Well, I'm working on doing the six small meals a day thing. For others who follow this same practice, do you wait until you get hungry to eat, or do you just eat on a schedule whether you're "hungry" or not? Did you find that after a while you started to get hungry every 2.5 - 3 hours or so? I'm only a few days into it and am curious what to expect as I get used to this new lifestyle.

[edit] yes, they are small meals :-p Breakfast is two Nutri-Grain bars, 1st snack is a banana, lunch is a plain turkey sandwich, etc etc., and drinking lots of water. Also giving up pop. How long did it take to get over the "boy this sucks, I feel worse than before" stage?

Once your body adjusts to the new paradigm, you'll feel better. Right now, your body is saying "WTF? What are you doing to me?" and making you feel sluggish out of revenge. Once you switch over from a carb to a fat burn driven metabolism, don't be surprised if your energy levels shoot through the roof!

Hold on a regular schedule, by the way. That maintains a more level amount of blood sugars and reduces the urge to binge feed when you really don't need to.

^^^ (what tom said!)

I personally prefer the whole "smaller meals more often" thing, as when I'm sticking to it and get over the slug phase... I'm supercharged! I'm actually doing this right now, and not really sticking to a schedule but rather it seems to be figuring itself out:
7:00a: Slim-fast shake with 1 scoop protein powder, 300 cals
9:30-10:00a: 1 half Nature's Valley Granola bar, 90 cals
noon: Slim-fast shake, 200 cals
~2p: bag of plain microwave popcorn, ~200 calories
~4:30p: second half of granola bar, 90 cals
~6-7p: dinner, varied but around 600-700 cals (I could certainly cut it down, but I enjoy my dinners after a hard ride home)
~9p: snack of either a fruit ro some more popcorn, ~200 cals

The past week I've been sticking around the 1500-2000 mark, and beyond yesterday morning I've been feeling great. Yesterday morning I had *NO* energy and barely made it out of bed, but perked up significantly after my morning shake and ride into work. This weekend I'm going to add some calories in each morning as I have some brutal riding planned, but generally this kind of thing works for me.

Note that I'm not endorsing slim-fast, Ijust find it an easy way to get all my "stuff" in at those times :D.

But really, what Tom said. I've been doing this kind of thing for the past 2 years, and it really is hard to adjust, but once you do your body feels like it's been supercharged. Another note is to watch the sleep schedule. I find, once adjusted, I need at least 8 hours of sleep to make everything "click". But if I do, I'm good to go! Heck, for awile I didn't even need caffeine!

I am not an expert...but this is what I do.

My breakfast and lunch are fairly heavy meals. I have a snack meal between breakfast and lunch. I do 40% protein, 40% carb, 20% fats....at least that is my goal. My breakfast and lunch are carb heavy.

I have an early snack between lunch and supper and that is usually a cup of non-fat plain yogurt and a cup of blueberries or apple. That snack is also heavy carb.

Supper is heavy protein and my last snack of the day is a protein shake.

I am hungry in the morning and after lunch. Sometimes I am not that hungry for dinner but will eat light. If I am not hungry after dinner I will skip the shake as long as my protein intake is high.

Before this I was a binge and starve guy. I would miss breakfast and lunch and pig out once I got home, or I would eat heavy all day. So a regimented eating pattern was a big changes. It took me about a week to fall into place. Now I am better at listening to my body for when it is hungry and that hunger usually falls into my meal times.

One other thing....you will fall off the wagon sometimes. The trick is to get right back on track. Last night was an example for me. We had planned poorly and found ourselves without 'convenient' food available for supper after an extended nap. The house was a mess and we did what we do...pizza. Pizza is a 'trigger' food for me. I can't control myself with pizza. I over ate. This was not a planned cheat meal or anything like that.

Today I am back on my schedule. I am not cutting calories to make up for the binge and I am not freaking out by doing a ton more cardio. Consistency is the key.

"Breakfast like a king, dine like a merchant, sup like a pauper." There's science to support this as a way to consume fewer calories overall. I usually have some kind of an evening workout, either a bike ride (commute) or a couple of hours of aikido. If I haven't fueled properly during the day (frequent, small and nutritious), I'll run into problems.

I eat 5 times a day on a schedule. Breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner. Hungry or not I follow the schedule. I was 250 when I started this eating routine a few months ago. I'm 220 now. Of course I've been biking and exercising more but the eating routine helps. I eat a lot of protein and am amazed how I don't feel hungry.

Lil Brown Bat- I always like your posts. You are right on with that. I also stay away from white foods .

One other thing....you will fall off the wagon sometimes. The trick is to get right back on track. Last night was an example for me. We had planned poorly and found ourselves without 'convenient' food available for supper after an extended nap. The house was a mess and we did what we do...pizza. Pizza is a 'trigger' food for me. I can't control myself with pizza. I over ate. This was not a planned cheat meal or anything like that.

Today I am back on my schedule. I am not cutting calories to make up for the binge and I am not freaking out by doing a ton more cardio. Consistency is the key.
Pizza is a trigger food for me as well....love the stuff!:D

Consequently, I only allow myself pizza if I did a Century or better on the bike and need those carbs and fats for recovery anyway.;)

I don't really stick to an hourly schedule, I just eat a little bit all day long. It usually end up being 5-7 times a day. I've noticed that I can eat less in a day and can stop the late evening munchies.

One other thing....you will fall off the wagon sometimes. The trick is to get right back on track. Last night was an example for me. We had planned poorly and found ourselves without 'convenient' food available for supper after an extended nap. The house was a mess and we did what we do...pizza. Pizza is a 'trigger' food for me. I can't control myself with pizza. I over ate. This was not a planned cheat meal or anything like that.

Today I am back on my schedule. I am not cutting calories to make up for the binge and I am not freaking out by doing a ton more cardio. Consistency is the key.

Jumbo, you are the MAN! Seriously, I'm the worst at beating myself up "the next day" when I run into stuff like that. My fiancee has rolled her eyes, lectured, and growled at me about it.. but I still do it. Generally she knows I went to a vendor lunch when I come home and collapse in a heap of sweat two hours after I got off work. This is usually followed by "ya idiot, that sure did a lot of good..".

Really though, good work. Can't change the past, so why try to punish yourself in the future?

Anyway, I'm with you on pizza. It's.. so.. okay I'll stop :D.

What the hell are they putting in the pizza?!?!? Same problem here.

Mozzarella and pepperoni crack!

The scary thing is I work in a kitchen. I know EXACTLY what is in pizza... and I still can't stop eating the stuff.

On a happy note the bistro I work at makes an amazing deep dish pizza, The veggie varriety is actually not too unhealthy for you and chances are you can only eat one slice... it's a large slice, but one is all you'll need.

I have been doing the 6 meal diet. I haven't lost a bunch of weight on it but it actually seems like a pretty realistic eating plan. I now am doing it with a lower carb plan. One benefit is after a while you really do get the small stomach thing. Now when I go to a restaurant and the food comes I look at it and right a way can tell that I won't be able to eat all of it.

I do eat on schedule, some times to the minute. But usually I don't think about food until just a few minutes befroe it is time for my next meal or snack.

Good luck.

One other thing....you will fall off the wagon sometimes. The trick is to get right back on track. Last night was an example for me. We had planned poorly and found ourselves without 'convenient' food available for supper after an extended nap. The house was a mess and we did what we do...pizza. Pizza is a 'trigger' food for me. I can't control myself with pizza. I over ate. This was not a planned cheat meal or anything like that.

Today I am back on my schedule. I am not cutting calories to make up for the binge and I am not freaking out by doing a ton more cardio. Consistency is the key.

Jumbo knows the secret! Bravo Jumbo!

Reading this thread...

... I developed a barely controllable appetite for pizza. Oh well... But on a more serious note: I´m no expert but from what I read I get the impression that this idea of having five/six meals per day is slowly getting out of fashion. As far as I see this is happening for two reasons, one practical and one theoretical/fundamental:

The practical reason is that the assessment and control of your energy-intake/calories becomes more difficult the more meals you have. And in the end it is all about reaching that energy deficit...

The fundamental reason is in fact more worrying for me: The basic idea behind the many-meals-per-day - concept was (I think) to maintain a stabile blood-sugar level, stabile insuline-levels and thus to avoid hunger. But from what I read now, the emphasis is rather back to allowing these levels to swing. You don´t want your blood-sugar levels to be kept up constantly, because you don´t want your insuline-glands to pump constantly! Allow the blood-sugar level to go low, because then you allow those poor insuline-producing cells to take it easy, too. Plus, your muscle-cells are not getting used to the constantly high insuline levels.
You get my drift: Diabetis is a threat to us clydes. I find the reasoning plausible that our body was not made to be constantly fed and that three meals per day with five or six hours of not eating in between allow those eating-digesting-hunger - cycles to be completed... Hunger is a natural feeling; may be one has just to get used to it again.

I have lost weight several times. Each time it had something to do with me "accepting" the feeling of hunger. Before I had categorised it as a form of "pain", now I saw it as, well, just... hunger. You want to loose weight, so you have to eat less, to move more, so you better expect hunger.

Yeah, well, on the other hand I am NOT slim right now, I´ve put on all those lost pounds (and some more) - so I don´t know what it´s worth... Again: I´m no expert. Neither am I to successfull with my diet: I´m around 250 and I´m seemingly stuck there. But I have a strong scepticism against the many-meals-per-day diets.

Karl

Mozzarella and pepperoni crack!

I'm a pizza lover too.... just think about it has made my mouth water. I find I can dull the craving if I have a food that has similar tastes but cuts out the BULK.

Most Mediterranean foods can be adapted to lower carb/cal with little loss of taste or satisfacetion. I make a big batch of Minestone Soup and heat up a bowl or cup when I start feeling like someting to eat. I add a little salami or pepperoni to give it a "bite" but leave out the spuds or pasta. Here's my fav recipe.

Minestrone?250ml chicken (or veg) stock?1 can tomatoes
1 small can of kidney beans or a couple of handful of dried kidney beans soaked in water over night
(any beans can be used)?100g cabbage, shredded?100g carrots, cubed?1 large potato, peeled and diced (optional)
A handful of dried pasta (optional)?100g long beans, cut in pieces?3 Tbs extra virgin olive oil (MUST)?1 medium onion, coarsely chopped?1 clove garlic, chopped?2 sticks celery coarsely chopped (I include the leaves)
Chopped pepperoni (optional)
Salt n Pepper

If using dried kidney beans cook in the stock for 30 minutes. If using canned, add with rest of fresh ingredients.

Heat the 3 tablespoons oil in a saucepan and cook the onion and garlic on low heat until golden.?
Add kidney beans, stock, canned tomatoes, cabbage, carrots, potato, long beans; add salt to taste.?
Cook for 45 minutes.

Add the celery and cook for a further 15 minutes.

This can be served immediatley or I prefer to pour into individual soup dishes and let it stand for about an hour.

Now this has really made me hungry!!!

how many people are keeping track of calories on a daily basis.. After I started writing down everything I ate each day, I was able to better understand why I was not losing weight.. Since keeping track I have lost 12 lbs last month alone..

Lil Brown Bat- I always like your posts. You are right on with that. I also stay away from white foods .

I was just told yesterday that sauerkraut is supposed to be really* good for you!

I'm not sure if you guys have the same problem, but mine is "peer pressure". When at work, where I control where I go to eat or what snacks I bring to work, I'm good at keeping it light and healthy. Where I faulter is when I go out with non-food-conscience (but *******ly-skinny) friends. We'll order wings and beer and pig out, and I find it very difficult to contorl myself. Or, my wife and I will go out for a nice dinner, and despite the fact that my mind thinks 'no' to the dessert question, my mouth says 'yes'.

What techniques do you guys use to limit the outside influences? I've thought about ordering a big salad (no dressing, cheese, meat, etc) to eat before my meal to fill up, but I think I may just eat the salad, then the food, then the dessert, and then need to lie down.

trich -

My problems are also during dinner. What I've started doing is pacing myself with my 18 month old - that is, eating verrrrry slowwwwllllllyyy. When I start eating, I put an appropriate sized serving on my plate, and by the time I've finished (usually about 40 minutes), I'm feel satisfied. I'm not "full," but I'm not hungry any more. And by picking the right foods, stuff like rice, veggies, etc, I don't get hungry later.

What techniques do you guys use to limit the outside influences? I've thought about ordering a big salad (no dressing, cheese, meat, etc) to eat before my meal to fill up, but I think I may just eat the salad, then the food, then the dessert, and then need to lie down.

Peer pressure is not a problem for me anymore. I eat what I want and how much I want. Then I stop. If I eat too much I know it, and learn from my mistakes and live to see the next day.

Eating healthier and having a better life is almost addictive to me. I am still overweight, but I have people that I haven't seen in 6 to 8 months come and ask my wife how they can get in touch with me, because they don't see me at events anymore. Too bad I was about 5 people down from her talking to someone else.

Exercise has become more addictive to me, that is why I spent a lot of money on a bicycle. I think I may have convinced my wife to do the same.

I'm not sure if you guys have the same problem, but mine is "peer pressure". When at work, where I control where I go to eat or what snacks I bring to work, I'm good at keeping it light and healthy. Where I faulter is when I go out with non-food-conscience (but *******ly-skinny) friends. We'll order wings and beer and pig out, and I find it very difficult to contorl myself. Or, my wife and I will go out for a nice dinner, and despite the fact that my mind thinks 'no' to the dessert question, my mouth says 'yes'.

What techniques do you guys use to limit the outside influences? I've thought about ordering a big salad (no dressing, cheese, meat, etc) to eat before my meal to fill up, but I think I may just eat the salad, then the food, then the dessert, and then need to lie down.

I am a closet eater. If there are people around that are not in my closest friend group I will only nibble. It is out of embarrassment. I am working on that problem, but that is the deal.

how many people are keeping track of calories on a daily basis.. After I started writing down everything I ate each day, I was able to better understand why I was not losing weight.. Since keeping track I have lost 12 lbs last month alone..

If I fail to track my calories I will simply fail. It never amazes me how much a few crackers can have in them, or how few calories a cup of blueberries contains. Track the input also helps me keep my mind right.

I don't strictly count calories, but when I stop losing I know that I am screwing up somewhere and need to find it and then I write down everything and then notice where the problem lies. Usually chocolate of some kind.

I don't count either, but I have a pretty good sense by now of when I'm takiing in more than I'm using up.

If you write down everything you eat, you will be shocked how easy it is too be putting down 2500+ calories a day or more.. I try to keep under 2100 cal per day, if I workout hard or ride for more than 2 hours, I give myself a little more for ride drinks and recovery.. A great book to buy is this:

http://www.amazon.com/Calorie-King-Carbohydrate-Counter-2007/dp/1930448139/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-2475073-8475911?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1183457115&sr=8-1

It is 8.00 and worth 10x more than that..