You might have noticed that you often feel hungry at around the same time every day. It is so because our metabolism is in sync with our meal patterns. So, what we eat is not the only thing that matters. When we eat is important too. And, these two aspects have a direct impact on our health. This is the reason why optimizing mealtimes is of the utmost importance.
In this blog, let us take a close look at our body clock and how it knows that it is time for dinner.
The Metabolic clock
Do you wonder why you feel hungry only at particular times? Yes, we have the answer to this question of yours and it is right below.
During the day, our bodies are naturally trained to expect food at particular intervals. And, this will usually happen during breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Our brains coordinate the consumption of food over a network of circadian clocks. So, we receive hunger signals from our brains before or during our mealtimes. Therefore, the fact that our body clock knows when it is time for a meal is true. It is more of a physiological process than a psychological one. A certain amount of psychological factors are still involved because we feel better after a meal. Even though sugar levels increase after a meal and it contributes to a lift in our moods, the thought that we have eaten (and therefore we will feel better) by itself gives us mental satisfaction!
The hunger that you feel right before a meal will decline (sharply) once that particular mealtime has passed.
A proper eating schedule
There is yet another reason why our bodies anticipate our dinner times. When we were babies, our mothers would have fed us at the right times and at the right intervals. Our digestive juices would have been secreted at those times.
So, our bodies would have been trained and fine-tuned according to those timings and intervals. The digestive juices will also be secreted at the correct times, which are before breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And, this internal metabolic behavior is retained as we grow up, and thereby, our digestive system keeps expecting food at the same times (when we were fed as babies) and at the same intervals.
If we don’t have a proper eating schedule in place, we need to adopt one right away because we may come to face lots of health issues if we keep disrupting our body clocks.
Dinner time and Circadian rhythms
Circadian rhythm is nothing but a cyclical fluctuation that occurs in the human body during a period of 24 hours. These rhythms affect our dinner times and vice versa. Having dinner at the right time every day is crucial. And, maintaining these timings is also important. Moreover, our body also needs to have some time for digestion before going to bed.
Delaying our dinner for several hours or going to bed right after dinner may disrupt our metabolism. Eventually, it can affect our health.
Some Pro Tips
It would be wise to avoid having a heavy dinner. People planning for weight loss can have a good breakfast and go easy on their dinner. In the mornings, the secretion of enzymes and digestion will be faster. Metabolism will be at its peak. So, it is a good idea to have a breakfast with all the nutrients. As digestion becomes slower at night, it is recommended to have a dinner with small portion sizes.
Maintaining proper eating schedules will go a long way in keeping our metabolic clock and our body healthy.
