Return to: Your Inputs- Food

5 Meals A Day

Here is an important lifestyle (remember, it is a lifestyle, not a diet) change for you that can play a key part in bringing out the new you.

Change from 3 meals a day to 5 meals a day:

• 3 primary meals a day- breakfast, lunch and dinner.
• 2 mid day snacks- mid-morning and mid-afternoon

For some of you, that could mean changing from 2 meals a day if you have been rushing out the door and skipping breakfast. What your parents or teachers told you is true. A good breakfast is a key to a healthy start on the day. No breakfast and you could wind down quickly in the morning and overeat at lunch.

Here is why the 5 meals a day is so important:

• To minimize the time between meals, so you are less likely to feel cravings.

• To cut out the excess at each meal, which your body would end up storing anyway. With 3 meals a day, we tend to eat too much at each meal, more than your body needs. Think of that excess going to a silo in your body. As too much gets stored up in the silo, it gets moved to more permanent storage, i.e. like the waist or those love handles.

Change to 5 meals a day and spread out your calories more among each meal. Suppose you were on 2,400 calories a day. Spread over 3 meals, each meal would be 800 calories. As an alternative, you could do:

• 3 meals @ 600 calories a meal.
• 2 mid meal snacks @ 300 calories a meal.

The result is 200 less calories at a main meal to go into your excess storage silo, or 600 fewer calories a day. That becomes 4,200 calories a week.

Depending on your body, the excess calories at the main meal could get converted into insulin, which can lead to a temporary spike in your energy. But it is temporary. That roller coaster comes down too, usually before the next meal.

Ever feel the big lull in the mid-afternoon after a big lunch? We used to get this a lot. When we spread our meals out, the mid afternoon crashes went away. We also did not have any more late morning dips, where we used to have to rely on a big lunch to get us back in gear. Spread your calories out more and get off the roller coaster.

This is a very layman’s lesson on how your body processes food. Your nutritionist can tell you more precisely how you react. What we can say is that it worked great for us.

We can also say that this was easy to keep on track. Think of the benefit. No longer do you have to wait hours between meals. You get to have some food every 2-3 hours. How about that? This lifestyle becomes a treat to your stomach. You get to eat more often. Think of it as 2 extra rewards each day for being good.