Eating every 3 hours

It's beneficial if it helps you stay within your calorie goals.

Unnecessary. If it helps you to stay within your goals or keeps your energy/mood/concentration levels up throughout the day, then great! Do it! But if it makes things harder for you throughout the day then consider not doing it. It's really a personal preference thing.

I am a cancer survivor l get tired and can't get to the gym everyday, but don't give up even if you have steps walk around your home 5times any little bit help. You can do it.

Why would it be ridiculous... Absolutely everyone professional I've talked to supports this. My personal trainer... my body builder friend... my doctor...

The longer you wait between meals, the hungrier you get, and then you’re more likely to overeat. This is the main reason I do it.

If you eat smaller meals your blood sugar level will be more balanced. Blood sugar affects your energy... So if you eat one huge meal you get a big high, which is not only hard on your digestive system but also your blood sugar drops down after about 3-4 hours. You want constant energy.

Another reason is to teach you healthy snacking and prevent snacking on junk food or candy.

Ohhh most important!!!!! DO NOT SKIP ANY MEAL.

Beneficial. I do it (for the most part). It keeps you from starving and it keeps your metabolism in gear!

borndieu wrote: »

I definitely think it is beneficial. On a normal day, I normally have around 5-6 meals. I've lost a lot of weight doing that.

You have lost a lot of weight by maintaining a calorie deficit.

rileysowner wrote: »

borndieu wrote: »

I definitely think it is beneficial. On a normal day, I normally have around 5-6 meals. I've lost a lot of weight doing that.

You have lost a lot of weight by maintaining a calorie deficit.

Yeah, that's true as well. Left that out.. In any event, eating more than 3 times a day at calorie deficit, keeps me full. It works for some people.

I agree with the overall trend - it may not be necessary for success, but I know from my personal struggles, it does help to curb snacking (especially bad snacking) as you are continuously fueling your body. The biggest caveat for me was that you really need to examine what comprises your typical meal, and be able to pare that down if you are going to eat an extra meal or two.

I've struggled a long time with the concept, and at least initially my change to 4 meals has been a good spark. It's only been about 2 weeks where I have seriously focused on and prepared 4 meals a day, and it's starting to feel 'normal' for me.

krhyme wrote: »

missylectro wrote: »

Why would it be ridiculous... Absolutely everyone professional I've talked to supports this. My personal trainer... my body builder friend... my doctor...

The longer you wait between meals, the hungrier you get, and then you’re more likely to overeat. This is the main reason I do it.

If you eat smaller meals your blood sugar level will be more balanced. Blood sugar affects your energy... So if you eat one huge meal you get a big high, which is not only hard on your digestive system but also your blood sugar drops down after about 3-4 hours. You want constant energy.

This! Plus... "When you eat large meals with many hours in between, your metabolism slows down between meals. Having a small meal or snack every 3 to 4 hours keeps your metabolism cranking, so you burn more calories over the course of a day." - WebMD

There are studies proving this and studies debunking this. So just use your own discretion.

In my experience, I'd die if I had to wait forever to eat my next meal. I get angry and tired and it's like torture if I have to wait too long to eat. That being said, if I still feel full 3-4 hours after my last meal, I may skip or shrink my next meal so not to feel bloated and force fed. It all depends on you. I focus on hitting my macros and staying within a certain caloric goal, and I usually succeed best when planning 5-6 meals throughout my day.

All of these claims are incorrect and have been consistently shown to be incorrect. Metabolism does not slow down significantly between meals unless you eat nothing for about 72 hours (yes, you read that correctly up to 72 hours). In fact the opposite seems to happen. From all my reading, there are no reputable studies that support that eating frequently will result in any difference in weight loss compared to eating less frequently if calories are kept the same.

There are several studied done on meal timing that I have hand, and more have been done since. They point to the same thing, when you eat does not matter. They did everything from one meal a day to several meals a day. In 2007 Stote et al in the A Journal of Clinical Nutrition did a study of people half the group eating one meal a day (dinner in early evening). The other half did three meals a day. After the test time they let the whole group eat as they normally would for 11 weeks to normalize their eating pattern, then the switch the groups around. The study time was 8 weeks, and they were eating enough to maintain their body weight. The results, 3 meals a day no change in weight. 1 meal a day lost 3 pounds and an average of 4.6 pounds of fat (probably because it is difficult to eat all your calories in one meal). That is not old science, it is recent. When you eat makes no difference. See also Smeets et al British Journal of Nutrition 2008 finding no metabolic rate change between 2 or 3 meals a day; and Farshchi et al Am Jrnl of Clinical Nutrition 2005 using 3, 6 or 9 meals a day again finding no change in metabolic rate.

The multiple meals a day may help some people feel more satisfied helping them stick to their diet, but will do nothing to significantly increase your calorie burning.

As Parks et al say in their article in the Am Jrnl of Clinical Nutrition, "Simply put, the question of whether there is a health benefit from the consumption of multiple small meals will ultimately depend on how much energy is consumed, as opposed to how often or how regularly one eats."

The conclusion is if multiple meals a day helps you to keep from eating too many calories, by all means do so. If it just makes you have to struggle to live life so you are more likely to cheat on the number of calories you eat, eat 3 meals a day. Use whatever works best for you to be able to maintain your calorie deficit and lose weight consistently.