Vegetarian diet: requiring less sleep?

Placebo effect.

It very well could be "normal". I've been a vegan for about 2 years and have a lot more energy, have lost lots of weight, my lipid profile has improved dramatically, I sleep less and I am running faster times. Other than that, nothing has changed.

Do the math.

5 lbs of legit fat is -3500 X 5 = -17,500 calories that you expended on top of your caloric consumption. That is about 2500 cals burned per day. You did not lose 5lbs in fat. My guess is you are eating more fruits, veggies, and high fiber carbs. It's called water weight. I'm not saying you did not lose any legit weight. But unless you are clinically obese, it's not ideal to lose over 1lb a week, especially if you still want to have quality training. It's not hard to do the first week, but it quickly goes downhill from there.

Also, 5 hrs a night of sleep will probably catch up with you around day 10. Let us know how you are feeling by then.

In the mean time I would definitely hydrate more (even if you don't feel excessively thirsty). Not entirely sure why you are not sleeping as much.

I've been doing the veg thing for about five months and have been wildly happy with it. It wasn't so much about weight but that I would make it too easy to fill a meal with a fried greasy meat item. Eating vegetarian forces me to be attentive to getting all the nutrients I need. As side effects, I have noticed that I wake up more quickly (I'm not a caffeine person) and tend to stay alert longer in the day, relative to when I was eating meat 4-5 times a week. I doubt that it requires less sleep overall; you're probably experiencing complicating factors (such as hormonal cycles).

I realize this was posted quite a long time ago but wanted to add my two cents for future readers. Our family switch to a vegan diet a few months ago whole foods plant-based low-fat. We feel wonderful husband and I have drop some weight it's all good. But a few things were unexpected positive changes one of them is our 10-year-old son has started waking up an hour earlier every day. He now has time to do things before going to school. I thought this was so strange I googled question eating A plant-based diet and needing less sleep and sure enough a lot of other people have noticed the same thing!!!

This has also been consistent w/ my experience. I've been eating a lot more fruits and veggies for about 7-8 weeks and the effect on my sleep has been dramatic. I've been sleeping 4-5 hours/night on average. Not every night but I can't remember the last day I had more than 7 hours of sleep. I never feel tired. I have been working out pretty hard as well (although that is somewhat mitigated in terms of still recovering from a broken leg, so hard for me is not as hard as it has been at sometimes).

Also, and I am not sure this is at all related to the sleep component but I have been trying to eliminate all flouride from my diet as well.

6/10

I was about to write that the same thing happened to me a few years ago, then I realized that the OP is actually me.