How much and when you eat throughout the day affects metabolism and blood sugar.

Blood sugar rises and falls primarily with the food we eat and our activity levels, even for diabetics who have trouble making or using their own insulin. Meal timing is a practice that takes advantage of this phenomenon where diabetics time what they eat and how much each day to try and keep their glucose levels balanced. Timing your meals is even recommended by some nutritionists to encourage weight loss and prevent weight gain.

How it Works

Meal timing isn’t too complicated. The most important part is to eat a large breakfastand a light dinner. This way you don’t have a lot of sugar hitting your bloodstream at night. Besides, skipping breakfast is shown to cause blood sugar spikes throughout the day and increase your hunger, so you tend to overeat.

Another method is having 70% of your calories before dinner and the remaining 30% at any time you like in the evening up to 90 minutes before bedtime. Just think of it as a 70/30 Plan for daytime and nighttime.

However, every person is different as is every person’s lifestyle. You’ll want to experiment a little bit to find what kind of meal timing works best for keeping your glucose levels stable. Here are a few more meal timing tips to try out:

• Don’t go more than five hours between meals.
• 3 meals a day or 6 small meals a day, whichever works for you.
• Make meals a part of your daily schedule. You want to be consistent.
• Snacks are okay if you choose wisely.
• Ideal snack sizes for most are between 100 – 150 calories and 15 carbs.
• Maintain a regular sleep schedule to help your metabolism.

When you start meal timing, test your blood glucose levels frequently to make sure they aren’t spiking or dropping too much. If you are having trouble getting your blood sugars within a healthy range, speak with your doctor.