Why is small meals beneficial? Why fractional nutrition can play a cruel joke on you and even harm your hormonal health. Creating a calorie deficit without disruption

The food you eat can affect your health and increase your risk of developing diseases. In order to eat right, you need to change some habits. You may need to make changes to environment, namely, to change the situation at home and at work. You don't have to change everything drastically in order to start eating foods that are good for your health. In addition, you should not change all habits at once. It's best to set goals and work towards them gradually. After a while, these minor changes will play important role to improve your health.

This information will help you change established habits and move to healthy eating.

Basic moments

Changing your diet and environment will help you start eating right.

A healthy diet is very beneficial for the body as a whole. It also contributes to the normalization of weight and its support.

To improve your eating habits, try making small changes to your lifestyle.

What should be done to avoid unhealthy eating?

Every day you are faced with the choice of what to eat and how much. Think about how your daily routine and environment influence this factor. Can you skip meals when you are very busy? Or maybe you eat a lot?

Such habits tend to provoke unhealthy eating. But along with this, there are also ways to help establish proper and healthy nutrition.

Plan your meals. Fold the menu for a few days, and then make a list of what you need to buy in the store. Hang it in a visible place, for example, attach it to the refrigerator.

If you have the opportunity, double the amount of healthy foods and store a certain portion of them in freezer. You will need them at a time when you will be very busy.

Be very careful with semi-finished products. Buy chopped vegetables for salads, peeled small carrots, or frozen vegetables that are easy to cook in the microwave.

Always keep a lot on hand healthy food for snacks, such as fresh fruit, chopped vegetables or crackers from whole grain.

When eating out, try to eat healthy foods. Go to restaurants that serve healthy meals. If you have to eat fast food, order the smallest portions, not double and triple. Find a café that can offer fruits, salads and milk instead fried potatoes and carbonated drinks.

In a restaurant, try not to eat everything, you can always take the rest home.

If you order fast food, such as pizza, try to eat it at home with salad, milk, or fruit.

Stick to a diet and try to eat healthy foods, both during lunch and during snacks. Don't wait until the terrible feeling of hunger will overcome you and you will have to run to the nearest cafe.

Don't snack while watching TV, working at the computer, driving, or cooking. After all, you will eat when you are not at all hungry. Determine exact time meals and stick to it.

How to change the mode and eating habits?

In order to stick to a healthy diet, you need to make some adjustments in your life. Remember that you cannot change everything at once. Small changes are easy to implement and usually more effective. Use the following tips:

Always keep on hand at home and at work a lot of fruits, low-fat dairy products ( skimmed milk or yogurt), vegetables or whole grains, etc. Your goal is to gradually introduce healthy foods into your diet, and not just eliminate unhealthy ones.

Try to eat together with the whole family at least once a day. This contributes to the involvement healthy diet nutrition.

Buy a healthy food recipe book and start cooking. Chew gum while cooking so you don't want to taste everything.

cook healthy snacks to work. This will allow you to control what you eat during your lunch break.

Put the contents of the package on a plate so you can clearly see how much you are eating.

Don't skip or delay meals, stick to a strict snacking schedule. If you ignore food intake, then you will end up eating too much or eating unhealthy foods later. If you often get overwhelmed strong feeling hunger, it provokes increased attention to food on your part.

If possible, eat in company. Relax, take your time, chew thoroughly, and enjoy your lunch. Make eating a pleasure, not an obligation.

Drink water instead of sugary drinks.

Why is it important to make healthy food choices?

Proper and healthy nutrition is very beneficial for the whole body. Together with healthy foods Your body receives nutrients needed to strengthen immune system and normal functioning. It also lowers cholesterol levels blood pressure reduces the risk of developing heart disease, type 2 diabetes, oncological diseases, heart attack, etc. Healthy eating is good for everyone. Improve your health by eating healthy and wholesome foods!

Fractional nutrition - not only Foundation stone balanced and healthy diet, but also lovely way lose weight quickly.

Numerous studies have repeatedly proven that this type of diet helps to lower glucose levels and bad cholesterol in the blood and does not overload digestive system while at the same time constantly keeping us in good shape.

Today we will tell you exactly how fractional nutrition affects our health and what changes will occur in your body when you start eating less, but more often.

no hunger

Try to count how many times a day we feel acute hunger, eating two or three times a day. Now remember how often you allowed yourself to eat too much for dinner just because you came home hungry, and the last meal was at least 5 hours ago.

Why are we? Anyone who adheres to fractional nutrition and is not lazy to eat 4-6 times a day in small portions, the feeling of hunger is unfamiliar. As soon as you switch to a "better less, more often" diet, you will realize that your body does not need a lot of food at all. It is simply important for him to “recharge” from time to time so as not to experience stress.

Good mood and energy all day

This point follows directly from the previous one. After all, what is hunger? For the body - the transition to energy-saving mode, a slowdown in metabolism and jumps in blood sugar, but for us - an inevitable gloomy mood and a terrible breakdown.

Including in your daily diet several even the smallest, but healthy snacks(for example, a couple of your favorite sweet fruits in the afternoon and a protein salad in the late afternoon), you will always be full of energy and good mood.

Acceleration of metabolism and the general benefit of the body

Starving, the body tries to put aside "in reserve". And coping with overeating, loses efficiency and speed of all metabolic processes(familiar with the feeling of lethargy and drowsiness after copious receptions food?).

Fractional nutrition will help not to overload the body with food, maintaining a normal metabolism and effectively using the calories received. small but frequent portions healthy food and enough water is one of the main recommendations of gastroenterologists for those who suffer from ulcers, gastritis and other stomach problems. In addition, a fractional diet has a positive effect on blood sugar levels.

Creating a calorie deficit without disruption

Everyone who has ever sat on rigid diets, knows for sure that the main success in the loss excess weight- creating a so-called calorie deficit, that is, spending more than you consume. The standard three meals a day does not really cope with this task: we do not control the size of portions, and besides, we run the risk of "hungry" and at any moment break into something very harmful and high-calorie.

We believe that the easiest way to create a calorie deficit is on a fractional diet. The body will not notice anything terrible, because it simply does not have time to get hungry, getting everything you need, and you will enjoy a stable and gradual weight loss without driving yourself into the unreasonable framework of strict diets.

One of the basic commandments is frequent (5-6 times a day) meals in small portions. Almost at the same time, I came across a publication where fractional nutrition is subjected to fierce criticism. I decided to carefully check everything and find out for myself what is the correct, healthy diet. The result of my research work— in front of you. This post took me a total of 26 hours, but it seems to me that it managed to dot the i's. I hope you find it interesting and useful!

Nobody can be trusted. I can. "Seventeen Moments of Spring"

I love articles where doctors debunk dangerous misconceptions about health. It's nice to follow the thought of an intelligent practitioner and think: well, the world has become a little better. Reason triumphs, homegrown experts flap their eyelashes in puzzlement.

I recently came across an interesting post. She got me interested in an unexpected topic.

In search of the ideal mode

Fractional nutrition - eating food small portions 5-6 times a day. It is believed that it favorably affects the work of the digestive tract.

This opinion, I emphasize, went to the people not from the notes of "yellow" journalists, but from applied medical literature.

Look for an example in the description of the good old tables according to Pevzner. Eating little and often is necessary for esophagitis, stomach and intestinal ulcers, reflux disease, cholecystitis ...

Personally, I, Marina Belyaeva, first heard about fractional nutrition when a few years ago I came to one of the (excellent specialist, Ph.D.) with suspected gastritis.

Fractional nutrition system - is it dangerous?

Let's translate? "High-calorie diets with increased meal frequency but no increase in food intake increase intrahepatic triglyceride levels: a randomized controlled experiment." Pay attention to the first word. This refers to high-calorie (!) frequent meals.

The participants in the experiment received oily and sweet food (consisted of fat and sugar or sugar only) in addition to the main dishes. The scientists who conducted this study proved a pretty obvious thing - that constant snacking on sweets is harmful.

Beloveshkin also reinforces his theses with a quote from the materials of the International Society of Endocrinology: “Fractional nutrition, usually recommended for obesity, not only does not lead to increased metabolic processes and weight loss, but even dangerous to health.”

I found information about this study. It turned out the following:

1. the "quote" is taken not from the report of scientists, but from a journalistic note about it;
2. obesity is mentioned not just by the word, but because the alarming results of the experiment refer specifically to people with significant overweight(the level of endotoxins against the background of fractional nutrition jumped only these people)
3. it was not possible to detect the effect of the frequency of meals on the number of calories burned per day - both those who ate little and often and those who rarely ate a lot consumed approximately the same amount of energy resources.

The data from the last point is really important. They are debunk a real myth that the transition to fractional nutrition without changing the caloric content of the diet allows you to lose weight. Here's a Google screenshot, look at the many discussions about split meals as independent method weight loss:

In general, the obvious was confirmed: count calories and monitor energy value diet is important. By the way, my online calculator can help you with this: (calculates landmarks for required amount calories in 3 formulas, and also gives recommendations for the consumption of proteins, fats and carbohydrates).

Returning to the topic: the experiments of the International Society of Endocrinology do not prove the danger of frequent eating in any way. Move on.

Food is fractional, insulin is normal. Tested on rats

Beloveshkin's article reads:

Remember that every meal leads to a rise in insulin. BUT elevated level insulin in the blood prevents the breakdown of fat in the subcutaneous fat. you need to understand that whenever insulin levels rise, fat burning will stop.

The fact that insulin levels increase after each meal is undeniable - it's just as natural process, like, say, the secretion of saliva when chewing. But: this “insulin rise” is normally short-term.

Does it become long-term with fractional nutrition? No.

Meal frequency almost no effect on the level of insulin production. Let's take a look at The Effect of Meal Frequency on Serum Immunoglobulins Profile, Insulin and Weight in Rat, by M. Shahraki, J. Majidi et al.

Scientists conducted an experiment on 30 healthy adult female rats. The rats were divided into groups. For 60 days, the animals of one group regularly received food in the nibbling regimen, the other - in the regime two meals a day(gorging regimen).
Eventually:

although, in the two regimens serum insulin level was non-significantly decreased but the percentage of decreasing in nibbling regimen was more than gorging one (-5.3% vs -2.3%) slightly decreased, while the percentage of reduction in nibbling mode was greater than in gorging. (-5.3% vs -2.3%).

Be especially careful to believe articles in which a phenomenon is considered as unambiguously “bad” (or, conversely, 100% “good”). Even in delusions there is usually a grain of common sense.

The Real Cons of Frequent Eating

I have defended fractional nutrition for a long time. It's time to acknowledge it real cons. Andrei Beloveshkin does not write about them.

Four or six meals a day is a troublesome business. It requires attention: you have to think through not only breakfast and lunch, but also snacks.

Plus, eating small meals takes a lot of time. Lots of cooking. Mountains of dirty dishes. Alas, this is the harsh truth of life - in order to feed a family qualitatively, one must either work at home or not work at all.

The nibbling mode also has such a minus: deviations from it are very unpleasant. When I go to, say, a conference that lasts three hours, plus an hour to get there and back, by the end of the event, I can't help dreaming about food. If I had eaten in reserve before going out, I would not feel this hunger, but it doesn’t work. I'm out of the habit of heroic portions.

As for the weight - for several years of fractional nutrition, it remained stably normal for me. I did not turn into either a kolobok or Kashchei the immortal.

I hope I was able to offer you a sober and unbiased look at the concept of fractional nutrition. All health!

plus

Balanced diet - actual topic. AT modern world fashionable to be healthy and successful. Dr. Stanley Bass has devoted almost his entire life to the topic of healthy nutrition.

The scientist began to experiment with products from the age of 19, arguing that "Man is what he eats." This is perhaps the longest study of an American naturopath, and has been going on for 80 years.

According to Stanley himself and his associates, the main difficulty in the transition to a healthy diet is the intermediate physiological state person.

How to become healthy through nutrition?

At first glance, everything is clear: sprouted grains of cereals are more useful than buns, and fresh vegetables will give the body more vitamins than heat treated. Beef is not as fat as pork, and, therefore, is easier to digest and less burdens the liver. Even more nutrients will enter the body with nuts and legumes.

As we move up the food priority scale, we include foods that are high in protein but do not require heat. Useful: cheese made from raw milk without salt, sunflower and pumpkin seeds, raw nuts.

By eating fresh food, we charge the body life force. Absence heat treatment
guarantees the intake of enzymes, amino acids, minerals, vitamins and carbohydrates in the body in the maximum amount. Thus, the process of tissue repair is activated.

In an effort to heal the body with the help of a qualitative increase in food, you should say goodbye to such not very useful additives as salt, sugar and pepper, as well as say "goodbye" bad habits: alcohol and tobacco. Coffee, cocoa, and chocolate are inherently toxins and hinder your wellness transformation.

To start the function of recovery processes, it is very important to observe the following rules:

• balanced nutrition (competent combination of proportions and selection of the right products);
• observance of the order of taking products (first of all, there are easily digestible products, complex ones - in the second, and concentrated ones are left in the end);
• the optimal volume of products of each type in a single reception;
• eating schedule (based on the feeling of hunger).

Exacerbations during the transition to a healthy diet

Having cleaned the refrigerator of food products of dubious benefit and going on a diet, a person expects a surge of strength, getting rid of ailments, the formation of a slender silhouette, clean skin, thick and shiny hair.

But in practice, amazing metamorphoses occur. Man switching to nutrition useful and quality products, begins to feel weakness and apathy, the body is tormented by nausea and diarrhea, and a rash covers the skin. I want to forget about nutrition nightmare, pour a good portion of coffee into the stomach and have a snack with a bar of chocolate.

Don't give up so quickly. The secret of the alleged deterioration of health lies in the natural wisdom of the body. The evolutionary process is that each cell prefers the good to the bad, and the best to the good. The natural instinct pushes out the accumulated rubbish from the inside: toxins, slags, residual elements of countless medicines. In the end, the tissues themselves become "morally obsolete components", which must be replaced with qualitatively new substances coming from useful products. Brick by brick, atom by atom, the body is being restructured. It's like during a renovation: they rip off the wallpaper, ditch the walls, and the visual impression states a complete defeat. But now the repair is over, the garbage is thrown out, the floors and windows are washed ... the room becomes cozy, clean and beautiful. The same processes occur in the body.

As foam forms on the crest of a wave, so all hidden diseases are washed away by a new way of life. They go outside and cancel. The temperature may suddenly jump out. But, later a short time All will pass. This is how “dirt” comes out, diseases “nailed down” with medicines. They just leave the body. They have no place in the new body.

How long does the restructuring of the body take with a change in nutrition?

From infancy, a set of rules is imposed on every member of society: you need to eat at certain hours, you should drink coffee in the morning, best breakfast- bacon and eggs. The mentality that has been formed over the years and decades requires adherence to traditions, and the process of body renewal is accompanied by unpleasant symptoms.

Are you already drinking clean water and fresh juices, eat raw vegetables and nuts. Useful material displace accumulated toxins, and the cells are renewed and healed.

Waste materials are excreted from the body through sweat, vomiting, diarrhea and unpleasant odors. It is not a fact that the whole range of "charms" will fall upon every adherent of naturopathy, but it is quite possible.

You should show wisdom and rest more if weakness is felt. When the body is prevented from healing, it always seeks to "lull" consciousness so that it does not interfere with the struggle for survival. Get plenty of rest and your body will adjust faster.

For decades, the body has been stimulated by tea, coffee, cocoa, chocolate, alcohol and tobacco. And suddenly all these products disappeared from the diet somewhere. During the period of restructuring and adaptation, this list of products will not be enough. Without doping, most people feel depressed and irritated. The main secret is that discomfort will soon pass, the joy of life will return. BUT physical state will reach a qualitatively new level.

Changes occur not only in every cell of the body, but also in the brain.

If you know main secret- all difficulties are surmountable. It takes 40 days to form a habit. The brain, like an idle caretaker with a huge ledger, conducts a daily inventory: the habit of drinking coffee is there ... The habit is there, but coffee is not. There is a feeling of discomfort in the body. 40 days the body will require doping. But after the expiration of the specified period, it will become easier and, on the contrary, an occasional cup of coffee will cause dizziness and cardiopalmus. Why? Because now there is an item on the list of habits: healthy eating.

Gotta be prepared to get worse general condition within 40 days. But if the rebuild only takes a week,
so much the better, you can consider it a pleasant bonus from the body.

In some cases, the conversion goes in leaps and bounds. The trend towards improvement is replaced by periods of malaise. This is fine. With patience, you will be rewarded with: good health and longevity, quality of life and high performance.

Renewal of the body is accompanied by high emotional pleasure. You begin to feel gratitude to God and unity with Nature. Call it what you want. Feel like a part of the Cosmos, a component of the Universe. Happiness and pleasure from life will fill your whole being to the very edge.

Pretty much every "fitness guru" touts these completely ridiculous eating patterns...

... "Make six small meals a day and you will accelerate your metabolism" ...

... "Eat several times a day to stay in an anabolic state and preserve muscle"...

... “Never skip breakfast! This is the healthiest meal of the day!”

Well, let me tell you one thing that is scientifically proven and not without real common sense:

Fractional meals will not affect your metabolic rate and growth in any way. muscle mass, the effect of such a scheme is no different from eating several large meals.

All these tips about "several small meals a day" nothing more than a simple joke, and the reason why the entire fitness industry preaches this is very simple. They just make money from it because when people realize that it's quite a problem for them to eat several small meals a day, they come to the conclusion that they "should" buy protein powders and various meal replacement shakes to compensate. those "missed meals".

Here's the real truth about portion sizes and number of meals:

A few small meals a day won't harm your metabolism.

This is precisely the “master weapon” or the main reason why the fitness industry claims that you should eat several times a day in order to lose weight.

The only drawback of this model is that it has no scientific basis...

And, if you are looking for common sense in this, then, nevertheless, will they help frequent appointments food to lose weight?

Here's what the science has to say about meal frequency and metabolism:

1. The researchers concluded that during the 24-hour period, more frequent, but smaller meals did not affect the energy balance.

2. In 179 different studies, it was found that frequent meals do not affect weight loss or metabolic rate.

3. One study found that smaller meals did not help control appetite. This means that claims like "you are hungry and therefore overeat in the evening" have no basis.

4. Another study compared 3 various schemes Meals: meals without breakfast, 2 large meals per day and 6 small meals per day. All meals had the same calorie content. As a result, the researchers found that the eating pattern consisting of 6 small meals per day had the worst effects, and the metabolic rate was much faster in the other two patterns.

5. The study showed that during the 24-hour period when calorie content is reduced, the metabolic rate also decreases, but it has also been shown that the frequency of meals has nothing to do with this.

6. The study found that over a 36-hour period, among the same-calorie diets, the 3-meal meal plan outperformed the 14-meal pattern (by superior, I mean that the metabolic rate was higher in the 3-meal group).

7. One curious study showed that if you fast for 72 hours, your metabolism does not slow down. In fact, the researchers found that the metabolic rate increased during fasting. Only after 72 hours complete starvation metabolic rate dropped by only 8%. This means that the fasting regimen exists, but it only kicks in after 72 hours of no calories, and in the end, it's a very small decrease...

8. In another similar fasting study, they found that patients who did an alternate day of fasting (eating unlimited during the day and fasting the next day) did not experience a decrease in metabolic rate during the experiment, which lasted 22 days (which means that they ate for 12 days and fasted for 12 days).

There are many more studies with similar conclusions, but I think that now I can prove my point ...

As you can see, several small meals a day have nothing to do with metabolism or weight loss, and it seems that eating less frequently and fasting increases the metabolic rate. Contrary to what someone told you.

Eating Frequency and Muscle Building

And here's another fad invented by the fitness industry that works for it, as people now think that if they don't eat every 3 hours, their muscles will melt. Protein Powders Help!

No, seriously, back in the affirmation "eat every 3 hours to keep muscle" there is no scientific proof.

It seems to me that the fitness industry has been lying to us all along (it's no secret that the fitness industry mostly gives us empty promises).

Here's what the science says about meal frequency and muscle building:

1. One good research clearly showed that intermittent fasting(fasting for 16-24 hours, and then taking total daily calories in a short period of time) does not increase muscle tissue breakdown.

2. Another study found that meal frequency really has nothing to do with muscle gain, it's all about how much you eat, not how often you eat.

Unfortunately, there isn't much research on muscle loss and meal frequency, but the research above should make things clear: muscle mass is directly related to how much you eat, not how often you eat.

The fact is that millions of people (including me) are now doing daily intermittent fasting and are still gaining large amounts of muscle, so the myth of the frequency of meals and loss of muscle mass has already been dispelled.

In a nutshell: it really doesn't make any difference how often you eat. The most important thing for building muscle mass is how much you eat. (instead of thinking about your daily calorie intake, think about your weekly calorie intake). So to get big, you need to eat more, but you don't have to eat more often.

Eating more often, but in small portions, is bad for your hormonal background

it real reason why I do intermittent fasting every day, and why I fast for 24 hours several times every month.

The fact is that our testosterone levels go down every time we eat something.

One study actually found that there was no difference whether it was fat only, carbohydrates only, protein only, or a mixture of the two. However, every time you eat, your testosterone levels drop.

Another important fact is that every time your insulin levels go up, your testosterone and growth hormone levels will go down. And if you eat small meals several times a day, then your insulin levels will rise several times a day. Thus, you get a double whammy on your male hormones.

And now what? Do I need to stop eating to raise my testosterone levels?

Not, this is not an option, because when there is a lack of energy in the body, your testosterone level also decreases.

And we can't forget that we still need to eat a ton of food to get all the vital building blocks needed for muscle building and hormone production.

So what best way minimize hormone decline while still eating enough and getting all the vital nutrients for muscle building and hormonal health?

Answer: Intermittent fasting (no calories for 16-24 hours, after which all daily calories are eaten within 4-8 hours), or alternative fasting day (eating nothing for one day, but for next day you eat twice the daily amount of food).

The examples above seem extreme, but they are actually very flexible and easy to follow, much easier than eating small meals several times a day.

Thus, here is what will help maintain hormonal health: eat less often, but do not eat less food. This is why intermittent fasting and similar eating patterns are extremely beneficial for your hormones. One study found that intermittent fasting increased testosterone levels by 180% in healthy, non-obese men.

The breakfast is not really the best. important trick food per day

"Breakfast is the most important meal of the day"- so say all the mothers of the world (and mine is no exception), but in reality it is not so ..

And that's why:

When you wake up, you are already in a state of starvation (assuming you don't eat while you sleep).

So, you are full of energy, autophagy is happening - your body is being cleared of waste, and your hormones are working at their peak (testosterone levels are highest in the morning).

What happens when you eat a bowl of cereal or muesli in the morning? I mean, it's right and great, isn't it?

a) autophagy (cleansing your body's liver) stops or slows dramatically.

b) when you wake up your SNS (sympathetic nervous system) is suppressed, which means your cortisol levels are suppressed too. But as soon as you eat something, your PSNS (parasympathetic nervous system) is activated, you become sleepy, slow, and you become more resistant to fatigue and stress. PSNS activation also reduces testosterone levels due to an increase in cortisol levels.

in) your body no longer burns its own fat for fuel, but instead uses the glucose from that meal.

G) your internal biorhythms are interrupted (this is because the PSNS should only be active during sleep).

Although this may sound very complicated, in a nutshell, it simply means that human body was never adapted for breakfast. And if you submit primitive man Do you think he ate breakfast and a few small meals a day? I strongly doubt it.

Our body still functions the same way as that of primitive men, so why complicate things with breakfast, which is completely unnatural for the human body?

NOTE: Kellogg and other large cereal and muesli companies pay hundreds of millions of dollars every year to promote the idea of ​​" healthy breakfast" in mass media. This is the real reason why everyone thinks that breakfast is the most healthy intake food.

Conclusion

Here are some of the reasons why I do intermittent fasting and why I have never been positive about the idea of ​​several small meals a day.

There are absolutely no benefits to such a regimen, and it is indeed quite unhealthy if we consider it from a hormonal point of view.