My No-Breakfast Plan

I first came across the idea of a no-breakfast plan in a book called, I think, 'Fit for Life.' Much of the advice in the book wasn't good, but ever after I read it I felt free to skip breakfast if I wasn't hungry or was too busy to be hungry.

And then recently I read of the idea of Intermittent Fasting. Which can be the same thing as the no-breakfast plan. And I've been doing it most days ever since.

I have read many things about the benefits of IF, but there is one thing they don't mention: it saves money. By going from 3 meals to 2, you can save on your food purchases. Since ketogenic diet food is often pricey, and you can't pick some up at the local food bank, this will help you support your healthy living plan even if you are low-income.

Also, it saves the stress of making breakfast, eating breakfast, and cleaning up after breakfast. It really feels like you have less work to do.

Intermittent Fasting is not some new fad. The book illustrated above was written in 1900. I've picked up my own copy from Amazon.com --- it's available as a reprint, or from ManyBook.net for free in ebook form.

By sticking to Intermittent Fasting until lunchtime, and eating keto when I do eat, I've lowered my blood sugar from scary-high to almost normal. I've gone into ketosis, as I can see when I test my ketone level using my Ketonix breath ketone meter. And I've lost 6 pounds in about a week.

Contrast this to keto-alone. A couple years ago, I was doing keto every day, and my nephrologist was fussing at me because I wasn't losing weight. I tried to explain that since I was post-menopausal and diabetic, weight loss had become much harder. She thought that was just some lame excuse. I don't think she knew anything about diet other than to fuss at people who hadn't lost weight when she told them to.

She also responded to me saying I was doing low-carb by handing me a sheet for the 'DASH' diet and told me it was government-approved. She was an immigrant, maybe in India saying 'government-approved' would make people eager to switch diets. I did try to follow DASH a little but my blood sugar went up since it was a diet which provided no help in dealing with the actual problem of diabetes--- carbs.

So--- Intermittent Fasting works for me. And I now have enough energy in the mornings that I can keep busy and not miss having breakfast.

When I eat at my mom's house, she worries if I don't have breakfast. So, I make a cup of tea for breakfast. This seems to reassure her.

Tea also works when I am doing intermittent fasting at home. The ritual of making a cup of tea in the morning is soothing. A good replacement for the breakfast habit. And it seems to control my appetite. If I am feeling hungry in the morning and have a cup of tea, I feel very little hunger afterward, or the hunger goes away altogether.

I have to point out that I'm talking about plain tea. No milk, no sugar, no artificial sweeteners. That may be hard for people who are used to taking their tea with additives. But I've been drinking plain tea all my life, the way my mom and grandmother always did. You can not only endure it, you can come to prefer it that way.

What if your first morning of Intermittent Fasting is too hard, and you eat something by 9 am? Well, don't worry. Maybe the next day you can hold out until 9:30 or 10 or 11. I initially set 'lunchtime' at 11 but I'm trying to shift to 12 currently. Intermittent Fasting gets easier the longer you do it. I've gone to 2pm before eating some days without getting crazed with hunger.