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Have you ever felt like you want to sleep or feel tired after a heavy meal? This feeling of drowsiness is known as postprandial drowsiness and it is a decrease in our body's energy levels after having a meal, especially when it is abundant and rich in carbohydrates and fats.
Nutritionist Itxaso Erasun Gorostidi, hand in hand with the digital solution that analyzes how glucose affects metabolic health, Glucovibes, develops 10 keys to understand this drowsiness and try to avoid it:
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1. Drowsiness is a subjective experience that increases after eating.
But our body does not act the same way with all foods. It's with foods rich in carbohydrates and fats such as paellas, risottos, lasagnas, pasta... when our body feels more depressed and goes into a state of drowsiness. However, meals balanced in macronutrients or rich in proteins, such as baked or grilled fish or meat with vegetables and tubers, for example, reduce the feeling of drowsiness.
2. After a meal, blood goes to the gastrointestinal tract.
To facilitate digestion and transport of absorbed nutrients to cells and tissues, blood is directed to the gastrointestinal tract after the end of eating. This causes our brain to receive less blood and this deviation causes drowsiness.
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3. After a large meal, reactive hypoglycemia may occur.
Reactive hypoglycemia is a hypoglycemia event (blood glucose below 70 mg/dl) that is normally generated after hyperglycemia, caused by high carbohydrate intake and/or lack of fiber. This situation is associated with a great need for insulin, which can cause a drop in blood glucose levels below the level prior to ingestion, generating drowsiness, boredom or even cravings and the desire to eat immediately after finishing the previous intake.
4. Not all carbohydrates provide the same.
Although carbohydrates are generally more complex for our bodies to digest, they are necessary to maintain healthy nutrition. To avoid drowsiness, it will be enough to adjust your carbohydrate and protein intake to keep your blood glucose levels stable. To do this, prioritize complex carbohydrates, such as tubers, fruits, whole grains, legumes…
5. Order food before eating.
The order of foods is essential so that our body understands how it should act when ingesting each one of them. Start with vegetables and proteins and follow them with complex carbohydrates. Reduce alcohol intake with meals as much as possible.
6. Parasympathetic nervous system
The arrival of food in the stomach and small intestine activates the parasympathetic nervous system and inhibits the sympathetic nervous system. The balance between the two tilts toward a predominant parasympathetic tone and generates a subjective state of low energy and a desire to relax and rest, as opposed to the “fight or flight” state induced by a high sympathetic tone.
7. Drowsiness occurs an hour after eating.
After eating a large meal, the food reaches the stomach and intestine where digestion begins and a series of gastrointestinal hormones are released that regulate gastric emptying and cause an increase in tryptophan in the blood, which causes the brain to have more serotonin and melatonin, neurotransmitters that cause drowsiness.
8. Drowsiness does not affect age.
The state of drowsiness does not affect age or gender. It affects children, adults or the elderly in the same way. As we have already mentioned, macronutrient imbalance will be the trigger for drowsiness, therefore, neither gender nor age will be important factors in this sensation.
9. Coffee inhibits drowsiness.
Caffeine is a powerful stimulant, found in coffee, tea and chocolate, and acts on the central nervous system. Therefore, its consumption will activate the nervous system again, somehow avoiding that state of low energy or drowsiness.
10. Taking a short nap gives us energy
Drowsiness or drowsiness makes us really want to sleep. Therefore, taking a nap of no more than 30 minutes can help rest the body and wake up with more energy than we had after lunch.
