the afternoon (which I always felt was normal) I went out for a walk then a run. Remarkable difference.
I still eat much less carbo than I grew up with, though I find that after heavy exercise a bit of carbo is a good idea to replenish my energy.
If you’re feeling like this try reducing carbo for a day or two. If it doesn’t make a difference you haven’t lost much!
I really get sleepy after eating. The sleepiness I always have to fight off by drinking coffee or tea. I also experience a headache or head pressure of some sort that runs from the top of my forehead down to my left chest. I’m not sure if its emanating through the heart. Its not painful though it feels like a brain to heart burning sensation or pressure with brain fog, anxiety and sleepiness mixed in. It’s really very hard to explain. I’m actually worried that this may eventually lead to heart disease or stroke.
Wow. So wonderful to read all of your experiences. I have had the same problem plus a problem of falling asleep about 90 minutes after a brisk walk. A few weeks ago I had some candy while my husband was driving. Fell asleep. Exact same thing next day. Worried, I asked him if the candy wasn’t making HIM tired, too, and when he said no and looked like I just said the strangest thing in the world, I decided I had to work on this again.
I’m not diabetic, but like many, I had been tested for it. I’m normal. However, I read recently about testing yourself at the 1 hour, 1.5 hour, 2 hour, and 3 hour marks after eating 60 grams of carbs without protein or fat to balance it out. If your readings stay within a tight range, you’re probably normal. If your numbers go way up at the 1 hour mark, then way down after, you might have reactive hypoglycemia. With the bagel, my glucose was 133 at 1 hour and then 85 at 2. On 60 grams of carbs from Kashi cereal, 2% milk, and a half of a banana, my high was only 92!
I’m going to pick one day per week and test at 1 hr, 1.5 hours, and 2 hours for at least one of the meals, carefully tracking carbs, proteins, and fat to see what effect they have on my readings.
For the walking, I noticed that I never have a problem on vacation. At first I thought it was the pace, so I slowed down the walk at home. That didn’t always work. Then I realized that on vacation, we walked a lot after meals. Now I eat my lunch at work and immediately go out for a short walk around the parking lot. If I can’t, I walk up and down the stairs and around the building a few times. Now I’m going to start testing glucose on walk days and see what type of pattern shows up.
Since I am not diabetic, my insurance won’t pay for monitors or supplies. I recently read that the Relion meters and sticks sold at Walmart in the US are only around $9 for the meter and $20 for the sticks. I don’t go through many, so price isn’t a problem for me and I’m using a different meter. I did, however, buy a Relion a1c home test this week. (You mail it in for analysis.) I don’t know how good it is because I don’t have the results back yet, but it, too, was only $9!
For those of you who don’t have insurance, you might give it a try. It’s cheaper for me and the medical system to get these numbers myself. I’ll share them with my doctor if they show a problem, but if not, I’ve saved everyone time and I don’t have to worry about getting refused insurance further down the road for being marked diabetic.
I do worry, though, about what happens if I’m in a car accident and the EMTs start a glucose drip… They started one on me when I had a routine colonoscopy my number was 139 before I got a chance to ask the nurse if my “problems dealing with carbs and sugars” might be a problem.
wow !
I am amazed how many of us suffer this awful disabling condition.
When I eat (it does not matter what I eat), I am drugged by my own body and sleep as if in a coma ! I sometimes dont remember falling asleep. I just wake up.
I use my condition if on a long flight or train journey ,I eat knowing I will sleep most of the journey but of course this is causing me huge problems in the rest of my life.
I had a severe hypoglycemic attack after eating jelly !
I was found to have reactive hypoglycemia , this was found after a glucose tolerance test , but the third test I did was normal. So its
not a constant problem but intermittent problem.
I was also found to have a calcified pancreas (found by chance), also my mother has a calcified pancreas.
I was checked for all sorts of diseases and inherited disorders all negative.
I was found to suffer from vit d deficiency and once my vit d is back to normal, once I stop taking it its deficient again.So I have to take it constantly.
All my gut hormones were checked, all normal, Insulin normal.
Interesting is my daughter suffers the same and has polycystic ovary syndrome which is a insulin resistant disorder. I have uncles and aunts with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes.
I started to study the way the body should always keep us in balance .For instance low calcium causes high phosphate to pull back the calcium. High salt ,low potassium and vice versa, also how calcium and salt take up the same space, so if one is too high it can cause a problem , this is when your kidneys switch on and off gates , these gates release the high chemicals to correct the balance , it all happens when we are so unaware………………but its when it goes slightly wrong !
How we are affected, the fine tuning not working so well makes us sick .
When we release insulin to break down glucose , if its too high (the insulin) the pancreas releases another hormone to release stored glucose from our livers or we go hypoglycemic !
Another problem that hits the elderly is lack of acid in the stomach , that causes malabsoption and the lack of acid causes all sorts of neurological problems relating to the digestive system , make your stomach more acid and see if what you have may be that simple.
Simple problems that are easy to treat , but we look for a complicated answer , its not your diet, its your own gut and body that has the problem , you have to find it yourself, you may be suffering from deficiencies that make you feel so ill and a simple acid problem or lack of acid.
Take care and good luck.
Rosie
I have tried just about everything that you have and have found nothing yet to give me an answer to why this happens. I know mine is not an acid problem as I have way too much stomach acid on a normal day and have to take a prescription med to calm it down. This is only a recent thing and the falling asleep after eating is an ongoing issue. (3 or more years now). I have tried vitamins and blood work of all kinds. I did find out I had low testosterone levels but even with correction the sleep issue still comes. Today so far I have eaten some meat and cheese along with a cup of half cocoa, half coffee and have not fallen asleep. I ate the exact same thing Friday and passed right out cold. (sleep, not actually passing out) I’ve had to resort to only eating once a day if I have anything at all I have to do. Otherwise, I have fallen asleep while driving, while working on computers, in meetings, at public functions, just about anywhere you can imagine. I have been able to fight it off at times but it is not easy. I never had this problem when my blood presure was untreated and was extremely high (260/165 or higher) but since I am now to a normal level, the problem is almost a constant. I have tried looking to the medications used to treat my blood presure but since the start of treatment, every one of them has been changed to s different medicine so that can not be the issue unless more than one of them could cause the same problem. Not to mention, I seriously doubt that everyone in the world with this condition is on the same types of medications.
I wish you the best with your problem and hope we somehow find an answer to this before someone gets hurt or worse.
Hi NAte,
I know the nightmare you are having , if I could just again mention some of the test I had done , what I have found out and the reason I mentioned stomach acid.
This is the list of some of the test I have had done just for this problem , not for other problems I have , but not to confuse the matter , I feel they are the cause of all of this to me and maybe others.
My symptoms are having eating even small amounts like toast !
I wake up ………….
I have no memory of going to sleep , other than a few yawns.
When I wake up , I feel I have been drugged, my neck is sore due to my head falling to one side.
I may have been asleep for 10 minutes or 2 hours.
Once I am awake I feel flushed and may even have pins and needles , I dont feel well.
I now can get rid of that feeling by eating soft fruit , like a few grapes.
Test I have had done by gastroenterologists .
Endoscopy(several) looking for diseases ect and taking biopsies,checking for celiac and other stomach disorders.
xray after eating radioactive food , to check for dumping syndrome, which is a condition where your stomach delays emptying(this causes insulin problems and low glucose).Duodenum biopsies to check small bowel for problems.
Everything normal !
Glucose tolerance test , result abnormal, hypoglycemic. comment written on results “normally seen in bypass stomach surgery ” !
But my stomach was found to be normal.
Blood tests,where early morning bloods are taken and frozen on the spot to check the gut hormones (looking for cancers). Normal (thank goodness).
Blood tests looking for everything from auto immune ,liver ,kidney the ususal rounds of tests !
What was found was a clue…deficiencies.
I was also seeing a neurologist and cardiologists and now also having problems with my eyes, and I have complained for roughly 6 years of pain upper abdominal.
( Of course due to all my symptoms I am sure they were looking for a psychiatrist ! ).
I had to also educate myself to make sure nothing was missed, by me or them. I looked at it as a study of science, proof 100% , not to be misdiagnosed and then to suffer with it for the rest of my life, I wanted a cure , not a quick fix. I had to look at the evidence , listen to the doctors (some of it total rubbish ) some of it interesting.
The cardiologist found my blood pressure to be very low with low sodium(salt), said this is why I fell asleep, blood pressure dropped after food. Sounded possible since I had low blood pressure and he did various tests to further check out my low blood pressure and put me on drugs to treat this (fludrocortisone and midodrine),he never found out why I had very low blood pressure ! He never looked ! I carried on falling asleep after food but the faint attacks improved.
I had brain scans,nerve tests, muscle tests, lumbar puncture, blood tests for neurological diseases, negative , negative.
I saw endocrinologists, several neurologists,gastroenterologists,ent doctors(lost my balance), and eye doctors as I grew cataracts,scars on the macular and then was found to be bleeding at the back of both retina’s.
The last neurologoist did a vitamin blood test and found I was deficient of vit D and also folate, both very low.
What was so odd , I had a tan and I eat meat !
My Gp sent me for a scan( I was convinced my on going severe pain that non of the doctors could diagnose must be a hernia)lucky the person doing the scan was a doctor(this was all just luck), she found my pancreas was sick !
I had stones in my pancreas(not gallbladder),and it was calcified.
Lucky for me it is working normally,but something made it calcified.
I will try to make this short ,my daughter whilst jogging suffered a fractured pelvis, and was also found to have suffered a previous fracture(she was 23yrs) diagnosed with osteopenia (vit D deficiency), my mother was also found to have a calcified pancreas and osteoporosis.
So the question was why since my stomach was normal did I have this, if I could find out then I could help my daughter, anyway a few years later my other daughter complained of really feeling very unwell and was also found to have vit d deficiency, her calcium and phosphate levels in her boots, and this was in the height of the summer and she sunbathed a month before.
I had lots of tests for inherited diseases all came back normal !
I spoke to my consultant we both agree the pancreas is not the cause but like my other problems the results of the cause ! The low calcium and vit D can trigger secondary hyperparathyroidism that can then cause a calcifed pancreas(that was my years of pain ) I also suffered muscle pain, bone pain and neurological problems, all normal now since being on vit D, even my blood pressure is better and I dont need drugs. I have damaged eyes,balance and the pancreatic stones but the rest is better except this falling asleep.
So who else falls asleep after food ? look at it from a scientific view point.. old people !!!!
I looked at this, old people fall asleep, why because their stomachs dont work as well and they suffer deficiences. Low acid and high acid of the stomach both cause indigestion and heart burn, which I have suffered for over 20 yrs after certain foods, mostly flour, wheat , I could not eat fresh bread without being in agony, I was convinced I had food problems, like everyone barking up all the wrong trees ,wasting my life !(red herrings, watch out for those).
Trial and error , medicine is not a perfect science (used a lot by doctors when they make mistakes ), but they are right , its not. And there is alot they miss, they are busy and want a quick answer to send you on your way, when you get complicated you can be dismissed, so you need to look at your self, check what you do (you take prescription drugs that stop your acid and heartburn, that also blocks your calcium and can cause deficiencies, and also can cause an inbalance to your gut, read more about them.
Millions infact billions of people dont have this so therefore its not food ! Its our bodies and genectics, you can be born to have low stomach acid, suffer deficiences that go unnoticed, you just have a life of feeling unwell, break a bone or two, suffer anemia’s ,poor at fighting infections,and even develop cancers,your stomach acid helps break down food for minerals like sodium,calcium and vitamins.
If you go to a good health shop and buy some stomach enzymes (which is really for old people) and try it , you never know !
I have been on it for 3 days and kept awake so far , so I am really pleased , I have stilled yawn but stayed awake.
It says you dont have to take it for ever only to kick start you own stomach acid into working again properly,.
Also think about the vitamins, without them such damage can be done .Both my daughter are on vit D and both feel well,one gets sleepy after food so she will also take this enzyme.
So apart from my other problems this one has been very disabling , so I hope when I see my consultants next , I can tell them what I have found out, and maybe doctors need to suggest that to anyone suffering this awlful disorder.
Give it a try , you never know you may be the only one awake to wash up after christmas dinner !
Your blood pressure is abnormally high, did they check your kidney function and scan your kidneys ? Did they tell you why it was so high !
High blood pressure can affect your hormones, also you are at risk of osteoporosis ! And that you take anti acids ,further blocking your calcium.
I would ask for further blood tests, to check out your calcium levels, ask why your blood pressure is so high before treatment(never except it is with out a reason ) and get to see an encrinologist to sort out your hormones.
good luck
Where to begin? I guess I’ll start with my blood presure. It is so high (untreated) due to a very large area of damage in my spine. I have 7 ruptured discs and 2 broken bones in my thoracic spine due to a work injury. The pain is what has caused a lot of the blood presure issues but also, one of the treatments was a nerve block thats done in the operating room. The Dr doing the set of 3 shots just so happened to miss on #2 and hit the nerves to the right side of my heart instead of what he was supposed to be aiming for. They had to break 2 Procardia pills under my tounge while I was still on the table to get my BP down. At the time I did not realize what had happened so I went about my business. It wasn’t until months later at a follow up with my normal Dr that my high BP was discovered. Of course there is no way to prove what happened that day so I am left on medications for the rest of my life.
I have tried diets and I have my bloodwork done every 3 months because of my Low T condition. All of my numbers are in the normal or real close to normal with the exception of of the one cancer test. On this I am real low for my area and surprise everyone with this including my Dr.. I guess in my area, the Prostate test is above average for most people. I imagine that the refinery we live under has something to do with this but again, no way to prove this.
My vitamin tests have all come back normal even being on the stomach medicine. About that…I do NOT take it as prescribed because of the damage it can do. I probably only take it 2 or 3 times a week and this has been enough to keep me from having an upset stomach and has also been enough to stop me from having issues at night.
Yesterday was the worst day I have had yet! I woke up in the morning hungry. That alone is unusual. I made myself some toast and peanut butter along with a cup of coffee. From that point on, I slept!! I woke several times during the day but was not able to keep my eyes open for longer than 20 minutes at a time. I awoke about 5pm with the stiff neck and the pins and needles you mentioned, adjusted myself so I could get rid of the stiff neck and allow blood flow to the arm and leg that had fallen asleep, talked to my wife for no more than a minute and went out cold. I woke up at 930pm, took my night time meds and went out again until 5am this morning. She asked me this morning if I was in pain yesterday and had taken muscle relaxers and I told her I had not and that I have no idea why I was like that yesterday.
Could I have been exhausted from pain? Yes. Has it ever had this effect on me before? NO!, not to this extent.
I have not had all of the tests that you have and have no desire to go through that much! I commend you on going through this much and pray you never have to do any of that again! I have had the normal upper and lower GI tests done with bleeding ulcers being the only abnormal thing found. I take a mens vitamin every other day as taken every day, I build up too much “C” and it starts to work in reverse.
The only abnormal blood result that I have had is several times I have been told that I have a high white blood cell count. No one has ever done anything about it nor have they seemed concerned so neither have I. Being that I JUST remembered this, I am now going to go see what I can find on this and see if maybe this has something to do with my problem!
I wish you the best and hope that someday we can get an answer to this. Who knows, you may be on the very edge of solving this yourself with all of the tests and questions you have asked.!! Have a great weekend!
Ohh…. just woken up. Ate lunch at one-thirty, now quarter to five. And aching – almost feels like it is INSIDE the marrow of my thigh bones and arm bones. Hopeless… I made my own fish cakes and salad was raw with just lettuce, tomatoes, peppers and no dressing. And yet, someone might as well have just shot a tranquiliser dart into me.
Yep, that is what we go through with no help so far to figure out why. I am constantly falling asleep with a cup of coffee in my hand or a plate on my lap, etc… Then when I wake up, not only do I have a sore neck from the position I slept, my arm or leg asleep from the lack of blood because of the position I fell asleep in, but also feel like I’ve been run over by a roller. The last part does not happen all of the time but when the weather is cold and wet it is a given. I had a bowl of Rasin Bran Crunch this morning along with 2 cups of black coffee, hurried up and jumped in the shower to try to fight the sleep, but as soon as I set down, out I went for almost 2 hours. I awoke with the change still in my hand that I took out of one pair of pants to put into the clean ones.
Hi Nate,
Like I had to , you need to now become a medical detective to yourself ! Its the only way to unravel your problems and separate the red herrings !
First before your injury , did you have a problem with food and sleeping. So looking for time and place of when it started.
After you eat (hours after) is there fluid still sloshing around in your stomach . Delayed emptying.
Look up a condition called carcinoid syndrome(not that you have a carcinoid ) but the symptoms are similar.
Look up dumping syndrome. Its all about problems emptying the stomach either too slow or too fast.
Look up gastroparesis.
Find one that matches you.
Buy one of those machines diabetics use to check there blood levels(finger needle test), check your blood before food and 2 hours after food,if you have reactive hypoglycemia it will be low( mind dropped to 2.4), if you check your blood first thing in the morning before your first drink and its high, then you need to be checked for diabetes, these gadgets dont cost alot, also you can help by ruling things out.
Then check out your surgery again ,get your notes and check what was damaged and what the surgeon did to correct the problem. how it affected your blood pressure, what nerves were damaged !
Check to see if any alimentary nerves were damaged , you have nerves to the stomach, these nerves can cause huge problems after food , parasympathetic nerves serve the stomach but after food can cause a shift to the sympathetic nerves and this affects your brain ! Autonomic part of your brain controls nerves and things like the blood pressure.
When you reach a state of problems you are left with , you because you know you so well need now to help you.
The problem with the internet we all think we have things wrong with us that we dont, so to avoid that you must have a open mind, make sure you tick every box. The nervous system can give the same symptoms whether you have MS or nerve damage as it affects the nerves, pins and needles is common ,but what is your cause is what you need to find out.
You have already ruled out deficiencies, so now to move on to motor damage !
High white cell count is found in infections, viruses (very high in glandular fever ) , if the rest of your bloods are normal then its probably a virus.(remember red herrings dont let them cloud your problem ).
Rosie
You all give me so much hope! Even though we don’t have a cure, or even a name, for this thing. It’s wonderful to know I’m not crazy!
Between this sleep problem and needing surgery on my foot, I have been growing so depressed! I keep feeling as if I must have something wrong – but they never find anything. So, I reasoned, it must be me! I must be unmotivated. I must not want to get things done. I must be depressed if I can just “fall asleep” when I still have food clean up and dishes….
Thank you for helping me feel less like I’m insane and more like someone that has a problem. Not someone that IS the problem!
I’ll be checking back. I wish I had something to add beside the “medical tests were fine” and “doctors have no clue.”
Hi off to see an endrocrinologist next month to see if they can shine a light on this problem, again I believe in self help , anything to help this awful disabling condition.
I have been jabbing my finger and checking my blood sugar levels , I do this just before I feel myself going, after all the deep huge yawns………normal, my blood sugars could not be so normal.
I have checked my blood pressure as low blood pressure can also cause this……………normal.
I have a history of very low blood pressure and also attacks of hypoglycemia , but since my deficiences have been treated this is so normal, but it was blamed for causing this in the past.
Vit D deficiency can cause both depression and many many symptoms, I was very deficient.(I was surprised due to being white with a tan !).
Get yourself super fit, sort out any deficiencies, then see if you still have this problem.
I have been taking the stomach enzymes now for a month, to see if its an imbalance of stomach acid. I can eat white floor without indigestion now , which is great but it has not stopped the crashing after food.
I will keep looking for clues !
Rosie
This just happened to me. It’s been happening for a while.
The fog, the black-out sleep, can curl up anywhere and its like nothing else exists.
Then waking up feeling cold, I notice I’m a little pail and maybe dark around the eyes. Usually irritable.
Sometimes I would feel it coming on so I would try to eat other things to try to counteract it or drink coffee or tea
But it would always get me.
And my stomach also has a weird feeling after, not pain, almost a raw feeling I guess.
Sometimes a very almost unnoticeable headache located behind the temples.
My eyes usually feel dry-ish
someone mentioned Banana’s. Those get me every time. Pasta sometimes will do this to me, cereals or granola, I noticed Honey triggers it.
Sometimes I drink Yerba Mate as I am trying to drink less coffee, but sometimes it will have the reverse effect and put me to sleep.
raw Salads also make me sleep sometimes. And beans. Sweet potatoes. sometimes raw onions.
Also… drinking. I am that person who can’t stay up past 11.
Thinks that don’t give me the foggy sleepy stuff…
I get this really nice whole grain bread from the farmers market… I’m telling you this thing is heavy, It doesn’t squish when thrown in a bag
with the rest of the groceries. 🙂 This never makes me sleepy. I think someone mentioned the protein thing. I think this is a huge part of it.
I never get sleepy if I eat this bread, Tempeh, most soups (except for ones with beans), crackers and hummus, dark chocolate, Cooked collard greens
Sometimes eating something sweet with coffee keeps be alert for the morning. (I try not to do this too often but damn … it makes me feel euphoric sometimes!)
I also think that eating fermented tings such as saurkraut, pickles, kombucha, with a meal help.
Which also makes sense because they are pro-biotics and someone mentioned earlier that this could be a yeast issue.
Someday’s I can eat anything… but I noticed lunch has been my most dangerous time for this to happen.
anyways. That’s my story.
I am relieved to find other people coping with this.
It’s really kind of embarrassing and confusing.
I also want to note that I have recently gone Vegan and have been vegetarian for years.
But I don’t think that this has much to do with my “sleepyness” as I have been experiencing
this for as long as I can remember… i can actually remember eating a big mac years ago and
getting one of these spells…. heh
On the article about how food effects your moods…. Totally agree. I mean look at children. They are a good example of this. Give them sugar and they go bonkers and crazy and later cranky.
I strongly believe in food as medicine.
Thanks everyone for sharing your stories and info.
I may try to do some experimenting with my diet and get back to you guys on here
-Mandi
Hi and happy new year to everyone !
I saw the endrocrinologist in London , what was interesting the consultant was digging away at my symptoms and we kept coming back to reactive hypoglycemia. This happens to non diabetic’s as well as diabetic’s, in the past I did do a glucose challenge test ( twice ) and my blood sugars dropped like a stone,because it was pure glucose I did react with shaking.
What he said was interesting as hypoglycemia after food causes sleepyness,but blood test can come back normal, he said it does not always show in the blood.
When you eat anything you release insulin, if the insulin is too strong it is correct by another hormone , glucagon. This hormone releases glucose from the liver, this all happens in a short time. But if you or me have a problem with that hormone, its sluggish, then we suffer hypoglycemia after food (reactive hypoglycemia ), its harmless unlike non reactive hypoglycemia. There is nothing we can do , we have to live with it. The worst it can do is cause us to sleep.
I use my disorder to my advantage , I eat on a plane knowing I will sleep the journey, I eat knowing I will fall asleep , if I dont want to fall asleep I just dont eat, I am still in control .
Take care Rose
You sure helped answer a TON of questions! I have been asking for several years now with no more of a result than if I was to ask a 3rd grader. What you said makes more sense and with some farther research has answered so much! I too am in control as I eat when I CAN sleep or WANT to sleep. It may only be for 20 minutes or maybe 2 hours but its better than no sleep at all. What I dont understand is what brought it on. And it came on all of the sudden too. I swear it was not here one day but was the next. Oh well, at least now I have a place to start for answers. Thank You VERY, VERY Much!
Hello Nate,
I have the same experience at times. After becoming aware of organic food choices, gmo’s, exercise, vitamins, alkaline foods and alkaline water I still may become sleepy after eating but not every time. One thing I have resolved is that I’m doing everything I know to do to be healthy and the after meal sleep is not necessarily unhealthy. There are many reasons for the after meals sleep drive to happen. I am certain I’m not the reason. And, if I die before I wake I pray Thee, Lord, my soul to take.
I used to get terribly sleepy after eating, to the point where I also postponed eating until the evening when it was the only time I could afford to crash out on the couch a bit. Since then, I was finally able to find a naturopath MD doctor who was willing to run a bunch of tests (my normal doc would never find anything). What was discovered was: I had high Candida yeast, low magnesium, low vit D, low zinc, subclinical low thyroid (borderline hypo), and allergies to coffee, soy, peanut, oats, chocolate, eggs, and garlic! I have resolved the issue by avoiding the allergen foods most of the time, (but not strict), following a gluten free sugar free diet (this was key), taking supplements and B vitamins, and taking a small amount of iodine, (1 drop/day of Lugol’s 2% solution – do NOT take this if you have Hashimoto’s thyroiditis). I feel like a whole new person and am so grateful! My father used to fall asleep after every meal he would eat, and found out he had a pre-diabetic condition, which he has resolved through a whole food, whole grain sugar free diet. This was not the magic bullet for me, as I had to avoid the gluten grains to start feeling relief from the fatigue.
Well well well , there we are looking for reasons for our condition, we will blame anything and everything and believe anyone who sounds half right !
I know because I have done it !
After seeing endocrinologists, these doctors understand in great depth the chemistry in our bodies from sugars to salts, from hormones to blood type, they dont say we are sensitive to food or its the air we breathe it is what is really going on !But they too get it wrong !
You are either allergy to food or not,
you either have low active thyroid or not,
you have diabetes or not,
you are not in the middle !
To accept that is never to find the truth of your problem.
I was told so many things and in the end I wanted proof ! Either I have it or I dont prove it !
And I found the truth !
I have sleep apnoea (and I am thin ) normally found in over weight people, so they were surprised when I had tests at the sleep clinic to find I have it ! So get seen at sleep clinics and get proper tests, sleep apnoea causing this dreadful day sleeping problem after food !
Next question is why do I have sleep apnoea , is it my brain ?
The brain controls sleep patterns it also controls sleep function when you are asleep, makes sure you breathe whilst asleep, as you are totally on automatic pilot……….so question ? why is my brain at fault and as Nate said one day you are ok then the next you are not ! So what happened ?
Knock on, knock on, knock on , a simple problem say a virus that set the wheels in motion, now we have a run away train of problems…….sleep apnoea is dangerous and the warnings are day time sleeping. So the apnoea first needs to be diagnosed then corrected and they may or may not find the cause, but the correction may solve the problem and slowly get back to normal.
Diabetics suffer sleep apnoea because they are over weight !
If you are over weight you are putting yourself in danger of both diabetes and sleep apnoea, its a knock on from one to the other condition !
If you are thin and not a diabetic then its something else , neurological and needs correcting ,
to put the brain back on track !
I also have long term ENT (ear, nose and throat) problems so it may be that , it may close down my breathing whilst asleep, all needs looking at.
So dont go for any answer to your problem, get real proof and get it corrected.
Good luck and take care, sleep well !
Rose