Eat Your Breakfast

"Eat your breakfast!" is one of those things we’ve all been told by our parents and even our grandparents. Of course, there is something to be said for putting calories into your body each morning and the positive impact it has on your brain.

Unfortunately, what happens all too often is that people get caught up in their lives and sometimes give in to the temptation to skip breakfast. For some people, it’s usually just a factor of being too busy. People are rushing out the door to get to work on time, drop off the kids, or get to an appointment.

There’s another segment of people that consciously choose to skip breakfast because they think it will help them lose weight. Their intuition tells them that skipping breakfast will give them a slimmer body shape, but, in fact, it’s actually working against them.

The Benefits of Breakfast

Several different things happen when you eat breakfast in the morning. One of the primary benefits is that it gets your metabolism started. It also sets the tone for the day.

Your brain needs a constant, steady supply of fuel, and it cannot store sugar, its primary fuel.

If you are going from, say, 8 o'clock at night until noon the next day without eating anything, then the brain is without adequate fuel for most of that time. When this happens, the brain makes the inference that there isn’t adequate food available. When the brain enters a state of crisis, it begins to prioritize the preservation of its most valuable source of energy: fat.

The brain triggers a catabolic response, breaking down protein structures and muscle mass throughout the body. Unfortunately, this is a very expensive process, which requires a lot of energy just to break down and use the protein. This may also accelerate the loss of valuable muscle mass, which tends to decline as we age anyway.

The result is that your body stores fat and you feel more sluggish. Most people, especially men, will deposit fat around the midsection and the neck.

The bottom line is that it doesn’t take much to wake up five minutes earlier to grab something quick for breakfast. When you’re first developing the habit of eating breakfast, it doesn’t have to be a big meal. Getting your metabolism started and providing energy for the brain don’t require much fuel.

Even something simple like eating a piece of fruit or a hard-boiled egg while you’re going out the door is better than nothing at all.

Contributor Author: Dr. Michael Trayford is a Board Certified Chiropractic Neurologist and Founder of APEX Brain Centers in Asheville, NC. For more information, please visit our Author's page.

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