To ask how many meals you eat each day?

[Jolleigh]

I'm 25 and most of my friends are a similar age to me. I've found that I don't really know anyone who doesn't have children who eats 3 meals a day. I personally just eat when I'm hungry (though I'm 8 months pregnant with my first so that's more frequent nowadays). What does everyone else do?

How do you define a meal? I just eat what I feel like, when I feel like. So I can be eating on anything between about 2 and 20 occasions in a day. I'm not sure which of those eating occasions would be defined as a meal though ...

2 1/2, porridge for breakfast, biggish lunch then a snack in eve....my dcs have 3. I tend to eat their leftovers in the eve.

3, doesn't everyone?
That said, I only tend to eat lunch when I'm at work.
When I'm off we generally go out for breakfast, then a bit of a toast or some such for lunch then a proper dinner.

I was surprised at the number of people on a thread a while ago who said that they don't get a lunch break at work.

Actually it's weird but I do eat breakfast on holiday

When we go on a caravan break I'll wake up, have a coffee, walk to the paper shop and then stick a mini fry up on about 10am.

Having said that, I wouldn't bother with lunch so would just have dinner about 6pm.

3 a day but timings can be erratic

One main meal usually at lunch and a small meal early evening.. Never snack

3 a day and loads of snacking in between and then I wonder why I'm so fat

6 children, one meal, food issues.

mrswishywashy - I only eat 2 and I'm fat. I definitely make up for eating fewer meals with larger meal sizes.

Three a day - just don't feel right or function well without breakfast in the mornings.

3 and always did. Breakfast can be quite light like a yoghurt and banana. I'm not a sandwhich lover, so given the chance will have something like beans on tosst. I've often had school dinners ar work. Proper meal. In the evening. I'm not much of a snacker but can have a weak point at 5pm. Going lonng chunks of time without eating is not good for your metabolism. Last year DP was gaining weight on too few calories because his breakfast and lunch were too light, abd he calorie loaded in the evening and his body hoarded them. By introducing some nuts mid morning, the calorie boost balanced out his metabolism better and hes stopped gaining weight.

When I'm working 13 hour shifts I tend to just have a big lunch. When I'm off I have lunch and dinner.

I've always been a poor eater and I also smoke which is bad for my appetite. I need to give up and put weight on. Last year I put on a stone after quitting and loved food and my figure but stupidly started again.

2 meal a day, lunch and dinner. Very, very rarely snack.

1-2 meals a day.
Breakfast is very difficult for me, has been since I was a child as I need to have been awake a while before I can face food, and I'm a late riser.
Lunch is hit and miss - I can get away with just a piece of cheese some days, others I'm really hungry.
Dinner is the only meal that I will definitely have these days, and that's only because of DH! If he's not here, then I don't always have a cooked dinner either - might just have cheese and crackers.

The DSs always get breakfast, lunch and dinner though.

3 meals a day here, plus the odd snack here or there (fruit at work, anything I can grab at the moment as I'm on mat leave and pregnant again!).

I'm always ready for breakfast as I tend to wake hungry, and I'm hungry at lunch and dinner time too.

My DH is the same as me, thankfully.

2 meals a day - no snacks. I eat around noon and around 7.00pm. Lots of hot drinks and water.

2-3 smallish-medium portions. Slightly bigger lunch portions on days I run.

3 meals and 1 or 2 snacks like a piece of fruit.

if an average women needs 2000 calories a day-how do you fit them into 1 or 2 meals? Even when I've been doing a low calorie diet I've had 3 meals a day and no snacks.

I am hungry when I wake up and then about every 4 to 5 hours.

I snack constantly. I suppose it tends to look like 3 small meals + 5 snacks. More if you counted each cup of tea as a snack. Takes me a few hours before I can eat breakfast, too, and can't eat too close to bedtime or that keeps me wake (everything provokes my insomnia).

Three but hate breakfast so often skip. If hubby and i go out for lunch on sat or sun we often skip dinner and just have yog or fruit. If not hungry why eat. I drink water most of the day, even if just a sip.

Usually 2.

I eat a sandwich or toast at about 10.30 and then have a proper tea at about 5.30. I will sometimes have a biscuit or 2 in between if I'm peckish.

Like another poster, I do eat breakfast if I'm on holiday or in a hotel and it's included, but then I don't have lunch (maybe a cake or pastry).

I think the average woman needs much less that 2000 kcal a day. If I am not exercising i need only 1600kcal a day and I'm 5ft 8in.

When I am hungry.

Tbh I haven't eaten since Saturday as I am not hungry.

Two meals a day. Usually coffee first thing then early lunch and supper. At the weekends, I will eat a late cooked breakfast but then I don't feel hungry for lunch so I might skip or I might have a bowl of soup.

I think 3 meals a day is usually too much unless one of the meals is very light (just a single piece of toast, say, or a banana, or a bowl of vegetable soup) unless you have a physical job, that is.

3 meals and 2 snacks, usually.

Breakfast an hour or so after getting up. Lunch, Supper - I like supper fairly early (and since moving to wales have started to call it tea, coming to think of it).

Snacks (if I'm at home) some fruit or yogurt or random item from the fridge. If I'm in the office, whatever's around (biscuit, cake).

On days when I'm in the gym (4 days/week) I'll usually have a banana before I go, breakfast when I get back and then a larger than usual snack/2nd breakfast later in the morning.

Earlier in the year I monitored my food intake really carefully (MFP and weighing everything) and discovered that I need about 2500-3000 calories a day to maintain my current weight and activity levels .

I feel best if I eat enough calories spread across around 5 meals/snacks a day with fruit and/or veg and protein at every meal/snack.

If I eat too little, too infrequently or too badly (I have a bad habit of resorting to toast and marmite, and chocolate if I'm busy and on my own) I feel really grim quite quickly. Delicate flower, I am.