I have terrible insomnia. Melatonin works some of the time, but my most reliable solution is to go out and buy a burger, usually at Wendy’s. After some experiments, I’ve concluded that it’s the beef that’s doing the trick.
I’ve started grilling burgers at home, but they’re not helping. I don’t feel sleepy or even full. I’ve been using ground round beef, and it occurs to me that I should try a different type. It also occurs to me that fast-food joints may be adding chemicals that I can’t obtain on my own.
Does anyone else have this odd affinity for hamburgers? Any ideas on what I should be cooking?
It’s the overall situation, not the food. Getting dressed, getting alert enough to drive, going out, interacting, coming back, and then getting some comforting calories down is not the same thing as kind of shambling around your house making something to eat.
I say this because when I am having trouble getting the raceway to shut down, I have found that making myself VERY awake - get up, maybe even put on clothes, go do something slightly demanding like load the dishwasher or put a coat of paint on something - and then going back to bed works well. I can’t force myself down that last bit no matter how long I lie there and try, but ramping all the way back up lets me fall past it into sleep.
The better question is “why do any hamburgers make Sefton sleepy?” Because that’s just frikkin’ weird. It’s the first I’ve ever heard of it. Google suggests a bunch of articles saying it’s the fat content, but it’s not like fast-food hamburgers are significantly fattier than home-made*, or that they’re the only fatty food in Sefton’s diet.
My guess is it’s psychological. A placebo, or ritual (as Amateur Barbarian suggests)
*unless your home cook is in the habit of buying ultra-lean ground beef, which would be borderline-terrible for hamburgers.
I was going to surmise fat content. You want something at least 20% fat–get chuck and see if that helps. I use anything from 70-30 to 80-20 for my burgers, nothing leaner. I don’t know Wendy’s fat content, but fast food burgers can even go 60-40.
I also don’t think the difference in fat content between a Wendy’s and a homemade burger, even a 10%'er, would make such a difference in immediate terms. A shot of fat is a shot of fat. Fattier food might have a longer effect.
Supposedly, In n Out is 40%, but it probably doesn’t qualify as a major. I expect your range to be more likely for most places. 80-20 is pretty much the standard in cookbooks/websites that focus on hamburgers and the like.
You have developed a very specific ritual that helps get you to a state where you can sleep. Doing a drastically different thing won’t have the same effects. The mind is funny that way.
I think you’re right in the ritual is the most likely explanation, but OP does mention that they don’t feel as full, and it doesn’t work with a chicken sandwich. This does not disprove the ritual explanation at all–there could be psychology involved here. But a possible physical explanation could be fat content. I kinda doubt it, but it can explain not feeling as full and sleepy.
All I can do is repeat the chocolate ice cream story.
Guy goes to a mechanic and says his car hates chocolate ice cream - if he drove to Baskin-Robbins and bought chocolate ice cream, it wouldn’t start to take him home. If he bought vanilla… no problem. Car started ever time.
Skip to the end of a long shaggy-dog story: Vanilla was pre-packed and he was in and out of the store in five minutes, before the car could vapor-lock. Chocolate had to be hand packed, and that ten minutes was enough to let the car hot-soak until it wouldn’t start.
I’ll bet on ritual and timing and a little bit of superstition over specific food choices otherwise mostly equivalent in calories.
My two year old works this way- he won’t want to go to sleep, and he’ll fuss and cry, and if I go in and soothe him and put him back down too early, he’ll just keep right at it. If (and I know it sounds a bit cruel) I let him really get worked up first, he’ll actually conk right out when I rock him a bit and put him back in bed.
Buy several Wendy’s burgers on your way home from work and keep them in the fridge. When you have trouble sleeping, warm one up, eat it, and see if it helps you fall asleep. If it doesn’t work, then it may have something to do with the ritual of going out to get one. If the reheated burger does work, then try just eating the patty and not the other stuff. If that also works, then get patties from several burger places and see if any of them have the same results. It would help if someone could randomize the burgers so you don’t know which is which. If you knew the Wendy’s patty was the Wendy’s patty, your personal bias might influence the result.
As an aside, I would recommend you stop using burgers altogether, as well as any other food or reward item. If you start developing a pattern of insomnia leads to yummy burger, you might develop a reward loop where your insomnia gets worse because your body wants a burger. It’s like if you gave your kid ice cream when he had a tantrum. You’re just going to end up with worse and worse tantrums. I don’t know for sure that insomnia works the same way, but I’m not sure it’s worth a chance.
I’m with Amateur Barbarian and bump on this one. I do the same sort of thing once I realize sleep is not in the offing. Get up, put on regular clothes, and surf the net or do some paperwork. Within a half hour it’s snooze city. On rare occasions a shower in the middle of the night does it.
It’s all about “I’m not sleeping” that makes it happen.
