to think the mantra "breakfast is the most important meal of the day" is just bollocks?

[Mintyy]

I am nbu, am I?

I get up at 7am most days (8 or 8.30 at the weekends) and never feel a pang of hunger before 10.30/11.

If I were to eat breakfast I would be forcing myself to eat when I'm not hungry.

Since I am quite overweight that would seem to me to be a very unwise thing to do.

Wow I'm amazed how many people can function without breakfast. I'm not hungry when I eat it but if I don't have a hearty breakfast I'm starving all day however much I eat.

I thought the whole 'breakfast is important' ruse was started by Kellogg's as a marketing ploy.

It is total bollocks!!!!

If you aren't hungry in the morning don't eat. If you are, do. Simple, huh?

If you want to 'kick start your metabolism' in the morning, do some vigorous exercise - before or instead of breakfast.

Plenty of people get by perfectly well without it, so if you're happy not eating it and don't think it'd benefit you then fair enough.

I didn't eat breakfast until a few years ago. I was fat before and I'm fat now (though gradually getting less so), but I do think it is important for me.

I find eating a decent breakfast helps me to control my eating throughout the day. I'm less likely to binge eat or snack excessively, and make better choices about what I eat in general. The most important part though is what I eat for breakfast. When I ate sugary, low fat breakfasts (diet yoghurts, cereal bars etc) lacking in protein I'd eat terribly all day, have massive sugar cravings, headaches etc. Now I'll have scrambled eggs with a bit of rye toast and butter, or greek yoghurt with some nuts/seeds. Taking out the added sugar and eating a bit more fat and protein has made a huge difference- I can concentrate better, don't get big sugar cravings and eat less overall. It seems counter-intuitive but eating this sort of breakfast has helped me to get a handle on my weight for the first time, so I'm really pleased I stuck with it.

Meant to add that when I didn't eat breakfast at all, I'd overeat later in the day- so starting to eat breakfast didn't really add extra calories. It just shifted the timings and reduced my intake slightly overall.

In an ideal world, breakfast to me is not before 1030 and cooked so, as you can imagine, it doesn't happen often. I tend to eat something mid-morning and my meal times are all a bit squewed but I don't eat with the children when alone with them as it gives me indigestion.

I eat when I am hungry.
I drink when I am thirsty.
There is nothing beneficial forcing stuff in your body.
I eat breakfast a couple of times a year.
I have a physical job and have bags of energy to cope with this.
I am a healthy weight

I think lots of weight related problems could be avoided if people simply ate when they were hungry. This insane eat, snack, eat snack world we live in seems to encourage over eating. I think my mum sensibly offered three meals a day. I have very little memory of snacks on offer, except for a fruit bowl in the kitchen.

I eat a banana at 4:30 am on the way to the gym, I take fruit and nuts to work to eat for breakfast somewhere around 9. I don't eat lunch. I have a rather large dinner with my family at 6, followed by some lovely dessert. I drink tonnes of water all day and a cup of coffee in the morning.

I'm not much of a breakfast person myself, but having known teachers who've had to deal with trying to teach children who come in without breakfast, I always made sure my dd had hers.

Just google 'Breakfast not the most important meal' and it will come up with quite a few studies showing the 'metabolism effect' theory has been debunked.

Eating when you are not hungry, because we have been socialised to do so at certain times, is where we can get into trouble with our weight.

A colleague of mine used to peddle that kick starting metabolism rubbish because, when not bfing, I have fasted till lunch. She would wax lyrical about her wonderful oats and then admit she ate a cereal bar two hours later. Funny that. Eating just leads to more eating.
I do think though that your first meal of the day should be decent - for me it should include protein such as eggs - and not come from a packet and be sugary (cereal).

I am slim as I eat a good breakfast every day. Breakfast keeps you very slim ime.

Different for everyone surely? I just eat when I'm hungry, which means sometimes I have breakfast and sometimes I don't. I've never been overweight.

Breakfast doesn't kickstart my metabolism, it kickstarts my appetite. I'm hungry again within a couple of hours if I eat breakfast, but can easily go until 1PM if I haven't.

We humans have spent far more of our existence not eating 3 meals a day, than we have spent following that regime. Feast and famine is how our species survived for far more thousands of years.

Our ancestors certainly wouldn't have rolled out of bed and routinely helped themselves to breakfast day in, day out. There would've been days with no food at all, let alone no cornflakes and toast.

YANBU.

I have loat 9 pounds in 7 weeks so now am 8 stone. I eat a 3 egg cheese and mushroom omelette every morning.

A decent breakfast helps you lose weight in my opinion. I would recommend it to anyone trying to lose weight.

Total rubbish. I don't eat breakfast ever. Still manages to lose 9 stone. It's widely thought the 'it kick starts you metabolism' is bollocks. You metabolism doesn't slow down for days without eating.

I have been 48kg since I was 17. I am now 32. I sometimes eat a decent breakfaat (eggs, toast), sometimes eat nothing, sometimes eat total junk (eg a snickers bar and sugary coffee from a can), sometimes just cereal. I normally go through phases of doing one of these for a few months and whatever I do, it never impacts on my weight or hunger levels. So for me, at least, it has no impact.

My mum is 62 and still a size 10 and she has no breakfast most days.

I think it just depends on your metabolism. If you are deliberately avoiding breakfast in order to lose weight, so then binge on a ton of biscuits at 11, then yeah, you will get fat. If you are simply not hungry til lunch, where you then eat a sandwich and fruit, then you probably won't.

Silver night fairy have you been to the gym this morning on less than 3 hours sleep? or do you sleep at other times?

Sometimes I have breakfast at about 7ish with the kids, sometimes I have it at 9.30. It depends if I feel hungry or not. I get up at 5am so by 9.30 I am usually hungry by then. It also depends if I have time.

I have never ate breakfast, I have no urge to eat before 11ish and have managed to stay slim into my forties with an under active thyroid. Two dcs don't eat before school but take a banana and malt loaf to eat at break.

I'm sure teachers judged my parenting in primary years when dds hand would shoot up when the breakfast question was asked but forcing food into someone when they're not hungry is near impossible. I encourage eating when hungry, evening meals can mostly be warmed whenever this is although we do eat together most of the time. We eat when our bodies tell us to not to GMT.

I don't eat breakfast first thing. On a work day I'm up at 4.30am and no way am I hungry at that time! I work until about 10.15-30 before I get a break, and then I normally have toast with scrambled eggs or just plain toast.

If I'm home and eat earlier, I find I snack more and eat more than I would otherwise.

I think to a certain extent your eating habits are engrained. I weighed 6 stone 12 before my 3 children and always had a big breakfast. I am very much the big breakfast, small lunch and tea with no snacks type.