Why does eating breakfast make me tired?

Question

Your told to eat breakfast and in fact make sure you eat 6 small meals a day. For example: today I had eggs w/ a little bit of cheese and a piece of dry toast. Now I'm ready to take a nap! I thought breakfast was suppose to give you energy but I've found if I don't eat breakfast it seems I have more energy than if I do....why is this?

Just a quick piece of info I should have added and failed to.....I'm insilin resistant. I am NOT diabetic. I have PCOS which one of the symptoms of that is insilin resistance......that may help those in the diatetic professions to give more accurate advise....thanks for all your answers thus far!

Answer 1

Well the answer that says not enough carbs is completely ridiculous.What's happening is when you eat after a long time of consuming no calories such as when you wake up (this is where the name comes from break-fast) your causing a rise in blood sugar.It's probable that your blood sugar is elevated to a point that the insulin that's secreted after the meal is overcompensating and removing too much glucose from your bloodstream causing a hypoglycemic state.Much like the crash you'll experience after a sugar high.By limiting the amount of carbs such as the toast or sugary drinks and leaning toward more proteins you may mitigate this insulin response and not feel tired afterwords.

Answer 2

Tired After Eating Breakfast

Answer 3

My guess is you aren't a "morning person." I am not either, and that's why I work a 3-11 pm shift. I usually don't even feel like eating when I wake up at noon, I just have a cup of coffee. An hour or so later I eat a boiled egg or two or maybe half of a turkey sandwich. If you eat a lot of carbohydrates, like cereal, granola bars, or pancakes at breakfast, they will slow you down. I eat dinner at 5 pm and something later at 11 pm and go to bed at 4 am. Try eating pure protein like eggs, cheese, bacon for breakfast.

Answer 4

Wow! The same thing is happening to me! I just went to Dr. about it and got no where. Breakfast is the worst..and yet I am so hungry but if I eat I might as well give it up for the rest of the day. So have been skipping breakfast, which isn't good. Have tried to change what I eat but it happens no matter what I consume. Hope you find the answer. Will keep monitoring this question.

Answer 5

You really have to take the insulin resistance factor into consideration on this one.

Carbs, particularly processed carbs, are broken down quickly to sugar in the body. The body releases insulin to control this spike in blood glucose levels caused by the sugar you ate. But in people with insulin resistance, the body doesn't respond to insulin very quickly, and so the body keeps releasing more of it, and it accumulates in the bloodstream.

Because your body doesn't bring sugar into the cells as effectively as it should, your body doesn't get the full effect of this sugar that you ate, and so you feel tired. Sugar is your body's energy source, and those of us who are IR have trouble using it. However, eating lots of sugar causes more insulin to be produced, which can make insulin resistance worse. It's really a vicious cycle. Are you taking metformin? If not, you may want to ask your doctor about it. It's a diabetes drug that many PCOS patients take to treat insulin resistance.

Answer 6

Ya that happens to me too. I find carbs tend to make me tired. So all I can suggest is you don't eat the toast and go for a piece of fruit instead. Difference in carb might help

Answer 7

Well as a Nutritionist, perhaps diamondk almost said it right. We have to look at several things, which are

Fats
Carbohydrates
Protein rich foods

Studies have shown (www.webmd.com) that a breakfast high in fat will cause people to get tired quicker.

Studies have shown that a breakfast high in protein tend to make people feel fuller. In addition too much protein at breakfast leads to fatigue and sleepiness that can linger in to the evening hours.

So, we need to have a breakfast with a good level of protein, but mainly high in carbohydrates which will increase our alertness and feeling of satiety.

Thank You

Answer 8

1

Answer 9

That's an interesting question

Answer 10

Maybe you don't sleep enough at night ^-^ then in the morning when your body needs food, you wake up and keep yourself awake just to eat (it's just the surviving instinct). After you eat, the body just relaxes and because it got what it wanted (food) it thinks it can go to sleep again (does that make any sense? i can't find the words) Anyway, e.g. when someone starves becomes an insomniac because the body must stay awake to 'hunt' for food. Maybe a caffeine drink at breakfast would help :-)