Dreamed that you forgot to wear pants? Or you lost your job? It might have something to do with what you ate before bed.
New research suggests that certain foods, namely dairy products, are associated with nightmares.
New research from Canadian scientists suggests that certain foods, namely dairy products, are associated with nightmares. The culprit? Gastrointestinal distress brought on after ingesting foods like cheese right before bedtime.
In particular, the researchers found that people who reported they were lactose intolerant experienced more disrupted sleep. When participants with such food sensitivities are unable to resist dairy, there are consequences, according to Tore Nielsen, lead author of the study and director of the Montréal Sacré-Cœur hospital’s dream and nightmare laboratory.
“It stands to reason people who are lactose intolerant and might be cheating and eating dairy anyway feel symptoms during sleep,” Nielsen said. “The brain is in constant contact with the body during sleep,” he added, so any signals of discomfort—cramping, flatulence, bloating or pain—can influence dreams.
His group’s study, published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, examined the association between food and dreaming by surveying more than 1,000 university students online at MacEwan University in Alberta. The survey asked about the frequency of participants’ nightmares, food sensitivities and symptoms, and associations they noticed between types of dreams and various foods, among other questions.
Roughly 40% of the respondents reported that they thought eating certain foods improved or worsened their sleep. About 5.5% believed what they ate affected the tone of their dreams, with many pointing to dairy and desserts or sweets as being primary culprits of vivid, disturbing dreams. Others noted herbal teas and fruits and vegetables were linked to better sleep.
Timothy Hearn, a scientist who studies humans’ biological clocks at the University of Cambridge and wasn’t involved in the research, pointed out that the study uses self-reporting, so participants had to accurately recall both what they had eaten and how they had slept, introducing subjectivity into the data.
Researchers found that people with lactose intolerance who ate diary products, like cheese, before bedtime experienced more disrupted sleep and nightmares.
While science can’t definitively say eating dairy—or any other foods—causes nightmares, existing evidence supports a link between food and dreams, said Charlotte Gupta, a sleep and nutrition researcher at CQ University Australia who wasn’t involved in the work.
Hearn and Gupta said much more is known about the timing of eating and the importance of its effect on subsequent sleep, regardless of what kind of food you’re partaking in.
Our bodies are built to sleep at night and be active during the day, according to Gupta: “When we eat cheese before bed, we’re asking our bodies to digest food at a time they’d rather be resting.”
If your body is busy breaking down food instead of focusing on sleep, the quality can suffer, she added, increasing nighttime awakenings, especially during the deepest stage of our slumber—REM, or rapid eye movement, sleep. Jolting awake from REM sleep makes us far more likely to recall our dreams or nightmares.
Hearn and Gupta suggest avoiding any food, not just dairy, a couple of hours or so before you turn in so you don’t disrupt your body’s rhythms.
“I like to tell people that it’s not just about what we eat, it’s about when,” Gupta said. “Eating close to our bedtime is what can get us in trouble.”
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