Coffee is Not Breakfsst

Once a month I host a mom’s get together before school pick up. It falls just before lunch so I put out a spread. Not the kind that would make my Italian Nana proud, but it does the job. Fresh berries, granola, a crisp veggie tray, cheese and fancy crackers and a few sweets. The food mostly goes untouched and our family happily enjoys the extras. My kids can’t understand why the good food goes to waste.

This Spring, I asked one of my friends if she wanted anything to eat and she said, “oh no, I’m intermittent fasting”. 

I simultaneously understood her position and felt sad because diet culture, one and my friend, zero. 

I promptly replied, “No judgement, but I don’t agree with that concept”. I try to keep any commentary light which will be hard this fall when I want to open my book and ask her to read chapter one which is all about diet culture and why diets don’t work for the vast majority of people. 

“But you seem so healthy, it’s supposed to be good for inflammation and lots of other things and almost everyone I know is doing it” she said eagerly. 

I hate to break it to you and my friend, but coffee is not a real breakfast and intermittent fasting (IF), a diet at its core, doesn’t work. Dietitian, Abigail Haynes reports that a 2018 systematic review of randomized controlled trials shows that IF doesn’t lead to any significant differences in weight loss, body composition, fasting glucose, hemoglobin A1c levels, estimated energy intake, total energy expenditure, or resting energy expenditure. Sorry, not sorry, to burst your IF bubble. 

No amount of cream or sugar can turn your cup of coffee into the meal your body needs to start the day. Starving your body at any time isn’t healthy and frankly most people jump on the intermittent fasting wagon because of the promise of waist management which is why my post party involves so much food waste management. 

Maybe you’re feeling all superior because you actually do eat breakfast (Yay! One point for you, diet culture, zero), but you still have some tricks up your sleeve. Like chewing gum between meals or immediately after a meal to quench your hunger, chugging sparkling water all day to keep your stomach “full”, eating rice cakes alone and calling them a meal or snack, or having a bowl of cottage cheese and calling it lunch. I had to laugh when an article in the NYT this week said that cottage cheese was making a comeback. But let’s be real, any hard core dieter has been adding this staple to their cart for decades. Sorry, but no amount of pepper worked to make that a consistent diet food for me in the 90’s or today. I was more of Snackwells, Crystal Light kinda girl. You better believe I stashed those Crystal Light on the go individual packets in my bag circa 2000. 

Diet culture excels at all the gimmicks and tricks to override your body’s natural hunger cues. Caffeine, cottage cheese, and Crystal Light or their equivalent will always be there to tempt you into believing that you don’t need real food for meals and your body can and should be much smaller than whatever size it is now. 

Eating a morning meal with a mix of carbohydrates, proteins and fats will help keep your energy and blood sugar stable throughout the day. Too much caffeine can actually upset your digestive system, especially when consumed without food. You and your body deserve to eat breakfast even if you feel like you “overdid” it yesterday or you don’t have time to workout today. And remember, sleeping at night is enough hours to be sans food for both you and your GI system.  Make yourself a fancy spread for breakfast this week. The kind you’d want to serve your Nana or Grandma.

PS. Imagine my face when I opened a box this week and my paperback book was inside!!! My book is REAL!!! We’re power reading for one last round of any potential errors and I hope the pre-order link will be landing 🛬 soon. Stay tuned!!!