Tips On Healthy Eating During Night Shifts

How does working in shifts affect your health?

As stated earlier, the first and foremost effect of working in shifts is lack of sleep. It is very common to see a night shift worker with dark circles, puffy eyes and a fatigued body.

Another very serious effect of working in a night shift can be emotional aloofness or feeling of being ignored and lonely. Although this may not be a case with all, but definitely affects the life of some night shifters. The feeling of being alone and left out can set in because of not being able to spend time with friends and family. A little time management can help you overcome this problem.
Night shift workers are more likely to suffer from cancer of various types, such as prostate cancer and breast cancer. Research has shown that shift workers are also at a higher risk of heart disease and stroke.

Most night shift workers suffer from various gastrointestinal problems such as constipation, diarrhea and irritable bowel syndrome. This can happen due to two reasons. Firstly erratic meal timings and skipping meals can upset the stomach. The second reason is snacking unnecessarily. When you’re awake at night, you’re bound to feel hungry. The body would not like to eat a proper meal in the middle of the night and you end up eating chips, biscuits and other junk foods.

Eating at incorrect time and eating incorrect foods also increases the chances of acidity and heartburn. Blood sugar levels may fluctuate and this puts night shift workers at a higher risk of diabetes.
Due to a disturbed biological clock, a lot of hormonal imbalances also occur in body. This can lead to thyroid and other disorders of the endocrine system. Women experience problems in their monthly menstrual cycle and may also face fertility issues.

Effect of night shift on your diet

Before we see the weight gain diet plan for indian night shift workers, it is important to know the effects night shift on your diet schedule.

While working in shifts, a person is unable to eat proper meals. Night shift workers sleep during the day. Hence they may not eat as many meals as another person would do during the day. Hence many of them who work in night shifts lose a lot of weight and become undernourished. The body is deprived of nutritious food and is not given food at the appropriate time. Eventually the situation gets worse and you feel very weak. It becomes impossible to concentrate on work and the sick leaves start increasing. Before the problem goes out of control, you need to look for a solution and get back to work. So here is your life saver weight gain diet plan for indian night shift workers.

Tips on healthy eating during night shifts

It might not be possible to get your shift changed and even tougher to get a new job but it isn’t actually difficult to take care of your health and gain some weight. Just calculate your current dietary requirement and consume at least 500 calories more than that per day. The only thing you need to ensure is that you eat healthy foods. If you eat junk, your weight will increase by leaps and bounds and it will bring lots of unwanted health problems along with it. Keep your caffeine intake to the minimum, since it causes acidity.

Although it isn’t easy to get in to this routine but it is better if you eat your meals at the proper time during the day. Do not skip any meal. If you work all night and reach home early in the morning, do not go to sleep on an empty stomach. Have a glass of milk and then sleep soundly. Try to get a good amount of sleep. Talk to your family members and make it very clear that you don’t want to be disturbed till a certain time. If you get about 6 hours of undisturbed sleep, it is good enough. Of course, you won’t mind another 2-3 hours but 6 hours is the minimum you should get on an average day.