Mother Might Not Know Best

Who could work after eating all this anyway?

I spent my youth with Cheerios and Wheaties, as I recall. This was, of course, before the age of sugared cereal, so we'd pour sugar on when Mom wasn't looking. Naturally, there was nothing for the sugar to adhere to so it ended up a congealed mess at the bottom of the bowl that even made the milk taste sickening. But it was better than oatmeal, as far as I was concerned. You may or may not remember the television commercial featuring a ghostly bowl of oatmeal or Malt-O-Meal that followed the young man around all day ensuring that he was taking great care of his personal health...well, his mother was anyway. Mothers worldwide (except in those places where people are lucky to get anything to eat, let alone three, balanced meals) probably still regale their children with tales of how a good breakfast gets them off to a positive start that will last all day, following them around like the spiritual bowl of oatmeal of my nightmares. Maybe that remains a truism, but it won't help someone who is trying to lose weight, according to research done in Germany.
Recently published in BioMedCentral's Nutrition Journal were the results of a study done to determine the effect of a hearty breakfast on weight loss. The theory was that if one ate a filling breakfast, he or she would not eat as much during the day, resulting in a lower caloric input and, therefore, weight loss. Turns out to be false hope.
Two hundred and eighty obese people and 100 "normal" folks ate the same breakfast for two weeks: cereal, cornflakes (aren't these the same? Maybe not in Germany) and sausage or butter, bread and cheese before going about their day. The supposed lessening of food intake throughout the day was not evident. It seemed that each group member ate the same amount at lunch and dinner as they had before. This meant that a big breakfast only increased the amount of calories taken in, so, instead of losing weight, folks gained weight or remained virtually the same. There was no real result pronounced in the article I read.
Weight gain/loss seems to be important to us as we get older, and it is obviously more important to some than others, so, while having breakfast to jump start the system after an entire night of using up calories, perhaps I might reconsider the "Heart Attack Stack at a local restaurant...that is, if I want to lose weight.
Maybe older women LIKE pudgy.
On the other hand, I hate oatmeal and cornflakes get soggy far too quickly for me. High fiber/low fat? And Mom is not around to tell me what to do...Who knew this could be so hard?