not eating after 7:30 P.M. (Bob Greene on Oprah)

I hope that this is not a repeat of another post:

Did anyone see Bob Greene on Oprah today?  He and Oprah agreed that the single most important thing that a person can do to promote weight loss is to choose a time at night beyond which a person will not eat.  I know that Bob Greene promotes this in his book The Best Life Diet, but for both Bob and Oprah to call it the single most important thing is telling.  I am trying it tonight and I am about to starve, but Oprah convinced me :)

Well I have lost 76 lbs, and I eat 120 calories of 'Dare" cookies every night.  I have to as I take a medication where I have to eat with my asthma pill which has to be taken before bedtime.  I just make sure I am within my calores.

I have asked my doctor, a dietician and a nutritionist, they all said it doesn't make any metabolic difference because of what time you eat.

jkirbo55:  Fast 8-10 hours every night?  You're awake until 3:30 a.m. or later (7:30 + 8 hours = 3:30 a.m.)?

Last I checked, sleeping around 8 hours is pretty good for you as a complement to a healthy diet.

It doesn't matter when you eat.

It sort of matters what you eat.

It really matters how MUCH you eat.

I have eaten a healthy snack at night like all my life and I am very very fit. I even got way too thin while still eating right before bed. As long as it fits into your calories, it's fine.

I always find it hilarious how now everyone thinks it's bad to eat after 7:30 because of Oprah. Well, why don't you take a look at her. Does it seem to be working? Um no

i read that oprah stopped eating after 7:30 in a magazin (one of those how to get skinny fast). i hadn't thought about it before but i decided to do it. you're hungry for a week or two but if you apply self discipline after a while you don't want to eat after 7:30. i think it truly helped me because it gave me a stopping point and i was actually hungry for breakfast for a change in the morning. try it. no harm done either way.

i crave carbs, especially when  i have been doing alot of exercising.  for me, a piece of bread, just bread, actually helps me fall asleep.  wierd i know. 

From my experience if I eat past 7:30 I do not want any breakfast.  However when I stop eating by 7:30 I wake up hungry and eat a good breakfast and actually end up eating less during the day. Of course what I eat after 7:30 is usually things like movie popcorn, ice cream, etc....

Are you watching reruns of old shows, fitnessforever717, because Oprah  looks fantastic!

All not eating after 7:30 accomplishes is to reduce calorie intake.  You aren't eating for say 2 to 5 hours per day and therefore you eat less.  So the most important component of weight loss is to eat fewer calories.  After that it's best to eat less calorie dense foods and combine those with lean protein in order to be full and not burn muscle.  However, that doesn't sell books or commercials for talk shows so they talk about the 7:30 thing.  I was a Chemist in my former life so I look at the whole weight loss thing very analytically, calories in vs calories out tells the whole story.

IMO, the most important thing for weight maintenance is regular aerobic exercise, at least it worked for me.

littlesara,

I am the same way.  There's something about a piece of toast with fat free cheese and half a tblspn of butter to make my stomach not grumble.  I work out every day, and I give myself a treat right before I fall asleep, but only if I have stayed within my calorie limit throughout the day.

since I started dieting I stopped eating after 7:00 its probably the hardest thing because thast when I get the hungriest but it made the biggest difference.

Ok, don't get me wrong, for the most part I think Oprah is an amazing woman who has done really incredible things with her life and is contributing in really positive ways.

Having said all that, her weight yo-yos up and down like CRAZY.  I just saw at the supermarket (ok, yes, I was reading a tabloid) that she's up to 200 lbs again.  I don't even understand how she can gain and lose weight so fast.

So, while I'd like to follow in her footsteps in a lot of ways, I'm not sure I'm going to take diet advice from her...

I think it really depends on how late you are staying up....my sister lost a ton of weight and when i told her i was trying not to eat past 7:30 she thought it was a little ridiculous....i am in college so my avg bedtime is around 2 am....she reasoned that there is generally 6 hours or so between lunch and dinner and if i am up till 2 am.....6 hours after i eat dinner im gunna be hungry again so i might as well eat a small snack becuase i will still be on track because it will be at least another 6 hours till i eat breakfast....i think it just depends on the person....i try to not eat in bed also (but that is more to help me sleep better because i am a slight insomniac)

My weight would yo-yo as well if I knew everyone was going to read about what it was in the tabloids.

Then again, if I had Oprah's kind of money, would I even care?

Hello All,

I am new to this posting things, however I joined cause I thought I may have some advice to help. I was looking for 8 years on how to loose weight, and specifically how to not GAIN WEIGHT!

I joined a radio contest called,"The Great Weight Off" it started Jan 14, and ended May 4.... I won.. I lost 67 lbs in 99 days. I have now lost 85 since Jan 14. I will explain what I did.... To see my pics please visit the radios stations website at www.wkkx.com then click on the contest tab at the top.

Now.. this is what I did. I went to www.caloriesperhour.com and found out my BMR ( the # of calories my body burns every day if I were at REST) I started this radio contest weighing 341 lbs.... now at 256, and still going down! When you look up your BMR it tell you how many calories a day your body burns, and that is what I ate a day. ( weighing 341 I was allowed 2900 cal, now at 256 Im allowed 2100 cal ) That is what I eat daily... Does it matter WHAT I eat.. NO! But for nutrition reasons it does..... snickers isnt Healthy, but if within your calorie count, you can have it. Then.. everything you do all day long... cleaning around the house, working, walking the dog, goign to the gym.. EVERYTHING YOU DO your burning stored fat. Look.. If you only eat what your body burns ALREADY.. everything else you do your buring fat. I did go to the gym 7 days a week and I worked on the elliptical for an hour ( I started off on it for 10 minutes, added 10 minutes a day until I was at an hour) and in that hour, I used to burn 600 cal an hour.. Now I burn 1100- 1200 an HOUR!!!!  Even if you dont go the gym... everything else you do, your still burning fat! Every 3500 calories you burn extra.... youloose a lb of stored fat. www.caloriesperhour.com will help you with everything...it tells you how many calories you burn doing what activity... But to cut this short.... I work 10 hours days... start at 7 AM end at 5 PM. I would pick up the kids and get to the gym around 6.. work out for an hour ( & change) I would leave around 7:30 get home at 8 PM or so...... So I changed my food schedule... I ate breakfast at 6:30.. snack at 9-9:30 lunch at noon.... snack at 1:30-2.. then dinner at 4:30-4:45 before I left work.... and snack when I got home.. snacks should be 250 cal or LESS!!!  I think that was the best thing about my diet was eating larger meals in the middle of the day, and light snacks at night! If you have any question please just ask.. I hope this helped.. I can go into more detail if needed. Thanks for the time on your post..

Trisha

Congrats Trisha and welcome to the site!  I just joined a few days ago.  Starting weight 312.  Have lost 4 lbs so far.  Your pictures on radio website are great! 

I don't think it matters what time a person eats.  Most important is total calories within a 24 hr. time frame.

Brenda

I have seen a nutritionist a number of times and she always says "it doesn't matter" People who make blanket statements about what to eat and when aren't taking into consideration variety.  Everyone's body is different, and the most important thing is to not label food good or bad, eat every few hours, exercise moderatly, blanket rules of don't do this or that, just aren't very helpful.  And in all honesty? Mr. Greene isn't a nutritionist,  so  it really ins't qualified to hand out advice on food issues, he is an exercise trainer.

And lastly, how people eat isn't entirely affected by physical, eating habbits also have to do with mentally how we feel.

Tory

i didn't see the show, but oddly enough 730 was the time i chose to quit eating at, bar a few exceptions such as when i have to work late or other schedual conflicts. the reason why i chose to start that regime was because i noticed that i had a very, very hard time controlling cravings. i would pretty much ruin an entire day of eating healthy and what not because i wanted to eat.

so i made a rule that i wasn't going to eat after 730. and i stopped. seriously, a week later i stopped getting cravings for junk food (that was all i would snack on late at night). it pretty much saved me a lot of emotional scale dancing because i feel like i've lost a lot of my desire to eat junk food at any time.

so i stopped eating after 730, not for any particular scientific reasons, but just to put more control into my diet. it makes me happy with myself, becuase i was horrible before with binge eating at night.

I know for me personally, eating less in the evening/night helps me to lose weight quite well.  (If only I were better at eating light dinners.)

One thing that has made sense to me was someone saying not to eat right before bedtime, because you don't need extra calories for sleeping... you need them when you are awake and active.  I remind myself of this when I eat late at night.  I don't want to go to bed hungry, but I shouldn't eat like I'm going to be awake for another five hours.  I never "close the kitchen," but the later it gets the smaller my dinner gets.