How To Keep Your Energy Stable With Food
Having enough energy for hectic modern life is challenging, and with snack companies plying us with unhealthy snacks, it can be difficult to find the facts about what we should be eating.
Breakfast: break the fast with carbohydrates and protein
When you wake up in the morning, you haven't eaten in a while so your body starts consuming its energy reserves: fat stored in your body. If there isn't enough fat, then your body might start using up the proteins in your muscles.
This generally doesn't make a person feel good. It's important to eat something soon after you wake up to avoid this feeling. Carbohydrates are usually the main source of energy for humans (I'm going to assume in this article that you aren't on any sort of diet, including any carbohydrate-limiting ones) so try to have a breakfast that consists mainly of complex carbohydrates (also known as starches.) The types of food to aim for are grains (which is why cereal is popular for breakfast), pasta, oatmeal, rice, breads, and potatoes.
It's also a good idea to eat some protein during breakfast. Protein takes longer for your body to digest, so it is a longer-lasting source of energy. Milk is a good source of protein with additional benefits like vitamins and calcium. Peanut butter is another protein-rich option.
Be sure to get some servings of fruits and vegetables with breakfast if you can. Fruit juice is high in simple sugars, which is not ideal for energy maintenance, but it still has benefits.
Don't overdo it, though. If you eat a huge breakfast, you might consume more energy than you need, and it will get converted into fat. This is not particularly good for you, and might mess with your metabolism, making you feel lethargic.
Healthy snacking
After breakfast, try not to go too long before eating again. Just eat some small things that will give you a boost of energy. Protein makes a good choice for your energy source at this point, so something like milk, yogurt, cheese, nuts, and seeds could work well. Be sure to check that you don't pick something too high in fat.
Fruits and vegetables are good snack choices as well, because they're so loaded with nutrients and people tend not to eat enough of them. They also tend to contain fiber, which can keep your energy consumption more stable.
Other than fruits and vegetables, avoid snacking on processed snacks like cookies and chips. These are rarely, if ever, healthy.
Lunch time
At lunch time, protein is the way to go. Avoid too much in the way of carbohydrates and focus on lean meat, legumes and beans, an cheese and dairy products. Don't forget to have as many fruits and vegetables as you can make yourself eat.
Fat, snacking and dinner
Though we tend to have negative feelings about fat, our bodies do need some fat for health and survival. Eating food with some fat content will add to your energy reserves... eventually. Fat takes a while to be stored, and a while to be converted into usable energy; and even then, it can only be effectively used if you're not doing strenuous exercise. So don't consume too much fat. If you eat a variety of things throughout the day, and you are not specifically trying to avoid fat, you will probably get plenty of fat for your reserves.
Continue having some light snacks, especially those that are mainly protein, after lunch. When dinner time comes around, keep your focus on protein.
Before bed
Don't eat much before bed. A full stomach before you snooze can prevent you from having restful sleep if you develop digestive woes overnight. Do be sure to have some water or other fluids before bed to help you stay hydrated while you sleep.