Operation Eat like a King - December

TaraMaria

"Breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, dinner like a pauper."

Breakfast is exactly what the name suggests - Break Fast. It’s breaking the fast your body had while you were asleep for 8 hours (or however long you normally do). It is the first meal of the day, usually eaten in the morning (assuming you slept at night). If you’ve got a twisted sleep cycle (perhaps due to working on shift, etc) and you sleep in the afternoons, then your breakfast will be the first meal you have when you wake up. Breakfast does not follow the time of the day, but your sleep cycle, and helps kick-start your metabolism levels for the day, which is crucial to weight loss.

A study once conducted found that although skipping breakfast may seem a good way to eliminate calories, breakfast skippers tend to be fatter than breakfast eaters. And when people eat a larger-than-normal breakfast, they end up eating almost 100 fewer calories by the end of the day, an amount that can help your weight loss efforts.

Skipping breakfast in order to lose weight is a big mistake and is counter productive because it actually slows your metabolism and can lead to over eating.

Planning what you will eat for breakfast the next day is one of the keys to success in being able to eat a regular breakfast.

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"Ahem...My name is Tara and I skip breakfast." (Hi Tara) "I save all of my calories for dinner because I tend to look at that as the fun meal of the day. Then I end up having calories left over because of working out or not eating as much as I thought I would. I pledge for the month of December to eat something for breakfast everyday so that I'm not as hungry towards the end of the day, don't have left over calories and can get the scale to budge for those few pounds. I know that I end up starving my body of the nutrients it needs to be healthy and I need to be healthy and happy to continue my life!"

My goal is to plan my breakfasts out. I'm NOT a good planner so I play on doing it at least 2-3 days in advance and working my way up from there. They say its easier to burn a big breakfast as opposed to a big dinner and I tend to agree with...them. Whoever they are. If you are someone who skips breakfast I encourage you to join me in this challenge. Its the perfect time of the year to try it. Fill yourself on healthy foods in the morning as opposed to being starving at that holiday party later on and shoveling unhealthy food in your mouth.

What do you think? ) Join me! )

For more info:
http://www.dailymuscle.com/2007/06/05/everyday-weight-loss-tip-6-eat-breakfast-like-a-king/
http://www.fitstep.com/Library/Tips/Tips/eat-a-big-breakfast.htm

HilarieXcore

I wanna join I breakfast foods, I just never have time to eat it..
so I'm gonna use this to help me get in the habit now before next semester when I have to leave home by 7 every day..
(:

SkierElle

I most always have breakfast! Usually something like eggs or a protein shake with some fruit or toast. I am a sucker for those breakfast sandwiches... they can be made really healthy!!! I am def going to eat like a queen in Dec., especially when I go to my parent's house, we always have so many veggies and meat and good breakfasts....

Steph_Anie

I've started eating breakfast... but it's usually just cereal and I still end up with tons of calories for dinner-- I leave for work before 7, and am not awake enough to do anything more complicated than that in the a.m. :-)

HealthyChanges2010

bump:happy:

tarapin

I eat breakfast everyday! It is so important and I don't want to give myself a reason to overeat at any other meal. I usually have shredded wheat or grape nuts with a banana and skim milk. Today I almost talked myself into eggs, home fires and bacon but after logging in both and seeing the difference in fat and sodium I RAN for the cereal!

Great choice in adding breakfast....I'm totally behind you guys :bigsmile:

TaraMaria

Today I ate half an english muffin and a serving of my fav cereal kashi go lean. I ate slowly because I wasn't hungry...probably took me at least 45 minutes, but hey at least I got a good steady meal in at the start of my day! )

HealthyChanges2010

:drinker: Great job Tara!! This is not easy when you're not used to eating until later in the day.

I typically eat breakfast but some crazy reason I completely forgot to eat until this evening, no wonder my body is having a hard time staying warm.

Tomorrow! Gonna eat breakfast like I usually do and check back here with you all

TaraMaria

Wonderful Becca! I know it seems like such a simple concept, maybe I'm crazy! Ha ha! But I keep trying to comfort myself by saying "Not only are you eating breakfast, you are trying to eat a BIG breakfast!" )

I was at 390 for breakfast today. I'm thinking omelet tomorrow... )

TaraMaria

I'm trying to stick around 400 at least for my first meal of the day. Its a big challenge for me! Ha ha! SO crazy! One thing I thought this was supposed to do was quench some of the rest of the eating during the day, but for me, its intensified. However you have to understand my day usually looked like this:

9 AM: Wakeup
2PM: First Snack (Very light, usually a carb)
5PM: Dinner (Big dinner)
7PM: Snack (Very Light, usually veggie)

And Done. Now I'm eating all day. Breakfast, lunch, dinner. Keeping dinner at 400 instead of 700 or 800. In the past 3 days of eating breakfast...I've lost 1.8 pounds. :happy: :happy: :happy: I haven't logged it yet because I want to wait a week. But I can't believe the change. Starvation mode is obviously a real thing and I was in it.

Yesterday the Omelet was amazing and ridiculously filling. Today I was in such a hurry that I only got a big old glass of juice and an english muffin with cream cheese. But it added up to 350 total. )

Happyoceangirl

Yay for your discovery Tara! This will open up a whole new world for you! Until MFP, I was never a breakfast eater either. Wait, I take that back. I think fully loaded Mountain Dew and a snack size bag of cheetos around 10:30 am could technically qualify as a breakfast, (a totally crappy, reckless, self-abuse kind of breakfast).

Once you start planning for it, and getting in the swing of it, you may eventually find that to skip it causes you problems! That's how it's been for me, since I got on track.

I think I'm going to join you and experiment with the idea of a bigger breakfast, lighter dinner. This could be quite a challenge.... but I'm in for a 2 week experiment.

TaraMaria

Yay! Its really amazing! I don't know that I'm actually qualifying as "Eating like a King" since my meals never go over 400 but at least its a meal that was never there before!

Today was my Kashi Go Lean Crunch cereal.... that cereal. I try to space it out...I could eat it every day but I really want to mix things up.

One of my absolute favorite things that have come from this...In the mornings I would always fix my 3 year old breakfast and then start doing chores. I wasn't hungry, I didn't eat. WELL. Now I make him breakfast, fix myself something and we sit there giggling about his toes or noes until we are all done. The time has become SO precious!

Another .2 down. This makes 1.8 pounds gone altogether in less then a week of eating breakfast. REALLY can't believe my eyes on that one. :noway:

Happyoceangirl

That's great - and how luck you are to have discovered a way to build in more fun giggle time with your boy. That can be a long standing habit.

I failed yesterday, after I wrote this down. I took too much time doing other things and then didn't eat until later. Set me up for failure I think.

Today, I had an english muffin with peanut butter. It was so good that I then snarfed down ANOTHER english muffin (no pb on that one). Logged it and realized then that I needed to do a worthwhile workout. Struggling with the whole balance right now....
BUT trusting that it WILL get better.