Bananas - Diet Friend or Foe

I lost faster & felt better when I was eating several portions of fruit a day - bananas included. (not budgeting my food money well enough - but HOPEFULLY next month I can leave enough for my daily fruit). I didn't eat the same everyday, though - I like to mix up different types of fruit. I usually would have them frozen, mixed in the food processor to taste like ice cream. Yum!! (So I'd end up having several bananas in one sitting).

Right now it's killing me not to be able to buy the fruits that are in season now. But, you can only spend what you have, so I'm currently doing without, which is such a shame. I feel better when my foods are as unprocessed as possible, as much fruits & veggies as I can possibly eat. I lose fast (I think because I was so full & satisfied), stay full & feel SO great.

And - one more thing - YES - you SHOULD be proud to stick to this through the stress!! I have taken a few 'breaks' (as my son called it - bless him!!) during real bad stress recently, but I'm back to it.

Good for you!!

Protein helps you feel full. So is it possible that since you've cut out the chicken, you snack a little more throughout the day to stay full?

If you are going to change something in your breakfast I would keep the banana and lose the processed cereal - at least the banana is in its natural form with all it's micronutrients intact, who knows what they have taken away and added in to make your cereal. What about oatmeal and banana instead of cereal?

(I haven't had many bananas lately as they are SO expensive ($16/kilo!) but my sister just came back from holidays with a big box of bananas for the family so I'll be eating one a day for the next week or so )

I pretty much have a banana everyday. I buy the small ones no more than 3 oz. because the large ones actually counts as
2 fruits. I have been losing steadily.

I agree with the person who pointed out it's one big sugar rush. Your past breakfast had some protein in it (chicken). If you don't wanna go back to that, I would lose the cereal and replace it with cottage cheese or yogurt (and keep the banana if you want it). Good luck!

I read somewhere that while bananas are high in potassium, it's the worst place for us to get potassium from, because the human body can't absorb much (if any) of banana's potassium. You can go to the USDA site which lists the nutrients in food, and click potassium and see a list of many other sources.

And i totally agree about needing to keep your breakfast with protein. Bananas aren't wrong, per se, but if your only reason is the potassium, try something different!

I was doing so well losing about a pound a week. This week I replaced my breakfast chicken muffin with Trader Joe's Multigrain Os, a banana, and 1/2 cup TJ's fat free milk. I've gained 3 lbs in 5 days!

I was just trying to get some potassium. But the sugar in that one meal ended up being 45grams!

Does anyone have insight on this otherwise super food? I hope to add and exercise/cardio routine to my life soon. But for now, the only thing I have control over is my diet and trying to lose weight. I'm going through an unbelievably stressful time and was super proud of myself for sticking w/my diet and not trying to cope w/food. So seeing the scale climb over that one change is a big deal for me right now.

Thanks for your input
Jolie

Even the sugar in fruit can stop weight loss in its tracks if you get too much of it. Sugar is sugar regardless of where it comes from. The difference is nutrients in fruit and no nutrients in refined sugar. The body isn't saying 'this is sugar from fruit so this is okay. I'll treat it differently". It doesn't. It's all treated the same. Even "complex" carbs (like grains) are broken down into simple sugars and raise blood glucose levels. Unless you are doing excessive exercise the body has no other choice but to send sugars/carbs that aren't used immediately off to fat for storage. Carbs are just instant fuel.

If you do a lot of excessive cardio (which the body sees as stress) then carbs will get used. If you don't then drop the carbs and increase your fat.

Somewhat true, but not quite. Your body is constantly moving glucose into and out of storage, it has nothing to do with whether you've worked enough to burn it off right away or not. Excess calories lead to excess fat storage, if you eat a high carb meal, don't burn it off, and still eat a calorie deficit, you will not increase your fat stores. Your body will burn it off as needed. The human body is a very efficient machine when it comes to storing and utilizing energy. Think of fat cells like a gas tank, a car uses a fuel pump to dose out fuel from the tank as needed to the engine, rather than dumping it all in at once, even if you are flooring the accelerator. The human body works the same way. You eat, your body breaks down the food, uses the glucose it processes to recharge any glycogen stores that are running low, and stashes the rest away. As you use energy going about your daily life, the body is constantly transferring energy from fat cells to recharge glycogen stores in the muscles as they work.

Fat storage and retrieval is a 24 hour a day process, and has absolutely nothing to do with the timing of what you ate and when you exercised. If you eat too many calories, then obviously the net storage goes up, if you eat less calories than maintenance, then the net storage goes down.