Breakfast is the most important meal of the day! But I don't feel hungry for breakfast!?
Why is breakfast the most important meal of the day?
Back in the old days, people would get up early when the sun rises and retire when the sun goes down. When they get up in the morning, eating breakfast would be the most important thing to do. The first meal of the day provides them energy to get them through a hard and long day of farm & labouring work.
Chinese Body Clock
According to the Chinese Body Clock, our Stomach and Spleen is the strongest at 7am-11am. This is the time when food will be digested and processed, in turn we get energy from the food we eat.
But I am not hungry when I wake up in the morning?!
This is what my patients say to me when they come to the clinic during our first consult. Most people will only have a cup of coffee as breakfast. Not feeling hungry for breakfast is actually not a healthy digestion in the eyes of Chinese Medicine.
Why am I not hungry in the morning?
One of the reasons why you are not feeling hungry in the morning is that dinner is your biggest and heaviest meal of the day!
How would you be hungry when you wake up from your sleep?
You haven't done anything in bed to help digest your food?
The only thing you've done overnight is overworking your digestion when it is supposed to be resting, this is also why you may feel hot and have reflux at night.
When digestion is digesting food, it creates heat in the body which is also energy that is meant for us to use it during the day. However, when you eat late at night, the energy that is created from digested food is just sitting in the body, causing you to feel hot at night.
As Heat tends to rise up in the body, reflux happens.
What can I do if I am doing a 168 fast?
Start your fast early, start between 8am-10am and complete it by 4pm-6pm.
What else can I do to feel a more hungry when I wake up?
Follow this,
"Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a paupe" - Adelle Davis
I always say to my patients, have as much as you like for breakfast and lunch, then eat very little for dinner. Sometimes, it can even be broths or soups or just green leafy vegetables for dinner.
I promise if you follow this, you will wake up feeling hungry in the morning.
Love, Jyn