Breakfast: Myth or Truth?

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  • keithgoode
    keithgoode Posts: 11 Member
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    It's likely a myth. The ultimate truth is that you should consume fewer calories than you burn in order to lose weight. That said, I eat within 30 minutes to an hour of waking in the morning, and I eat every two hours like clockwork afterward. This approach has really forced me to educate myself about portions and caloric values. I'm never to the point of starving, but I do get hungry every two hours now. I guess it's all about how your train your body.
  • romancefan1983
    romancefan1983 Posts: 88 Member
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    I agree that it's an individaul thing. I'm one that has to have breakfast or I'll be super grumpy! :explode: lol Also, without breakfast I'm starving and are more likely to overeat. But my husband doesn't eat breakfast and is just fine.
  • cowgirlupkelly
    cowgirlupkelly Posts: 51
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    Myth. However I used not to have breakfast too and found out that I actually ate more later to make up for it.

    /\ this is me. I used to feel (back when I started Weight Watchers in the 80s) that I was hungrier eating breakfast throughout the day but once it became routine this stopped.

    But you have to do what works for you.
  • crandos
    crandos Posts: 377 Member
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    Not really in the open and direct way about metabolism but I have read more than a few research articles on how eating breakfast is still relevant due to it helping to regulate your cortisol levels.

    From what I understand, when you sleep, your cortisol levels are naturally high because you are basically fasting. Breakfast helps bring them back down to their normal levels. If you skip then your levels will remain higher to keep your glucose levels up and diminish your insulin sensitivity....which of course helps regulate your carb and fat metabolism.

    I am like you though, if I eat breakfast then I am usually hungrier during the day. What I try to do is eat higher protein foods in the morning because they take longer to digest and keep me full for longer.

    Nah cortisol is greater in the morning it lowers before you go to bed then rises as you begin to wake up, then lowers again this is if your a healthy person.
  • alihaus19
    alihaus19 Posts: 9
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    Hello! I would do whatever is best for you but I always eat breakfast within the first few hours I wake up. When you go to bed, you are basically fasting for 8 hours and your metabolism slows down to its slowest rate because you are not doing anything! When you wake up in the morning, and you don't eat anything, your metabolism is still very slow and continues to be at its slowest rate since it has no energy; calories.
  • nomeejerome
    nomeejerome Posts: 2,616 Member
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    Hello! I would do whatever is best for you but I always eat breakfast within the first few hours I wake up. When you go to bed, you are basically fasting for 8 hours and your metabolism slows down to its slowest rate because you are not doing anything! When you wake up in the morning, and you don't eat anything, your metabolism is still very slow and continues to be at its slowest rate since it has no energy; calories.

    nope.
  • morticia16
    morticia16 Posts: 230 Member
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    Not sure about the importance of breakfast, the opinions differ. I'd say, do what feels best for you.

    As for me, I used to never eat breakfast. When I started at MFP, I started eating breakfast too. To achieve my calorie goals in a sustainable manner mainly since I really needed to change my eating habits to achieve balance in my meals and get things going. Turns out, I also feel better after eating breakfast. The downside: I get hungrier much sooner.
  • icimani
    icimani Posts: 1,454 Member
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    The question of breakfast or not seems to be one of the recurring controversies here at MFP. I'm sure you can find studies either way and, as you've seen here at MFP, there are lots of opinions either way and everywhere in between. Experiment and find out what works for you.

    I was never one for eating breakfast but gave it a try on the recommendation of my nutritionist. For a while I was like some other people here - if I ate breakfast I was hungry a few hours later. But now I find that if I don't eat breakfast I'm starving by the time lunch comes, and then I'm reaching for the first thing I can find instead of planning or making wiser decisions. So for me, it works.
  • corgicake
    corgicake Posts: 846 Member
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    It's a myth, along with the whole 'don't eat after 6pm' bit. I have to eat after 6pm and specifically to eat enough carbs or you'll need a couple sticks of dynamite to get my keister out of bed the next morning.
  • mike_ny
    mike_ny Posts: 351 Member
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    Eating breakfast works well for me. I don't really buy it revving up the metabolism, though.

    Eating several small meals makes it much easier for me to track my macros and calories and adjust them as needed. I can get by on eating less at each meal and the sum total is still less than I used to eat either just eating lunch and dinner or three squares a day.

    For me the key is not going too long and being overly hungry to the point where it's just too easy to overeat before I feel satisfied but not full. A light breakfast carries me over to either a light mid-morning snack or lunch without being overly hungry.

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