Study Reveals How Eating Cheese Might Be Linked To Your Nightmares

A study found that cheese might be linked to your nightmares. The peculiar research, published on Tuesday in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, suggests that people with lactose intolerance are more likely to experience nightmares, possibly due to gastrointestinal discomfort caused by dairy consumption.

Over 1,000 participants were included in the study, with some blaming dairy products, including cheese, for their bad dreams, with 5.5% of respondents believing that food affected the tone of their dreams.

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"In the earlier study, people were blaming cheese all the time for their bad dreams," Tore Nielsen, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Montreal who co-authored both studies, said, as quoted by NBC News. "And so I think we got some better answers in the study for that."

While the study doesn't pinpoint specific cheese as a nightmare trigger, aged cheeses like cheddar and parmesan contain high levels of tyramine, which may disrupt sleep in sensitive individuals.

Marie-Pierre St-Onge, who is the director at the Center of Excellence for Sleep & Circadian Research at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, said that sleep issues could be linked to gastrointestinal problems.

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"If you have GI issues, that could account for a lot of what's happening in terms of your sleep disturbances that could be associated with different dreams," St-Onge said as quoted by NBC News.

Poor gut health and digestive discomfort could cause bloating, gas and stomach cramps, eventually disrupting sleep and potentially leading to nightmares.

But the study's authors emphasise the need for further research to confirm these findings and explore the relationship between food, sleep, and dreams in diverse populations.