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Will Eating Six Small Meals Help Me Lose Weight?
Posted on Jul 20th 2010 1:00PM by Liz Neporent
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Will eating five or six small meals a day help me lose weight? Jessica– Rhinebeck, NY
In theory, eating small, frequent meals should help shed pounds by stimulating metabolism and keeping hunger at bay. In reality, it doesn't seem to be working out that way for many people.
Obviously waiting too long between meals can set you up for a diet catastrophe. You become so ravenous that visions of ice cream bars begin dancing in your head and before long, right into your mouth. This is why one of the number one piece of weight loss advice from the National Weight Control Registry is to avoid skipping meals, especially breakfast. (If you have trouble finding time for breakfast, check The Best of Breakfast for healthy choices on the run.)
However, if you're not careful the so-called grazing approach, where you eat every three to four hours to keep your blood sugar level steady, can rack up the calories too. Eating scoopful after scoopful of whole grain cereal or taking numerous trips to the fruit smoothie bar is just as likely to register on the scale as a cookie binge or too many super sized banquets.
Many experts feel that trying to spread out the day's calories rather than sitting down to regular meals may throw off the body's internal clock making it forget how to recognize hunger and satiety cues to the point when you no longer understand what it's like to be hungry but also never quite feel full. This is not a good thing.
Also, many people seem to have translated the advice to graze into an excuse to throw caution to the wind. They eat whatever they want, whenever they want, justifying their mid-afternoon candy bar by skipping the second helping of mashed potatoes at meal five in the evening. They eat for reward, to wake themselves up or out of boredom rather than as a response to any physiological need. Such thinking – and behavior – is not helpful for anyone's waistline.
Even if you graze virtuously it is unclear whether it offers any metabolic or weight loss advantage. An Australian study in 2008 took nearly 180 obese adults and divided them into two groups that consumed the same number of calories but in different eating patterns.
One group ate three squares a day while the other ate three meals plus three snacks. The researchers found no difference between the two groups in terms of blood sugar levels, weight, body composition or girth measurements. A compilation of earlier studies came to a similar conclusion. A carefully controlled 2009 Journal of Clinical Nutrition study found that as long as calorie count and nutrition stay relatively the same, then when and how often you eat makes very little difference to your metabolism.
Perhaps it depends on your personal preference and psychology. I simply don't have the discipline or the patience to eat half a dozen tiny portions. When I try to eat this way I feel peckish and deprived. I find myself constantly paying my food forward so to speak, so that by lunch time I am pretty tapped out in terms of the number of calories I am supposed to be eating and actually wind up taking in a far greater number of calories than when I stick with a no-snack policy.
Besides, I like sitting down to three structured meals where one is a little bit bigger and I get to have the experience of feeling full at least once a day. And frankly I like when actual hunger reminds me to eat rather than timing out food with a chronograph and a series of pre-measured baggies.
This is the approach that works for me. I'd love to know – what works for you? Post here or tweet me your thoughts.
Also, find out if this hot weather will help you burn more calories.
