Everyday Systems

From the Today Show: Two Meals a Day Better than Grazing

Excellent reading. I'd love to see a sticky here featuring links that support no snacking. How would one do this? I've got quite a few I could link to...

My computer won't highlight these, but here are my favorite quotations:

But Madelyn Fernstrom, TODAY's diet and nutrition editor, says that the real-life takeaway here is less about skipping dinner, and more about simply eating less frequently. "An earlier study showed that if you ate three times a day, you got the same thing. So it's really cutting down how often you eat, because you'll tend to eat less," Fernstrom told Savannah Guthrie this morning on TODAY.

But perhaps most importantly: know what works for you, and choose an eating strategy that you can really, actually stick to.
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For me, there is absolutely no comparison between skipping breakfast and skipping dinner. In my life, those two meals play very different roles. I think they do in most people's, and leaving people with the most important roles food plays I think is integral to long term success.

But I'm not ready to skip either consistently.

Once again, No S shown to be superior, even if by inference.

Interesting article, of course; it makes sense. I do have a problem with this, though: " [Elisa] Zied’s rule: Eat when you’re hungry, stop when you’re satisfied, and plan ahead."

This person apparently has not had any eating issues. Are my eyes open? I'm hungry. Am I leaning back on the couch, groaning? I'm satisfied. How late am I staying up? That's my plan for eating.

That's why I'm here.

Bssh,

Good idea about creating a resource for articles supporting no snacking.
I'd suggest to create a new topic with the title of "Resources which support No Snacking" or whatever might be appropriate; then add responses to it and invite others to do the same. As it is developed and seems to be a valuable resource, Reinhard will evaluate it to determine its "Sticky-worthiness" and if he deems it so, he will make it a sticky. He's the only one with the power to do that.

Good luck.

Christine wrote:Interesting article, of course; it makes sense. I do have a problem with this, though: " [Elisa] Zied’s rule: Eat when you’re hungry, stop when you’re satisfied, and plan ahead."

This person apparently has not had any eating issues. Are my eyes open? I'm hungry. Am I leaning back on the couch, groaning? I'm satisfied. How late am I staying up? That's my plan for eating.

That's why I'm here.

I have a general plan for what I eat and when. I'll not get into the what here, but the when has been highly influenced by the French. Several authors I've read have stated that pretty much no matter where you are in France, people eat at about the same time. Certainly things vary somewhat because of work schedules, but breakfast is usually between 7 and 8 AM; lunch begins between 12 and 1 PM and dinner usually isn't served until 7:30 or 8 (at home). If you go out for dinner it's probably going to be later since most restaurants don't open for dinner until 8.

I've modeled my mealtimes after that and it seems to be working well.

Thank you LA_Loser. Will do that.

I don't see a thread for this so I'll post here. Science catching up with Reinhard, though he used habit-friendly theory, not weight loss science. English literature major turned computer scientist outdoes the experts again.

http://www.prevention.com/weight-loss/d ... l-day-long

Oolala there is now a Resources thread here. Sorry, am on my phone so cannot link.

Here is the thread to put links on:

http://everydaysystems.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=9449

wosnes wrote:If you go out for dinner it's probably going to be later since most restaurants don't open for dinner until 8.

Yes! I used to live in Belgium and not only do they have dinner late, they take a long time doing it. Boy was it nice! It really highlighted the idea that eating should be social and enjoyable, rather than scarfing down whatever you can find as fast as possible! (me) So, I wonder how our British friends on No S "not" have tea? That seems to be pretty ensconced in their culture.

I had heard that "tea" is actually dinner in England. It's more common in America for restaurants, usually in tourist spots, to offer a snack they call "tea" than it is for the English to partake in anymore. But tea rooms exist in England. I know when my English friends back in the '70's told me they'd "had their tea," they meant they'd eaten their evening meal.

I hope this site is accurate:

AFTERNOON TEA (The traditional 4 o'clock tea)

This is a small meal, not a drink. Traditionally it consists of tea (or coffee) served with either of the following:
Freshly baked scones served with cream and jam (Known as a cream tea)

Afternoon tea sandwiches - thinly sliced cucumber sandwiches with the crusts cut off.

Assorted pastries

Afternoon Tea today

Afternoon tea is not common these days because most adults go out to work. However, you can still have Afternoon tea at the many tea rooms around England.

Afternoon tea became popular about one hundred and fifty years ago, when rich ladies invited their friends to their houses for an afternoon cup of tea. They started offering their visitors sandwiches and cakes too. Soon everyone was enjoying Afternoon tea. text taken from and copyright of projcetbritain.com

HIGH TEA (The traditional 6 o'clock tea)

The British working population did not have Afternoon Tea. They had a meal about midday, and a meal after work, between five and seven o'clock. This meal was called 'high tea' or just 'tea'.

(Today, most people refer to the evening meal as dinner or supper.)

Traditionally eaten early evening, High tea was a substantial meal that combined delicious sweet foods, such as scones, cakes, buns or tea breads, with tempting savouries, such as cheese on toast, toasted crumpets, cold meats and pickles or poached eggs on toast. This meal is now often replaced with a supper due to people eating their main meal in the evenings rather than at midday. text taken from and copyright of projcetbritain.com

So, I think for workers, No S would still be very workable.

I'm pretty sure those early aristocratic ladies who had afternoon tea ate dinner rather late and did not heap their plates with big servings and seconds, even though they could afford to, financially.

This is getting off topic, but on vacations or when I travel, I rarely use extra S days, but I do often plan for a late afternoon sit-down cup of decaf cafe au lait or a mocha. It feels very civilized and celebratory with no chewing involved, and I still get hungry for my dinner- or tea, in England.

LOL, I'm in England and no one I know regularly has "4pm tea" anymore - well, actual tea perhaps yes but not with cake or biscuits (sorry, cookies!) etc. daily work life is just too busy for such civilised behaviour Now we grab our cake and cookies/biscuits when we can

Yes, tea can also be another name for dinner.

I'm now hungry for scones!

I have an article from Prevention magazine that is about 20 years old called "How in the World to Stay Slim." It's about the eating and exercise habits of people around the world who are slimmer than we are (or were slimmer than we are). The author looked at people and their eating habits in China, Japan, Myanmar, Korea, Sweden, The Netherlands, England, France, Italy and Mexico. This is where my interest in the eating habits of people in other countries started.

I thought there was something about English tea, but there's not. There are some commonalities among many or most of these:

1. They all walk or bike more than we do.

2. Snack time isn't all the time. Either they don't snack or there's a set time -- like the English tea or French gouter (generally only for children).

3. There's less focus on fatty foods. "Europeans and Asians alike commented on how expensive food is in their countries, relative to the United States -- especially fat-packed meats, restaurant meals and processed foods. So these types of foods aren't as big a part of the diet as they are in the United States."

4. Their portions are smaller.

5. Grains star on their plates. Arguable here, but the norm in most of the rest of the world.

6. Dessert's not their religion. While they may end each meal with "dessert," it's usually fruit, fruit purees, fruit and cheese, fruit and yogurt or something similar. Rich desserts are saved for special occasions. Homemade desserts may show up on weekends (when there's more time to cook), but they're often pretty simple. Ice cream isn't generally in their freezers.

One other thing I noticed is that most don't eat three substantial meals daily. At least one if not two meals are lighter.

Inspired by oolala's post I might indulge in some scones, clotted cream and jam this weekend

Bssh wrote:Inspired by oolala's post I might indulge in some scones, clotted cream and jam this weekend

I think I'm going to have to make some, too.

wosnes wrote:From the Today Show: Two Meals a Day Better than Grazing

Showing weight loss in "BMI points" (?), both of which round to 1, is a clear indication that weight loss was about the same, because they were eating the same.

The point of the daily number of meals is to establish a habit that will help you monitor closely the volume of what you eat.

Sometimes, specially on S days, I'll be stuffed from one meal and not eat the rest of the day.

Christine wrote:Interesting article, of course; it makes sense. I do have a problem with this, though: " [Elisa] Zied’s rule: Eat when you’re hungry, stop when you’re satisfied, and plan ahead."

This person apparently has not had any eating issues. Are my eyes open? I'm hungry. Am I leaning back on the couch, groaning? I'm satisfied. How late am I staying up? That's my plan for eating.

That's why I'm here.

Yes, the old "eat when you're hungry, stop when you're full" is not very useful to a person with eating issues. I believe this belittles the complexity of the problem.

wosnes wrote:I have a general plan for what I eat and when. I'll not get into the what here, but the when has been highly influenced by the French. Several authors I've read have stated that pretty much no matter where you are in France, people eat at about the same time. Certainly things vary somewhat because of work schedules, but breakfast is usually between 7 and 8 AM; lunch begins between 12 and 1 PM and dinner usually isn't served until 7:30 or 8 (at home). If you go out for dinner it's probably going to be later since most restaurants don't open for dinner until 8.

I've modeled my mealtimes after that and it seems to be working well.

After reading so much about the French diet, it makes a lot more sense to eat on this time schedule (and more socially friendly) than on the schedule my psychiatrist recommended (wake at 4:30 am, in bed by 8pm to prevent night time grazing.) I can't imagine telling people I can't come over because if it's after 8pm I might graze too much.

wosnes wrote:6. Dessert's not their religion. While they may end each meal with "dessert," it's usually fruit, fruit purees, fruit and cheese, fruit and yogurt or something similar. Rich desserts are saved for special occasions. Homemade desserts may show up on weekends (when there's more time to cook), but they're often pretty simple. Ice cream isn't generally in their freezers.

This is interesting because it shows that for those countries, dessert on the weekend is simply a practical issue, of not having the time to cook dessert during the week. It is not an issue of forcing one's cravings to fit into a certain day. They probably don't even think about rich desserts during the week. These cultures likely wouldn't just grab a bag of cookies because they are used to home cooked desserts, and a packaged junk food just wouldn't taste as good. So they wait for the weekend when there's time to make something really delicious.

leafy_greens wrote:After reading so much about the French diet, it makes a lot more sense to eat on this time schedule (and more socially friendly) than on the schedule my psychiatrist recommended (wake at 4:30 am, in bed by 8pm to prevent night time grazing.) I can't imagine telling people I can't come over because if it's after 8pm I might graze too much.

Egad! See, that's why we can't do this; people recommend such weird stuff. The regimen that my daughter & boyfriend are on requires that you eat protein and veg for each meal. Lunch & dinner, I can see. But it would be very weird for me to eat protein and veg for breakfast. Omelet with veg, OK. But who has time to fix it in the morning? Not me. I also have to eat breakfast a lot earlier than the typical French breakfast hours, before I leave for work at 6:30 am. And I can't possibly bike to work, it's 20 miles away (about to be 25 miles starting next week with my new job). Etc. Oh, to be able to live like the French... not possible in my case.

The French don't eat big breakfasts. You can have bread or toast with a smear of butter and preserves plus your cafe au lait and be very French. Sitting down for a mult-course lonch might be more of a problem.

There is a difference between being hungry and having a desire for food. Most people with eating issues can learn to distinguish between the two, but it does take some practice. They might want to eat all the time, but that doesn't mean they are hungry all the time.

But it turns out that even feeling hunger isn't enough of a reason to eat right away. I know I've been able to tolerate hunger longer using the meal structure.

In fact, when my thin friends feel hungry between meals, they will many times just put up with it until the next meal anyway. That's one of the beauties of No S. You're not a slave to hunger or desire.

Yes, this is what I really like about NoS - the fact that I'm no longer a slave to hunger or desire. I eat at fixed times and don't have to think about food until the next scheduled meal time. No investing scarce time to trying to work out whether I am hungry or not or battling with my desire to eat a small snack/treat - if it's not a proper meal time then I don't have the option to even think about it. It's liberating!

oolala53 wrote:In fact, when my thin friends feel hungry between meals, they will many times just put up with it until the next meal anyway. That's one of the beauties of No S. You're not a slave to hunger or desire.

I wish there was more discussion about how thin people's hunger feels to them. There is such confusion about what "hunger" actually is. Is it feeling run down? Is it your stomach growling? Is it your mouth salivating? Is it a headache? Is it a huge craving for something?

People should be educated that it's ok to have these feelings for a few hours and not succumb to them. It's taken for granted the way that thin people think/feel. I'm sure that thin people have all of these same feelings too, but they don't let it consume them. It's hard to know for sure, since the thin don't really talk about it (probably because it's so normal to them.)

Alas, in my case it's not that I think I "shouldn't" feel hungry or it's not OK to feel hungry; it's just that it feels icky and I simply haven't wanted to feel that way! However, lately I am living with hunger a lot of the day, and I don't like it, but I am sticking it out. I'm still happy with myself from yesterday: co-workers took me out to my going-away luncheon, and I absolutely did have (the equivalent of) one plate, and couldn't even finish it all! And no dessert! And I was perfectly happy to be able to say, "Wow, I'm full!" with no feelings of wanting to stuff the rest down my gullet. There's hope for me yet! I'm really liking this feeling of "starting" to feel like I have a normal appetite and not feeling like I have to stuff myself because it's my last cheat meal until <I can't stand it any more and want to cheat again>. WOW! How liberating indeed!!!

oolala53 wrote:But it turns out that even feeling hunger isn't enough of a reason to eat right away. I know I've been able to tolerate hunger longer using the meal structure.

YES!!!!!

I've tried having two meals on a couple of days, and it was good in that it showed me that I can very easily go longer between meals than the usual 5-6 hours. It has helped me realize I have largely been imagining (or over-valuing) my "hunger" when I've eating in the past few hours, and reinforced that three meals reasonably spaced is more than doable, it's actually easy.

But I have one concern: I feel like my body has settled into a nice rhythm of three daily meals over the past half year. While I am very interested in what I've read (and believe) about the potential mental/emotional/physical benefits of occasional fasting, and I like the idea of skipping a meal or two each week, if only to boost my eating enjoyment, I think my body will be confused and not know when to "expect" food. I don't want to throw off my equilibrium. So if I skip a meal and eat at, say, 11 and 6 instead of 9, 2 and 7, then I think I might untrain my stomach.

This sounds rambling, but I wonder if anyone has any thoughts?

Hm, maybe it's good to do it that way if it hearkens back to the "caveman" eating habits which they're touting these days. Like, your body is used to not getting food at regularly scheduled times?

finallyfull wrote:So if I skip a meal and eat at, say, 11 and 6 instead of 9, 2 and 7, then I think I might untrain my stomach.

I don't think your stomach is trained to eat at any time; it's your brain that's trained to eat at specific times.

I find it more difficult to eat three meals than two. I don't consider having two meals "skipping a meal." I'm just eating twice instead of three times.

Two is my usual, but one or maybe two days weekly I'll have three. I also don't consider this adding a meal.

I'm able to be quite flexible without any problems re number of meals even though I generally will eat those meals at fixed times. Some days I eat only dinner (my IF days), others I eat to a 16:8 IF schedule with lunch and dinner only and on the weekends I'm more likely to be on a brunch, lunch & dinner schedule.

oolala53 wrote:I had heard that "tea" is actually dinner in England. It's more common in America for restaurants, usually in tourist spots, to offer a snack they call "tea" than it is for the English to partake in anymore. But tea rooms exist in England. I know when my English friends back in the '70's told me they'd "had their tea," they meant they'd eaten their evening meal..

That is so true. There's a (Scottish?) expression "You'll have had your tea" (a way to greet guests to let them know not to expect a meal!).

I've lived in Scotland, Wales and England and I think most people I've known would call the main evening meal "tea". A lot of people also call the midday meal "dinner" (as in "school dinners"), rather than lunch. I tend to say lunch and tea for clarity, as dinner can be either! I've heard "high tea" in Scotland, but not in England. I believe some people call the evening meal "supper" (and a "fish/chicken/sausage supper" at a chip shop means fish/chicken or sausage with chips), whereas some mean a late evening snack. After tea. I think that dinner is considered a bit more posh than tea.

Afternoon tea is more of a very occasional treat and seems to have got more popular recently. I can't imagine anyone eating it daily!