The Dad Bod Diaries: After 8pm, I would gnaw through a baguette like a man escaping captivity

I’ve imposed a strict post-6pm food ban, because the real battle happens at night

I can pass through a supermarket bakery at noon like a monk, but after 8pm, I would gnaw through a baguette like a man escaping captivity.

THERE are many moments in a man’s life where he realises things have tipped from a bit unhealthy into ‘this is a situation’.

Some men realise it while tying their shoelaces and having to recover for a minute afterwards. Others discover it when their shirts begin erupting around the second button. I, however, discovered it the night I was found by one of my children lying on the couch in my underpants at 10.30pm, eating Häagen-Dazs salted caramel straight from the tub in the dark, watching a man on YouTube rebuild a crash-damaged Ferrari.

To be clear: I wasn’t relaxing. I wasn’t unwinding. I wasn’t even treating myself. I was horizontal. Barely clothed. Shovelling in ice cream like a man trying to destroy evidence after committing a dairy-related crime. And then the kitchen light flashed on.

Out of nowhere stood my youngest, silhouetted like a tiny, judgmental angel. He’d come down for a drink of water. Instead, he found his father in the wild — an animal caught mid-feeding, startled, confused, half-naked, and glowing in the sudden light.

Bernard O'Shea: 'I can’t cheat now. Because if I break the rule, I have to come back here next week and write in a national newspaper: 'Folks, I relapsed into a chicken fillet roll at 11pm'.'

He blinked twice, took in the horror, and delivered the line that will go down in our family history: “Dad … why are you eating ice cream in your underpants in the dark?”

There are no words that can recover a moment like that. None.

Three months have passed since this event. I’m still thinking about it. I’m still trying to explain it to myself. I am still, in many ways, that man in the dark, in his underpants, with a tub of Häagen-Dazs and a YouTube algorithm that prioritises far more capable men doing for more capable things. But that was the night I finally realised: My eating problem is not a daytime problem. It is a nighttime catastrophe.

Day-Bernard vs Night-Bernard

During the day, I am a model citizen. I talk to Jill Taylor, an online fitness and nutrition coach, once a week as if she’s my nutrition priest, confessing indiscretions like “I had a Tunnocks tea cake, but I didn’t enjoy it, so does that count?”

Day-Bernard is organised. He eats vegetables. He feels proud of himself.

Night-Bernard is a forager who emerges from the shadows after 8pm to eat anything not bolted to the floor. Jill once said “You have two Bernards”. She meant it kindly. Science, however, has decided she was being generous. There may actually be three.

I went looking for answers — real ones — and found three scientific explanations that read like a biography of my worst habits.

1. Cognitive fatigue — the brain quits early

Apparently, our brains get tired before anything else. During the day, the brain is making hundreds of tiny decisions. By evening? The brain is done. Tapped out. Closed for business. The logical part shuts down, and the gremlin part takes over. This explains why I can pass through a supermarket bakery at noon like a monk, but after 8pm, I would gnaw through a baguette like a man escaping captivity.

2. Reward circuitry — the chemical betrayal

The brain collects stress all day. It holds onto all of these like stamps in a loyalty card. And what redeems that loyalty card? Dopamine. When do we need dopamine? Evening. What gives dopamine the fastest? Food. 

We have no business eating. Scientists call it “emotional regulation”. I prefer the more honest description: “What I do
between 9pm and midnight.”

3. The circadian hunger spike — prehistoric sabotage

This one felt like a personal attack. Studies from Harvard and MIT show that humans naturally experience a hunger spike between 8pm and 10pm — regardless of whether they have eaten. It’s not about need. It’s biology. A mechanism left over from a time when humans didn’t know if breakfast would exist. 

Of all the explanations, this is the one that resonates most. It validates something I’ve known for years: After 8pm, I’m not myself. I am ancient Bernard ... a hairy hunter-gatherer trying to hide from predators while inhaling Hunky Dorys.

Last night, around 11pm, I passed the kitchen and saw the cat eating her dry food before settling in for the night. I stood there longer than any grown man should, staring at her bowl with envy. She looked up mid-chew as if to say ‘Move along, buddy. This is mine’. And for one shameful moment, I understood her food in a way no human should. That was the moment I knew things needed to change. Not in a week. Not Monday. Now.

So this month, I have instituted a strict rule: No food after 6pm. None. Zero. Except for two social occasions, when I will behave as if I have a functioning relationship with cutlery.

But more importantly I can’t cheat now. Because if I break the rule, I have to come back here next week and write in a national newspaper: “Folks, I relapsed into a chicken fillet roll at 11pm.” And let us be honest: There is no motivator on Earth stronger than shame. For the first time in years, I actually feel like I’m winning the battle against Night-Bernard. Or at the very least, I’ve stopped eating in the dark.

Oh, I’m still 17 stone.