Folks skip meals for multiple reasons. Those reasons can include hoping to lose weight or improve blood sugar. But the method can backfire. Especially if you skip lunch.
Researchers wanted to see how skipping meals impacted post-meal blood sugar spikes after other meals. In their study, they had healthy young adults eat normally for two days to track their normal post-meal spikes. Then the researchers had the participants skip the same meal for two consecutive days to see how skipping breakfast, lunch or dinner impacted the body. Skipping lunch caused a significantly higher post-meal spike after dinner. Skipping breakfast didn’t cause a higher post-meal spike after lunch, and skipping dinner didn’t change blood sugar after breakfast. When it comes to preventing post-meal spikes, lunch is the most important meal of the day.
This is the first study to find that skipping lunch raises post-dinner blood sugar. The study used real-world conditions and a fixed dinner time. It has to be noted that no one in the study had blood sugar concerns, and the results may be different for people with blood sugar concerns. A 2020 study that used people with blood sugar concerns found that skipping breakfast was linked to worse blood sugar control throughout the day.
There is a difference between skipping meals and intermittent fasting. When a person is intermittent fasting, it can aid blood sugar health. Aligning your meals with your circadian rhythm and restricting the hours you eat can lower blood sugar and aid glycaemic control. Intermittent fasting doesn’t require a person to skip meals. Instead, it makes a meal schedule more regimented.
Skipping meals is linked to a higher risk of micronutrient deficiency disorders. Ninety-one percent of people who habitually skip meals don’t get enough calcium, 98 don’t get enough folate and 73 are vitamin C deficient. Skipping meals can also be the first steps in an eating disorder, if a person continues to skip meals or over-compensates later with less healthy foods.
Skipping meals isn’t a shortcut to better blood sugar. It can lead to higher post-meal spikes after the next meal a person eats. While different studies argue whether breakfast or lunch is a worse meal to skip, the best option is to just stick to three meals eaten on a regular schedule. Intermittent fasting can help some people manage their blood sugar. Still, we don’t recommend making significant changes in your routine without speaking to your doctor. And intermittent fasting doesn’t mean cutting out meals to fit your eating into a time window.
