I think with the calorie counting a lot of people never really allow themselves to reach satiation. One therapeutic thing I did at some point was to learn to eat to satiation. I was literally advised to get a huge tub of ground beef, brown it up (no spices or salt), a few cartons of eggs, and boil a couple of pounds of potatoes. Then every time I was hungry, I had to eat until I was full of whichever one I wanted: ground beef, potatoes or eggs (or a combo of thereof). UNSEASONED. Till I was full. Not counting calories.

That was the regimen that broke the back of my CW inherited hungers. Basically, you will be sitting there with a bunch left on your plate and experience the knowledge that you are full and will be able to put the rest of the food back into the fridge.

Now W30 arbitrary forbids white potato, so you can either try sweet ones, or do not obey arbitrary restrictions if you want to try this method.

Just because you think you *should* be full on 500 calories that is not true. Sometimes you need a pound of ground beef to feel full. And then you won't bother to eat for 7 or 10 hours. Sometimes a few bites are enough. It is the hardest thing to eat when you are hungry and it is even harder to stop when you are full. But without mastering it all the rest is not going to work.

I would caution against intermittent fasting or reducing the number of meal until you actually get that full signal.

I'm a snacker....

I can't eat a lot of food first thing in the morning nor in the evening - especially on nights when I work out - I don't workout until 8pm and I simply can't eat a good sized meal and then workout...

I simply spread my food out over the day - with my biggest meal being lunch.

With Paleo/primal because you are focused on protiens, fats and good for you veggies the portion sizes may be a bit bigger.

I set my day with a light breakfast (usually 2 egg cups and some sausage) - a mid morning snack (usually nuts), lunch, a mid afternoon snack (usually some guac and veggies or small apple and almond butter), dinner, evening snack (usually some frozen berries or a piece of dark chocolate)

Whomever said to do three larger meals is....wrong.

'Three squares' is a product of the Industrial Revolution - where meals had to be scheduled to maximize factory productivity. "Eat before you come to work; eat after you go home; oh, and we'll give you a food break at midday to keep your strength up."

Hunter/gatherers eat when they are hungry. Period. You might have to modify that to fit in with your work schedule, but smaller meals more often keep insulin, hormone and enzyme levels far more level that Three Squares do.

I eat when I'm hungry, and I get physically hungry for 3 meals a day.

Just want to point out that just because you get physically hungry for 3 meals a day, doesn't mean that everybody does. Different approaches work for different people, based on a number of variables including their work/life schedules, how much time they get to eat in one setting, what macros they're eating for, what their workouts are like, etc. Similar to how IF didn't help you, but it does seem to help a lot of other people.

I think the "how many meals a day" question ultimately boils down to what works best and is sustainable to you, which takes self-experimentation. I don't think there is any right or wrong answer and as long as the quality of the food you are eating is good, when/how often doesn't matter as much as we think it does.

To get to the original question of this thread, 6 days isn't long enough to truly know what will work for you one way or another, and the first 2-3 weeks of this way of eating is generally the toughest part of the learning curve as you discover just how much you need to eat in a day to keep yourself satisfied. Just keep at it, eat when you are hungry for now. If you find yourself snacking a lot in between meals, I would probably make note of that and take it as a sign that you need to tweak your meals to include more protein or fat. Eventually you will find a way that works well FOR YOU, and if it's different than someone else's ideal number of meals per day, so what?

Good luck!

I wasn't trying to disagree with you, just trying to say it in a way that was perhaps more clear to the OP that it's about finding what works from you

Sorry, I disagree. Constantly jacking up your insulin is not good. Constantly eating does not keep your insulin levels "even". That's mostly a CW myth. Your body needs a break. Your digestive system needs a break.

Maybe it's only semantics, but I'll have to disagree with YOU - or at least, how you wrote it. 'Grazing' as I understand it is eating small amounts of food several times per day. That being the case, small amounts of food will not 'jack' insulin levels up - they will rise mildly to deal with the small amount of food entering the system, then lowers and eventually produces the signal to look for food again. It's no different than your 4 meals a day, other than the waves are smaller and more frequent. You get MORE 'rest periods' - and less to rest FROM. Less stress on the system, and less potential to overshoot on the insulin response because of the amount of carbs entering the system at once.

It is the difference between small waves lapping at the edge of a lake, and the large waves crashing on the beach.

That being said, I eat one 'meal' a day - dinner - and sometimes two if the wife is home for brunch on a day off. The rest of the day, I eat small amounts whenever I feel like having something. If I was still working, this would probably be different, but even then I seldom had breakfast, and had two or three 'snack breaks' during the day where I'd grab a bite and walk around the courtyard (had a desk job).

Body chemistry doesn't really support the idea of 'three squares'; neither do hunter/gatherer societies, who eat small until they catch something big to share - and then feast. The important thing is to listen to your body and do what works best. If Three Squares works best for your body and lifestyle - go for it. If smaller meals more often help keep you from obsessing over the next meal - go for it. It's your mouth, your body, and your life.