Skipping breakfast?

this doesn't count as breakfast.

You already know it's the most important meal of the day, but maybe you're not a breakfast person.

Let me paint a picture for you.

You skip breakfast, eat a small super light lunch, work all day and come home starving, smash on whatever you can find or go to a restaurant and eat a gigantic portion of something that has more calories than you think it does. Maybe you have a beer or a glass of wine too. Then, shortly after you're home and in your jammies on the couch for a while before you go to sleep.

this is not a lunch.

The next morning you wake up semi-disgusted with how much you consumed the night before so you vow to "cleanse" your system by only drinking coffee until you absolutely have to eat, which will probably end up being--with the exception of your tiny lunchtime snack--another late dinner, where you've gotten yourself so hungry that you eat until you're ready to crawl in a hole and die.

And the cycle, with slight variations, goes on and on and on.

Sound familiar? I used to do this in college because I thought calories in=calories out and you're good. My meal plan was basically to drink coffee and eat gummy bears all day in school, work out at the rec, then go eat shrimp scampi pasta at Red Lobster. I was chubby, squishy, and tired, because I was slowing my metabolism down with my "feast or famine" attitude toward eating.

What you're doing when you skip breakfast is you're forcing your metabolism to slow down so that the energy (or calories) you're burning whilst starving yourself are coming straight from your muscle mass, not your spare tire (Read more about that here). When you do finally eat, you body stores tons of extra fat because you're forcing a blood sugar spike and an overproduction of insulin, which stores extra fat.

Go to bed hungry.

Break the cycle. Going to bed hungry will (eventually) make you wake up hungry and eating first thing in the morning can become a habit. It will take some self control and some getting used to, but with a little effort you can break the starvation/gluttony cycle and promote a healthier metabolism, stable hormone levels, and fat loss.

If you need some breakfast inspiration, check out the Pinterest world.

Some of my favorite breakfasts.

fritattas (omg)

Whole grain/egg white french toast with agave nectar
baked oatmeal

peanut butter/chia/strawberry preserves on ezekiel

oatmeal and fruit

greek yogurt/fruit smoothie

scrambled egg, avocado, salsa

bacon and egg white on ezekiel

grapefruit and a baked sweet potato with cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice (seriously!)

my oat pancakes

any homemade protein bars

cereal with chia/flax/hemp seeds

What's your favorite breakfast?