Even when she's rushed, Tara Taymore, 28, makes time for breakfast.
"I notice throughout the day that my energy levels are better sustained if I start out with a breakfast that includes protein. That's important to me," she said.
As tasting-room manager at Georgia Wines, she's on her feet much of the day. On the rare day she misses breakfast, she said, she leaves a trail of guilt in her wake.
"When that happens - and I don't let it happen very often - I will usually eat an unhealthy lunch and end up thinking I'm so hungry that I stuff my face," she said.
That overeating, said Patrick Wortman, registered dietitian at the Center for Integrative Medicine, is the main problem with not eating breakfast.
"First of all, eating breakfast is crucial for starting your metabolism for the day," he said. "Your body tends to go into storage mode if you don't, because you've gone for eight hours overnight without food and then you extend it another four hours till lunch. That's a long time for the body to go with no fuel."
Once your body has put itself into storage mode, it starts to think that it's starving, and it will cut back or slow down metabolism to save calories, he said.
"Then, when you do finally eat, you are generally starving and will eat a big meal and excess calories," Wortman said.
So first you starve, then you overload.
"If you're eating that much at one meal, your body can't burn it all at once. So you can end up gaining weight," he said.
Breakfast skippers tend to eat more food than usual at the next meal or nibble on high-calorie snacks to stave off hunger. Studies from WebMD suggest that people tend to accumulate more body fat when they eat fewer, larger meals than when they eat the same number of calories in smaller, more frequent meals.
Wortman agrees, adding that breakfast is the perfect first small meal of the day. He even goes so far to say that a less-healthy breakfast, such as a sausage biscuit, is better than none at all.
Taymore says she usually begins her day with an egg. "I love them," she said.
Wortman praised her for her healthful start. "Protein first thing in the morning is good. You can also get it from cottage cheese, Greek yogurt, peanut butter on a whole-grain bagel, a turkey sausage sandwich - foods like that. And maybe a piece of fruit on the side."
Wortman has one recipe he makes most every morning and shares with his patients. After his morning workout, he blends fresh or frozen fruit with almond milk and whey protein.
"It takes less than five minutes to make. It's no muss or fuss, you just have to plan ahead and make sure you have the ingredients on hand. Your nutrition is just that important."
Contact Anne Braly at abraly@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6285