Tuesday, December 5, 2017

Should you eat heavy breakfast?

Every one around has apparently become, what we call now a days "Health conscious". You start a channel on TV, open Facebook, or even a post in Whatsapp, you come across different ways and methods to keep a good health. So, either you need to reduce weight, or gain some. You need to reduce some cholesterol.Sometimes you need to retain good cholesterol and selectively reduce bad cholesterol. Same goes for fat content. Again, you need to also bring control on carbs, but increase intake of proteins and fibres. Basically there are many norms which have come up and most of these are related to the food that you eat. Now , all the norms discussed are related to what to eat.
But then there are a separate set of norms to decide when to eat and how much to eat. A common consensus that has emerged in recent times is you should eat heavy breakfast and light Lunch and Supper. Again the Supper should again be no later than 7.30 p.m. apparently. Almost every one is advocating this. Major focus is on breakfast and that too heavy. As they say, Eating heavy breakfast would yield you a good fuel to sustain the days activity in addition to keeping your metabolism up. It apparently also helps in reducing weight.
I am not sure about above said benefits of heavy breakfast. My take on this point is little different. Recently, I started going to the gym early in the morning, instead of evening. One thing that has happened because of it is, I just feel real hungry in the morning.I decided to apply the formula of heavy breakfast. You will not believe it, but it does not good to me. Problem is, I feel hungry and I follow this rule, so I eat a heavy breakfast. Now, my conjunction is that it will sustain for atleast next three-four hours till the lunch time, which I plan to have a little light.
But in my case, I had two different observations:
i)This heavy breakfast does not sustain for that long. Very soon, within two hours time, I again feel hungry. Now I must eat, but I am wondering whether I should try to stretch it till lunch? Somehow, it doesn't work and I end up eating again. ( This time a little less.)
ii) The heavy breakfast (realizing that I feel hungry with in 2 hrs) sometimes makes me feel sleepy. So, last Saturday, I had heavy breakfast and then I decided to do some work sitting at home. I did not realize, that I went into the deep zone of sleeping for next 2 hours and got up again only to take my lunch.
After experimenting a bit here and there with my breakfast pattern, now I have designed a new format of breakfast. And this new format drags me away from the concept of heavy breakfast. What I am trying now is, I am splitting my breakfast content into two parts. Suppose earlier, I used to eat 2 dishes of poha for breakfast or 3 parathas in one sitting. Now, I split it into two parts. I eat only one dish of Poha or say 2 parathas only in my first sitting. The second dish of Poha or the remaining one paratha, I eat after an interval of 1-2 hrs, i.e. the time when I again get the craving for food. This way, I get to eat again without any guilt and I also do not feel sleepy.
This concept of heavy breakfast seems little misleading to me. What I conclude is, because you are hungry in the morning and you have a bigger appetite for food, you are not sure how much you should eat. Out of the heavy breakfast, only a small portion would actually get utilized, rest of the food taken would probably do no good. After some time when that quota is consumed, rather than using the extra food available, it sends the signal to brain for eating more food. Since you eat on already loaded stomach, the result is you end up feeling sleepy.
I have experienced it many a times, and thats why I propose this new form of split breakfast method. It not only reduces your food intake, but it also avoid you from having any food eating guilt as well as sleepyness.
Well I am no dietician. But this is a well tested method that works for me.
So, avoid heavy breakfast; have a split breakfast.

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