Should I skip meals to lose weight?

Research has shown us that missing meals invites us to be hungry more often which, in turn, encourages us to over indulge when we do eat. People who miss out on meals also tend to snack on unhealthy convenience foods. So they end up consuming more calories from less nutritious foods than people who do not miss out on regular meals.

Taking that one step further, several recent studies have concluded that it is much better to eat frequent small meals than two or three larger meals. Even though you are eating more often you are not actually consuming more because each meal or snack is itself much smaller.

This works because of the way in which the food we eat is converted into sugars which are passed into the bloodstream. From there it can be used by various parts of the body to provide energy to cells in our muscles, brain, nervous system, organs, etc. to fuel daily life. Insulin is the hormone produced by our body to signal cells that they should take on sugars for fuel.

The size of any increase in blood sugar levels after eating depends on what was eaten and how much was eaten. If large amount of most foods or even smaller amount of foods which are easily converted into sugars – like processed grains and simple sugars – are eaten then blood sugar levels rise rapidly. The body responds by mopping up the extra sugar and storing it as fat for later.

This natural mechanism made a lot of sense to our distant ancestors who might rely on that fat store when food was much harder to come by. But in the modern age we just store more and more fat, day by day, pound after pound, and rarely burn it off again.

The glycaemic index is used to score foods on how quickly they give up carbohydrates into sugar in the blood. A food’s glycaemic load takes account of the amount of carbohydrate in a serving as well as its GI score.

By choosing suitable foods and eating smaller portions more frequently you can help your body maintain a more stable blood sugar level. For someone trying to lose weight this means fewer surges after large GL meals during which fat is laid down in stores. It also means fewer dips in blood glucose levels which prompt the body to feel hungry. And strong hunger pangs lead to over-eating which makes creating the negative calorie balance needed for weight loss much more difficult.