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An early breakfast can affect your weight loss and BMI, study says
Longer periods without eating sound like a straightforward way to lose weight – but it’s more complicated than you may think.
One of the more persistent dieting trends in recent years has been the growth of intermittent fasting. With the help of specially designed tracking apps and countdown clocks, the increasingly popular health trend sees individuals condense their meal times into small blocks of time, before assigning a larger chunk of their day to fasting – generally in the hope of promoting weight loss and a healthy metabolism. And according to new research, the role of sleep can not be underestimated by those looking to incorporate intermittent fasting into their diet.
Eating late isn’t the best way to fast
According to a new study published by BioMed Central, the time at which you eat your first meal of the day can be a strong determinant of your Body Mass Index (BMI) – which is rather pertinent to those who are fasting with the goal of losing weight.
Using a sample group of adults aged 40-65 in Catalonia, the paper analyzed a range of staggered start times for the group’s first meals of the day, along with external factors like sleep quality and the time of the last meal the previous day.
Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, the study found that those who ate their first meal later on in the day were found to be associated with a higher BMI than those who ate earlier on in the day.
This line of thinking may be counter-intuitive to some, as it feels logical to suggest that the longer you wait to eat your first meal – the longer you are fasting. The crux of their discovery though is that those who arise and eat breakfast are more likely to have higher energy during the day, and are less likely to engage in snacking as they have more chance of enjoying a balanced meal that sets them up for the day.
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Sleep is very important too
Additionally, those who eat first thing in the morning are said to be more likely to have their last meal of the day earlier, too.
This is important as, according to the paper, a long nighttime fast promotes a lower BMI. The important point that the paper highlights is that the long evening fast should begin early in the evening and end early in the morning.
The fast should not begin late at night and continue until late the following day, as eating close to sleep is often associated with bad quality resting and awakening throughout the evening.
If you’re looking to sleep right through the night, the BioMed paper claims that those who eat less than three hours before heading to bed have a 40% greater chance of waking up at an unnatural hour.
Of course, there are no sure-fire ways to guarantee weight loss or a healthy BMI beyond living healthily and maintaining a positive balance of things that are good for you and things that are less so. Any fasting-based approach should always be controlled and based on a sensible intake of three balanced meals per day.
