Q
: I have always heard that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. I am also aware of the three main meals as staples of a good diet. My question regarding these two issues is this: Are they true, and why or why not? Thanks for clarifying an issue that should be simple but is constantly discussed.
A: Most of us get locked into the three-meals-a-day mindset. It’s no wonder. After all, it’s traditional to eat breakfast, lunch and dinner. Somewhere, we were told if we ate less (in amount, duration and frequency) we would lose weight. Today, nutritional science gives us incredible insight into these concepts.
We now know the physiological effects of eating (or not eating) three meals a day. Skipping breakfast and eating nothing before noon means your brain is starved of its principal fuel – glucose – until lunch time. Clearly, you’ll be at your productive peak only for a short time after lunch – and then only if you don’t eat a large, fat-heavy, drowsiness-producing meal.
The day gets off to a far better start if you eat breakfast early in the morning. However, on the three-meal plan, you will have a rise in blood sugar, but by late morning your blood sugar will drop back so much that you will be definitely in a depressed blood-sugar state. The same occurs in the late afternoon.
Both slumps can be headed off since the brain works on glucose. One simple way to head off blood-sugar troughs is to eat a small snack in the midmorning and another in the midafternoon. This serves to stabilize your blood-sugar levels, enabling you to be more cognitive throughout the day.
Setting yourself up for a productive day
The setup is called breakfast. Break the fast imposed by sleep and refuel your mind and body. It’s not a new concept. The term breakfast dates from the 15th century, and the concept probably became well established during or even before builders set out on empty stomachs to pull huge blocks of granite across the Egyptian desert. But every generation has to learn the importance of breakfast for itself.
You may get up in a fog and hate the idea of eating, but as always, your body remains in a survival mode. It won’t release the muscles’ limited store of energy in case some sudden emergency requires fight or flight. All our progress in civilization has not ruled out that possibility.
If you eat a high-carbohydrate diet, you replace the glycogen (or starch) in the liver much more quickly than if you eat a protein and fat diet. Protein and fat replace glycogen slowly; carbohydrates replace glycogen quickly. Specifically, whole grain breads and cereals, such as oatmeal, provide a far more productive breakfast for a mental worker than ham and eggs.
The body wants to be energized when it awakens. Research shows that most people reach their highest level of mental energy within six hours of waking up. A protein breakfast won’t necessarily make you more alert, and a carbohydrate breakfast won’t necessarily make you calmer. However, eating something for breakfast is essential to give your blood glucose levels a jump start.
We know food helps wake us up. After sleeping, your body’s glycogen supplies are at their lowest level, and the physical processes need a kick start. The brain works on two things: oxygen and glucose. With little oxygen, you die. With little glucose, you sleep. With little oxygen available for conversion into glucose and no breakfast, you tend to function cognitively way below your potential.
People who perform below their potential all morning are likely to say, "I don’t have time to eat breakfast." Missing breakfast is often a characteristic of someone who flails away frantically, working hard without accomplishing much.
Even the busiest person can find a few moments between getting up and getting to work to make a breakfast of bananas, oatmeal, rye toast, bran muffins or bagels, even if there isn’t time for a quick bowl of cereal topped with fruit.
Find time to eat breakfast
People are always telling me they don’t have time to eat breakfast. I can’t say this strongly enough: eat breakfast. Period. No ifs, ands or buts. A good night’s sleep depletes much of the glycogen stored in the liver. (Glycogen is the starch the body converts to glucose for energy.)
The brain works on two things, oxygen and glucose. With the storage bin containing the glycogen fairly well depleted in the morning, you must eat something for breakfast to function at a high level. It can be a small breakfast, or it can be a quick one, but food intake can’t be omitted entirely without gravely weakening your morning’s productivity.
As an aside for those who study physiology and know that glycogen is also stored in the muscles, I offer this theory: The body won’t utilize muscle glycogen unless we are literally starving.
Still no time to eat breakfast? As several studies show, eating breakfast is associated with improved midmorning endurance and with better attitudes toward work.
Still no time? How about some ready-to-eat foods? Apples, yogurt, whole-grain muffins and bagels are just a few examples of foods you can eat on the run, driving a car, whatever.
If you don’t eat breakfast, I urge you in the strongest terms to reconsider your position. From the viewpoint of losing fat, it’s imperative. If you don’t eat breakfast every morning, you tell your body in loud and clear tones: "I’m starving. Do something to save my life." Your body responds by lowering its metabolism and energy output to store more fat.
There is simply no reason to avoid eating in the morning. Breakfast is not the time to "just say no!"
