6 Rules for Healthy Living That Every Night Owl Should Know

Both Grandner and Pelayo say that their night-owl patients tend to eat more just because they're up later. Grandner doesn't give his patients a cut-off time to stop eating for the night, but he does recommend avoiding large meals late at night. Instead, he suggests eating only snacks, and only if you're actually hungry. The researchers behind one study, however, give 8 p.m. as the latest time you should eat. They found that women who were night owls were more than twice as likely to have metabolic syndrome (excess belly fat, high blood sugar and overall unhealthy fat levels) than morning people, which they believe may be due to a combination of eating past 8 p.m. (previous research found that late sleepers tend to eat more past this time) and too much artificial light at night, which may affect your metabolism.