Mormegil

Any tipps against afternoon low?

16 posts in this topic

Hi,

I'm wondering if any of you have some good tipps how to deal / overcome the regular afternoon low (I hope that's the correct english term lol). 

To me it always hits me quickly after my lunch around 2pm and for about 2 hours my energy level just hits such a low point that makes it impossible for me to work or do anything productive. It always feels like a huge waste of time.

Lunch is usually my first meal of the day, I like to skip breakfast. My diet is relatively clean, I only eat self-prepared meals, usually a healthy mix of carbs, protein and veggies. 

Obviously coffee or green tea might help but I don't drink that after noon, since caffeine stays for a very long time in your body and can cause trouble with falling asleep.

Curious if any of you have similar trouble and what you do about it ?

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How is your exercise routine and your morning routine? 

Are you getting enough sleep?

Sometimes a wrong combination of foods, such as including too many rapidly absorbable carbs can induce a bit of sleepiness in some people. 

Also as @Asayake said, having a bit more depth on your diet can help us advise you 


“If you find yourself acting to impress others, or avoiding action out of fear of what they might think, you have left the path.” ― Epictetus

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hey thanks for your replies!

i eat pretty similar meals. i usually skip breakfast and have a cup of coffee or two instead. Lunch is usually something like rice or pasta with some protein like chicken, sausages or eggs. also i always have a portion of vegetables with every meal and i try to go for wholegrain carbs instead of the standard wheat.

for dinner it depends how hungry i am. most of the time a salad with some fruits and some other protein source like egg or cheese is enough.

somedays i will have oatmeal as a third meal with peanutbutter and fruits.

stuff like fast food i almost nevet eat and also sweets or snacks maybe once a week. Also i eat no snacks between my meals and i prefer to do something like intermediate fasting where i have my meals in a time window of maybe 6-7 hours a day.

i workout actually regularly, at the moment 4 times a week, moderate fitness training around half an hour per session. I used to do more but i think for now this is enough.

My sleep is actually pretty good at the moment, i get around 8 hours a night.

I also already thought it might be too much carbs? my bodytype is ectomorph, so i heard in order to gain weight (and muscle) my main intake should be carbs. But still i dont actually have so many, cause i prefer food that contains more nutrions and before sleeping i like to have no carbs. in general i probably dont eat enough anyway to gain weight :D

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1 hour ago, Mormegil said:

hey thanks for your replies!

i eat pretty similar meals. i usually skip breakfast and have a cup of coffee or two instead. Lunch is usually something like rice or pasta with some protein like chicken, sausages or eggs. also i always have a portion of vegetables with every meal and i try to go for wholegrain carbs instead of the standard wheat.

for dinner it depends how hungry i am. most of the time a salad with some fruits and some other protein source like egg or cheese is enough.

somedays i will have oatmeal as a third meal with peanutbutter and fruits.

stuff like fast food i almost nevet eat and also sweets or snacks maybe once a week. Also i eat no snacks between my meals and i prefer to do something like intermediate fasting where i have my meals in a time window of maybe 6-7 hours a day.

i workout actually regularly, at the moment 4 times a week, moderate fitness training around half an hour per session. I used to do more but i think for now this is enough.

My sleep is actually pretty good at the moment, i get around 8 hours a night.

I also already thought it might be too much carbs? my bodytype is ectomorph, so i heard in order to gain weight (and muscle) my main intake should be carbs. But still i dont actually have so many, cause i prefer food that contains more nutrions and before sleeping i like to have no carbs. in general i probably dont eat enough anyway to gain weight :D

This might not be something you're willing to do but how about decreasing your fat intake drastically? Let me explain how I view this.

As far as your lunch goes.. particularly sausages and eggs are high fat foods, they take a lot of energy and time to digest, about 4 hours or sometimes longer. During that time your body will put an increased effort into digestion and you will feel sluggish and slow. Look at how runners or cyclists eat, they don't eat sausages a fatty meats before a running race unless it's like some keto ultra marathon guy, it would slow them down and make them preform poorly, not only physically but also mentally. Look at what Magnus Carlsen consumes while playing chess - a glass of orange juice, the most low fat food there is. That's what you want to feel and preform your best, something light yet high in energy.

High fat foods decreases your body's ability to handle sugar/carbs and temporarily thickens your blood which worsens your blood flow. Increased blood flow = better oxygen transportation amongst other things. There are many reasons why high fat foods can make you sluggish, so I would try cutting down on those or cutting those out entirely and see how that makes you feel. Opt for chicken or white fish over sausages and eggs but an even better option is opting for a bean chilli without meat and oil, or simply steamed vegetables as sides to your grains. You will likely feel the best eating as high carb as possible, it's clear energy. Things like a fruit smoothie(with sugar even if you want) or a bowl of rice will digest in 30-60 minutes and you're ready to go. The key is to eat something light, which more or less can be summed up to something high carb low fat low protein. You can still eat til you're full, you don't have to eat a small quantity of food, you just need to eat the kinds of food that are light on the body, in other words easy for the body to digest, and those foods are high carb low fat foods. Examples of such foods can be rice, potatoes, sweet potatoes, couscous, bulgur, corn, chickpeas, lentils, beans, carrots and other vegetables. Chicken breast and white fish are pretty low fat but they're very low in carbs as well so that's a downside, they don't give you much readily available energy.

As far as your mornings go.. you're skipping breakfast which puts the body in a fasted state where it is forced to rely on cortisol because you're depriving it of sugar/carbs. Then you're adding on coffee on top of that which is a cortisol stimulating drug. What your body really wants is clean energy from foods like fruit or grains but you're depriving your body of that and mistaking the body's stress response for sustainable energy. But the coffee spike lasts a couple of hours and then your energy will crash. This will compound with the high fat lunch you're eating. They're teaming up to knock you out, so to speak. So I would suggest also trying to substitute coffee for fruit, a fruit smoothie, fruit juice sooner or later. You can even try pouring some sugar on top for extra energy, it will make it easier to quit coffee if that's something you're willing to try, it will simply give you more readily available energy and lower your cortisol. Also drinking water early in the mornings will help your body rehydrate from sleep which will make you feel better and get you going faster, 3 glasses when you wake up and then down some fruit. 

Also you're working out quite a bit so high carb is important to help your body recover and the working out is going to be increasing your cortisol levels so sugar/carbs will help you regulate those levels so you don't burn out from overtraining/stressing yourself out like I did last year. The reason you like to have carbs before sleeping is that it helps your body lower cortisol, which is good. But imo you should be focusing way more on carbs overall throughout the day, it will keep you feeling better and recovering better overall, carbs alone aren't going to make you gain much weight but carbs + fat + protein will so if you really want to gain weight some fatty foods are fine. But keep in mind it's likely not going to make you feel your best imo, because fatty food does tax our body. If you're going to keep high fat foods in there maybe eat them on the later part of the day so you don't get knocked out at lunch.

You could try just for a week eating fruit, fruit smoothies, canned fruit for breakfast & lunch and grains & veggies or grains & legumes or grains & white fish or chicken breast for dinner and see how that makes you feel. 

Edited by Asayake

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I struggeled before with the afternoon low as you describe. After i tested the keto diet and intermediate fasting i understood how to avoid it. 
its extremely easy. Dont eat carbohydrates while you are working. Just stay to proteins and fat. A little bit of carbs can be fine, like a small salad, but avoid bread, pasta, rice, potatos. Anything with alot of carbs. 
When you get home and are finished with the day, you can eat carbs again. 
My buddies experience the same as me. I would say give it a try for 3-4 days and see how you feel. 

Edited by Vinni84aa

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Wow thank you guys for the detailed answers!

14 hours ago, Asayake said:

You could try just for a week eating fruit, fruit smoothies, canned fruit for breakfast & lunch and grains & veggies or grains & legumes or grains & white fish or chicken breast for dinner and see how that makes you feel. 

I will try this, I had so far no eye on fats, I always thought the cheap carbs are the ones that cause energy crashes.. Very cool, thanks!

 

14 hours ago, Vinni84aa said:

Dont eat carbohydrates while you are working. Just stay to proteins and fat. A little bit of carbs can be fine, like a small salad, but avoid bread, pasta, rice, potatos. Anything with alot of carbs. 

I already dont eat too many carbs and already have trieb keto last year... to me it's always a hassle to keep count of your daily carbs, but I will try out the method you describe, only having them for dinner.

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6 hours ago, Mormegil said:

Wow thank you guys for the detailed answers!

I will try this, I had so far no eye on fats, I always thought the cheap carbs are the ones that cause energy crashes.. Very cool, thanks!

 

I already dont eat too many carbs and already have trieb keto last year... to me it's always a hassle to keep count of your daily carbs, but I will try out the method you describe, only having them for dinner.

I agree. Counting calories gets to tedious over time and Keto is just disgusting. Its just too much fat and protein over time.

These days i just eat between 12-8pm and try to keep my meals as healthy as possible. I just avoid carbs on day time if i need to keep my energy high through out the day. 
 

i hope you report back with your result :)

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On 24/01/2023 at 5:10 PM, Mormegil said:

i usually skip breakfast

there is your first thing to fix & bring back ^ 

On 24/01/2023 at 5:10 PM, Mormegil said:

and have a cup of coffee or two instead

you skip energy intake and blast your adrenals with double barrel caffeine bomb so that you can trick your body thinking it has energy where in fact it has none and is running on adrenaline. This is a common strategy in IF world and IMO one that gets you into an area of chronic fatigue syndrome. Bring the food back, reduce the caffeine and you will fix your problems in a week. 

On 24/01/2023 at 5:10 PM, Mormegil said:

Lunch is usually something like rice or pasta with some protein like chicken, sausages or eggs

more fibre, more variety, more flexibility, more plants. Step away from the chicken and rice diet, get yourself a plant based cookbook and enter the world of another universe :D Seriously you don't know what you're missing and your energy will come back once you put some more low GL carbs and more fibre in the mix. 

On 24/01/2023 at 5:10 PM, Mormegil said:

somedays i will have oatmeal as a third meal with peanutbutter and fruits

this is good. move this meal to the beginning of the day. Add some nuts to the mix and even an egg on the side if you fancy 

 


“If you find yourself acting to impress others, or avoiding action out of fear of what they might think, you have left the path.” ― Epictetus

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On 25.1.2023 at 4:13 PM, Vinni84aa said:

These days i just eat between 12-8pm and try to keep my meals as healthy as possible. I just avoid carbs on day time if i need to keep my energy high through out the day. 
 

i hope you report back with your result :)

That sounds like a healthy middle ground :) I will try out different tipps mentioned here and report back in a few weeks

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On 25.1.2023 at 7:06 PM, Michael569 said:

there is your first thing to fix & bring back ^ 

Hehe yea I already installed breakfast back since this thread and I believe that alone already has a big difference. I personally like the idea of intermediate fasting, it seems natural to me (in the way that human beeings lived like this for tens of thousands of years) and I feel like our bodies are designed to go for longer periods of time without food. However for now, I won't do that anymore and try out with the regular 3 meals again :)

 

On 25.1.2023 at 7:06 PM, Michael569 said:

more fibre, more variety, more flexibility, more plants. Step away from the chicken and rice diet, get yourself a plant based cookbook and enter the world of another universe :D Seriously you don't know what you're missing and your energy will come back once you put some more low GL carbs and more fibre in the mix. 

Agree, that is probably way more healthy :) I honestly just get confused sometimes what the right diet should be for me (like mentioned above I'm working out and would like to gain at least a little bit muscle and weight, and I heard that for my body type I need to eat  a large amount of healthy carbs).

Fun fact, I actually used to have an entirely vegan diet for 2 or 3 years, but thats already quite some time ago. Back then I didnt really do it for the health benefits, mostly out of ethical reasons, and at some point I got to dogmatic about it, that I dropped it entirely again, since it didn't feel right the way I did it. Also back then I had even less knowledge of a healthy diet, than I have today.^^

On 25.1.2023 at 7:06 PM, Michael569 said:

this is good. move this meal to the beginning of the day. Add some nuts to the mix and even an egg on the side if you fancy 

Haha I think I prefer my oats without egg, but thanks for the tipp :P

Thanks for the feedback, I will definetly change some stuff. It was very good to get all this feedback, I was too focused on carbs causing my sluggishness, I think that I didnt see the overall mistakes in my diet!

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I know it's been really long ago, but still wanted to give a quick update:

I managed to get rid of pretty much all those afternoon lows, I did experience right after my heavy lunch (which would usually also be my first meal in the day). I started with implementing a big breakfast (usually oats and yoghurt with fruit and maybe nuts) and sometimes even have a second small breakfast if needed before noon. I really make sure now, that I won't stay hungry anymore.

For lunch I think I eat more healthier ones than before, nothing really fatty anymore. I basically have a good protein source and a large amount of veggies (for example chicken breast or tofu  with beans or broccoli or mixed veggies). Carbs I add sometimes when I feel like it but not always, and it doesn't seem to have a difference on my energy.

This alone already pretty much did it for me luckily. I got really hooked before on intermediate fasting because it made sense to me that it should bring a ton of health benefits, but right now I'm unsure if I will try it again. Thanks again for all the feedback and the ideas, it really helped!

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Some people avoid a mid-afternoon crash by delaying their first cup off coffee till 10:00 am. 

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@Mormegil awesome!? Thanks for the report.

There is time and place for IF but it is not when you can barely keep your eyes open and every task is a struggle.


“If you find yourself acting to impress others, or avoiding action out of fear of what they might think, you have left the path.” ― Epictetus

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@Michael569 Have u got any vegetable  cookbook suggestion?


I will be waiting here, For your silence to break, For your soul to shake,              For your love to wake! Rumi

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@Harikrishnan I've learned a lot from the How not to Die - Cookbook & How not to Diet - Cookbook . Both have great recipes. 

Although I'm not a raging fan of Michael Greger's work as I once was, I am yet to find recipe books that come even close to these two...at least for me. They are all 100% plant-based tho


“If you find yourself acting to impress others, or avoiding action out of fear of what they might think, you have left the path.” ― Epictetus

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