This may come as something of a surprise to many, but you're actually taller in the morning when you wake up than you are at night.
On top of that, you also may weigh a little less. The reasoning behind that might be more obvious than why we shrink throughout the course of the day, though.
That reason is that the cartilage in our spines and knees is compressed as we walk about and generally experience the effects of gravity through the day, so we shrink down a little bit as that happens.
The amount of change might come as a shock, too.
On average, a person is between 1cm and 3cms taller when they get out of bed than when they get back into it that same evening, one 2017 study suggests.
Weird, right?
It's even weirder for astronauts who travel to space.
Obviously, while they're up in space they are no longer subjected to the same levels of gravity that we on earth experience.
That means the cartilage has plenty of time to relax and expand, which means that returning space travellers are often several inches taller than when they left.
Almost worth the intensive training if you've got a Napoleon complex, isn't it?
As for the reason you might weigh less in the morning than in the evening, that's pretty simple.
If you've ever stepped on a scale first thing and been shocked to discover you've lost a few pounds, you might be even more shocked to discover that you'll just have put it back on by bedtime.
That's because we always wake up slightly dehydrated, and the amount of water that has been lost overnight through sweating simply takes the weight off.
To be fair, you can stop this by drinking plenty of water before bedtime - but beware - you might find yourself waking up to go to the toilet more often.
On top of that, the body's metabolism works overtime whilst we're asleep, burning through the calories to keep us breathing and generating heat.
So, the stomach might be empty, and you could have lost a bit of water, meaning that you'll feel pretty good about yourself if you step on the scale first thing.
That said, you should be too worried about what the scales say, because - as we've discussed - it fluctuates and changes throughout the day.
On top of that, weight and height are just numbers, you shouldn't let yourself be ruled by them in the first place.
Featured Image Credit: PixabayTopics: Science, Interesting, Health