Is It Bad To Eat Grapefruit At Night?
If grapefruit is a regular part of your diet, you're making an incredibly healthy choice. This citrus fruit is chock full of nutrients (per Healthline). Just half of a medium-sized grapefruit contains 64% of your daily vitamin C needs, 28% of vitamin A, 5% of potassium, 4% of folate, and 3% of magnesium. It also offers 2 grams of fiber and even contains 1 gram of protein. The best part is it is super low in calories, delivering just 52 of them.
The nutrition that grapefruit provides goes a long way in staving off certain health conditions when consumed as part of a healthy diet, including diabetes and heart disease (per Healthline). In fact, one 2012 study found that participants who consumed three grapefruits a day for a mere six weeks significantly lowered their overall blood pressure. If you're not worried about your blood pressure, you can still benefit from the addition of grapefruit to your diet — specifically when it comes to immune health. Due to its high vitamin C content, grapefruits provide potent antioxidants that help the body fight bacteria and viruses.
While many people think of grapefruit as a morning fruit (similar to its cousin, the orange), the truth is that it can be eaten at any time of the day, even at night, according to Livestrong. However, there are some things to keep in mind if you're opting for grapefruit as a before-bed snack.
Eating grapefruit before bed may cause unpleasant side effects
While there's no blanket guideline that says you shouldn't eat grapefruit before bed, you may experience some unpleasant side effects if you do. WebMD points out that citrus fruits, including grapefruit, are a leading contributor to heartburn due to their high-acidic content. Especially if you eat one on an empty stomach. This is exacerbated by the tendency for heartburn to worsen at night since food often isn't able to completely leave your esophagus and enter the stomach while lying down, as per Livestrong. Whether or not grapefruit will give you heartburn, however, is something you'll have to experience to know.
Heartburn aside, eating grapefruit before bed can spell a different problem. Grapefruit has been found to interfere with your body's ability to properly break down and absorb medications (per Livestrong). Common medications that interact with grapefruit are those that are designed to lower cholesterol and blood pressure and those that combat infections. Talking with your doctor can help determine if any contraindications might exist.
If neither of the above issues applies to you, know that eating grapefruit before bed might actually benefit your sleep, as per Epicurious. Grapefruits contain concentrated amounts of lycopene, which has been shown to help people fall asleep.