Breakfast jump-starts your metabolism
A lot of my patients rarely even think about breakfast, let alone actually sit down and actually make breakfast. They don't realize what they're missing out on, including weight loss -- significant weight loss, as a matter of fact.
See, some people actually think they're cutting calories by skipping breakfast. But in reality, they're really setting themselves up for empty snacking and binging throughout the day, especially at lunch, by which point they're practically starving. And the end result is that they're taking in even more calories -- along with fat and carbs -- than they would have had they just taken a few minutes to eat a bowl of cereal or oatmeal.
In fact, breakfast is a must-have when it comes to losing weight successfully. In a survey of members of The National Weight Control Registry, the most successful losers (those who maintained a 30-pound or more weight lost for a year or more) noted that they eat breakfast every day.
Overall, 78 percent of the successful dieters said that they eat breakfast every day, and 90 percent eat breakfast at least five days a week. And, earlier this year, two other studies got similar results-and even though a cereal company that profits from your breakfast funded them, I just can't help but agree.
In one of the studies, a group of researchers analyzed data from a government-funded study that followed the eating habits of 2,000 young girls, from the age 9 to age 19. After 10 years, the researchers saw that the regular cereal eaters had fewer problems with their weight.
Meanwhile, another research group analyzed government data on 4,200 adults. And they found all sorts of reasons why regular breakfast eaters find it easier to lose (and keep off) excess weight.
First of all, regular breakfast eaters were more likely to exercise regularly. Next, the women who ate a regular breakfast also tended to eat fewer calories during the day. Also, breakfast cereal eaters had a lower fat intake than those who ate other breakfast foods, or no breakfast at all.
There are also other factors to keep in mind.
When you wait too long to eat after waking up, your body goes into starvation mode, slowing down your metabolism and holding on to fat and calories because it thinks you need to store them for energy later. On the other hand, when you actually eat breakfast, you jumpstart your metabolism and start burning more fat to lose weight.
Of course, not just any breakfast will do. To get the best benefits, stick to healthy fruits and whole grains at breakfast time, especially high-fiber foods, which fill you up without packing a bunch of empty calories and fat grams into your belly.
