You probably heard of people saying that eating in small portions and having your meals frequently is better compared to eating in large portions and having three meals a day only. This advice is popular among celebrities and fitness junkies for good reasons.
Here are the top 3 health benefits of eating in small portions:
- Achieve controlled sugar levels
- Better control of your weight
- Avoid digestion problems
Controlled Sugar Levels
It’s not only diabetics who should be watchful of what they eat to keep their sugar levels at bay. Everyone should pay attention to details as to what they’re eating and how much food is taken in.
So, how can eating in small portions help you in controlling your sugar levels? Eating in small portions goes beyond having control over your weight. It helps you stabilize your insulin production.
Your body digests carbohydrates and turns it into glucose. So, when you are taking too many carbohydrates, your sugar level would rise, and this signals your pancreas to produce insulin. When insulin is produced, this lowers down your sugar level, and it tells your body that you need sugar. This, in turn, makes you think that you are hungry and that’s when your cravings kick in followed by over-eating.
Eating in large portions is nothing but a vicious cycle. To stop that cycle, the trick is to eat in small portions of balanced diet meals, so your pancreas won’t need to produce too much insulin to control your sugar level. The effect is that you won’t have too many cravings for sweets. Hence, you can achieve controlled sugar levels.
Controlled Weight
When you eat in small portions, you know that your calorie intake is lower. This means that your body will less likely store the food you ate as fat since it is immediately converted into energy.
Another reason why eating in small portions and having meals frequently can help you control your weight is that this allows your metabolism to keep going during the whole day. The logic is that even if you are eating in small portions, this allows your stomach to feel full throughout the day because you are constantly eating. This will in effect lower the chances of you overeating when you have your next meal of the day.
On another note, eating slowly in small portions will help you feel full easily. Hence, it lowers the chances of weight gain.
Take note that your stomach takes time to digest. This is why people who eat fast tend to not realize that they have eaten a lot already.
When a person eats fast and takes in a lot of food, the person would think that he or she is still hungry because the body takes time to digest the food. It is only after you have stopped eating that you begin to realize that you are already full; and that’s when regret comes in to bite you, and you will realize that you ate too much again.
Unlike when you eat slowly, you would be able to notice when your stomach already feels full.
Avoid Digestion Problems
When you eat in large portions, this will make your stomach expand larger. When this happens, the walls of your stomach can push against the other organs surrounding your stomach, and because of this, you will most likely feel discomfort.
Not only that, but you are also exposing yourself to suffering from heartburn. When you eat too much, your acidity level goes up, and most likely than not, you will suffer from acid reflux and have too much gas in your stomach. Again, this will leave you with discomfort.
Take food in small portions, and you will see an improvement in your digestion.
Summary
To sum it all up, eating small portions have a lot of benefits for your body. It will do you a lot of good if you follow such a diet. It will not only give you those 3 benefits mentioned above, but it will also improve your immune system and overall health and well-being.
