I get that breakfast is important. I’ve read articles explaining how you haven’t eaten in so long that your body really needs food, and how it jump starts your metabolism in the morning. I’ve read articles about the negative effects that stem from not eating breakfast, like you gain more weight or you have lower energy levels.
But I don’t recall ever reading an article that actually compares the effects of skipping breakfast to the effects of skipping lunch or dinner, and actually supports the claim that breakfast is not only important, but the MOST important meal of the day.
Breakfast is no less or more important than lunch or dinner, what is important for many people is that they don’t allow themselves to get too hungry or else they may overcompensate by eating too much, or their mental/physical performance will suffer. As far as body composition is concerned, total caloric intake through the day is what matters for weight gain/ loss. I personally tend to eat a rather large breakfast and very little through the rest of the day. If you search “The Warrior Diet” proposed by Ori Hofmekeler, you will see that he proposes one meal a day, with that meal being consumed around traditional dinnertime.
I’m pretty sure I’ve read reports that eating breakfast is a success factor in weight loss, that is, those who eat breakfast are more likely to be successful in losing weight than those who skip breakfast. I’ll take a look on my Weight Watchers site and see if I can find something more concrete…
OK, found one reference: Wyatt, H.R., et al., Long-term weight loss and breakfast in subjects in the National Weight Control Registry. Obes Res, 2002. 10(2): p. 78-82.
According to this article, eating one meal a day can lead to diabetes and CVD due to the metabolic effects; conversely, people who ate many small meals a day were less likely to be obese:
(the site looks like an “ask the…” site but is produced by Columbia University so I’d consider it reliable, unlike this Wiki answers which claims that only 6 hours without protein makes your body start breaking down muscles)
Not certain if this will work for everyone, but about 10 years ago at age 32, I began showing poor readings on my cholesterol and the doc was close to prescribing Lipitor for me.
Since then, I stopped eating breakfast. I only drink some water and maybe drink a black sugar-free coffee in the morning. I eat a huge lunch and try to include some healthy choices in that huge meal. This is around 12:30 or so. I don’t eat anything at all until dinner (around 10:30 pm) which is pretty light but basically anything I want.
Before I go to sleep I drink one glass of water with a teaspoon of Metamucil.
Over the past 5 years, my doc is always amazed at my complete blood work. My HDL is high, my LDL is low and I have very low triglycerides. In fact,
of the 40 or so things they measure, I’m within the healthy range for all of them.
I credit this to eating 2 meals a day, with no snacks at all in between. Again, YMMV.
It depends on your basal metabolic rate and activity level, but 6 hrs. does not seem unreasonable for the amount of time it would take to deplete your body’s glycogen reserves and shift into muscle catabolism:
I have found that skipping breakfast (and eating lunch well after 1) is great for me when I want to lose weight. Not only do I get fewer calories, I’m less hungry for the rest of the day. Less grazing and all that.
The properties of how the body starts going into fat burning mode, etc., seems to be particularly helpful.
I put the line about breakfast being important in the same category as other valuable medical advice like “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”