which is better 3 or 5 meals?

rkascak

Someone told me to eat 5 smaller meals a day instead of three larger ones. I decided to give this a try. For breakfast I usually have oatmeal and a banana, but todoay i just has the oatmeal at 9 am and i just a trail mix bar at noon. I figured that I shouldd eat a little bit about every three hours. Has any tried the 5 meals a day? Any advice?

emilyfh

hi, smaller meals are better for more reasons than just digestions, keeping blood sugars normal levels, the list goes on. I eat 3 meals about 250-350 calories, plus 4 snacks with some kind of protein around 100 calories and exercise most days to stay within my calorie goal. this works for me and I would give it a try. I follow food lovers weight loss plan.

Fit4Vet

I eat somewhere between 5-6 meals a day. It really works for me. I've been steady in my weight loss (ticker doesn't reflect it all as I threw out the scale!!). I think it helps my metabolism stay up.

RentThisSpace

I've done this for awhile now, and I really like. It helps to not gorge yourself during the traditional three meals by having smaller portions throughout the day. So your body doesn't get hungry as you are consistently feeding it, it doesn't store as much fat because it doesn't get the signal of extreme hunger anymore.

missyannb85

I dont know that you would count them as all meals but this i how I eat:
Breakfast- High fiber cereal or oatmeal
Lunch- between 200-250 cals, usualy a turkey sandwhich or lite soup
2-3pm- a fiber one bar or special k bar
Dinner- 300-400 calories typicaly pork or chicken with veggies
7:45pm- yogurt or celery with PB

Eatng every 2-3 hours is really working for me and it's easy! If you eat something and dont feel totaly satisfied you say to yourself "only 2 hours and I get to eat again!"
Good luck!

nickkehagias

I try to eat every 3 hours, and I think it's helped a whole lot in cutting down on body fat %. Now that I've done the 4-6 small meals a day for the last 2 months, I'm like it a lot more. It's easier to stay low on the calories, but high on the good stuff. *Feel free to skip the rest of what I wrote, I just babbled on*


My diet probably isn't the type you want to emulate, since it's SUPER protein heavy, but I figured I'd throw it out there, in case you do low calorie/high protein too. The meals in the middle of the day aren't really set in stone. My schedule varies from day to day, so they get shaken up, but that's the jist of it.

8:00am- 4 or 5 egg whites, occasionally a real egg too. some feta cheese and an apple.
11:00am- Protein bar and a banana or protein shake if I went to the gym early
1:00- oatmeal or a ham sandwich, etc. occasionally some fruit
4:00- hard boiled egg, protein bar or protein shake(depending on what I had earlier)
7:00- something lean, usually chicken, brown rice and a veggie
9:00 usually depends on my calories left for the day. I don't like to leave more than a 500 calorie deficit, because your body will often slow it's metabolism for fear of starving.

jclguru

I actually only eat twice a day...around 2pm and midnite (I work the midnite shift).
As you can tell by my ticker, my metabolism is working just fine

Doug

catherine1979

I don't have a job where I can eat every 3 hours, so I eat 3 meals and maybe a snack if I get a chance. It's worked for me, I have no issues with blood sugar though.