Timing of Big Meal
 

I having problems with hunger. I eat breakfast between 6 and 6:30 Am. I have lunch at 11:00. Between meals is bad; I'm teaching all day and I think I burn off all the food before I have the chance to eat again. Is there a problem having my protein at lunch along with the salad and veggies. The hunger gets so bad I feel sick.

I always split my protein between lunch and dinner. It's a better balance for me and I don't feel hungry.

There's no problem with swapping your "dinner" with your "lunch".

Could you sneak in a bar or a snack between lunch and dinner? That's when I eat mine. Quick and easy.

my understanding is that you can pretty much eat the packets and food in what ever order fits your lifestyle and needs as long as you get it all in each day.

I have the same problem. I eat breakfast around 6am when I am working - I tried eating a packet then, but I would be really uncomfortably hungry around 9:30 - 10:00am. My coach told me not to wait longer than 3-4 hours between eating due to starting to burn muscle mass.

So, when i work, I have 2 hard boiled egg whites around 6am, then 8-9am I have my packet. Lunch at 12pm, packet at 3-4pm, dinner at 7-8pm.

Another coach I saw today, not my regular one, said a whole HB egg would be fine as well in the morning instead of egg whites.

I swear everyone's coaches are giving them a different story!!

and that is why i joined here ans started doing it on my own.

I almost always have part of my protein at lunch because otherwise I tend to get hungry in the afternoon...

I've read of a few dieters here who have regularly switched their 'main meat + veggie' meal to lunch time. Sorry, I can't think of the actual poster names right now. I recall them saying that it suited their daily schedules/family schedules, etc. better.

I've done that occasionally when it suited something different that was going on with my schedule on a particular day, and weighed myself out of the curiosity the following morning. Was surprised to always see a small loss on the scale. Of course this means that my 'dinner' was a packet - generally ended up being a soup packet with 1 cup zucchini blended in, plus a romaine lettuce salad with the remaining 1 cup of celery/cukes/radishes. In general though, I prefer to eat my main meal in the evening.

ITA, how it's frustrating and confusing that coaches give out such different instructions.

There's no problem having some of the 'real meat' protein at lunchtime, if that suits you better. I'm wondering if it would help too, if you saved 1 cup of your lunch vegetables and had them around 3pm or so? Or maybe 'borrow' a bit from both the lunch and dinner veg - say, 1/2 cup from both? That would give you a 1 cup veggie snack mid afternoon, and still having 1.5 cups with lunch and dinner. I do that frequently and it seems to help a lot. One cup of zucchini slices with a bit of WF blue cheese dressing as a dip gives me a crunchy snack that hits the spot mid afternoon.

I eat 2 egg whites as a snack.

It is a bit frustrating that everyone seems to get different opinions from their coaches. My coach is 'strictly by the book'. Meaning, I eat my protein at dinner, and no breaking up the veggies. He didn't even necessarily want me to have my evening snack earlier in the day. It's only my second week, so I am just following his instructions, but a few more weeks down the road I may mix things up a bit.

I hear you AngieBaby... I'm single with no kids too. At present I work from home so I'm free of the social distractions at lunchtime. In the past I've definitely been in work-related environments where it would have been much more realistic to switch things to the 'main meal at lunch' regularly. Most of the times when I've switched things around for a day have been due to being in a more social situation at lunch, and wanting to make it easier on myself when dining out for that meal. I guess the important thing is to figure out how to make the diet most easily suit our individual needs, while keeping to the protocol. The first week is definitely the toughest... once you're through those first few days, it will get much easier. Hang in there. :carrot: I saw your post about your first weight loss - I think it was 5 lbs and a bit? After 4 days I think it is? That's great - congrats! Keep on keepin' on..... :carrot:

I save my "normal" meal for my work lunch too.

Ahhh I find it easy to follow the way it is set up, but then again I work lame shift work, all evening or 2pm the earliest. I find I become almost painfully hungry around 5 pm when I don't get home til 8 or 9 some nights. May try having the snack then, because it makes me feel like I'm going to be sick it's so bad sometimes.

Wow, I work shift work too! I get home around 9am. I'm still trying to figure out when to eat when I'm at work. When I'm on my weekend it all changes.

My non-usual coach yesterday told me to eat all of my protein in one meal. My usual coach said it's ok to break it up for lunch and dinner if I wanted. There was a sign in the office yesterday that 4 whole eggs plus 2 egg whites are now considered the daily allotment for protein, which is when I said, 'that's a lot of eggs, I could split it up during the day' and she told me I should have all protein in one meal. I sometimes do that, sometimes split it up between lunch and dinner.

The sign also said that in P1 we shouldn't exercise more than every other day, which was new also.

I am going to go by my usual coach's instructions. I've been doing fine with that for 7 weeks!

Ahh yes I find it easiest if I split my veggies up. So I have a snack, instead of eating my IP packet and veggies all at once, not sure if thats allowed but I find it keeps hunger at bay. I don't get home til 12:30, 1 A.M. some nights and its difficult not to munch or having a "full meal" is too much before bed

Thanks evepet!! I was pretty happy/surprised! And it's a good motivator. The first thing I thought of when I saw the scale was "I get to change my ticker already!!!" LOL

And you're right ... today is day 5 and I feel completely different today than I have the last 4. I felt "draggy", but I got to work this morning and literally have been dancing in my chair to the radio. :dancer: Good thing I'm back here by myself and no one can see me! I noticed by the second night too that I was already sleeping better. It's amazing how quickly our bodies adjust/adapt to the right fuel.

I've been told as long as you get it all in, it doesn't matter when or how. My schedule is different everyday, so I've split protein, split vegetables, had it all at lunch, had it all at dinner, started at 6 in the morning or somedays it's 10 or 11 before I have breakfast. No matter how it's happened, my losses have been pretty much the same each week. So whatever is easiest and the least amount of stress, that's how I go.