Your 6:30 alarm goes off but you accidentally, maybe on purpose, hit the snooze button. Seemingly five more minutes later, it’s 7:05 and your bus stops by your house at 7:10! You jolt out of bed, throw on the closest set of clothes you find on the ground, put your shoes on, grab your bookbag, and sprint out the door in order to catch the bus. 

Since you were in a rush, you skipped breakfast at home. When you arrive at school, you skip the school breakfast and study vigilantly for your big test on the book you didn’t read in English. Without your breakfast, you go all morning feeling off.

A lot of people skip breakfast in the morning, whether it be intentional or not. Not having breakfast in the morning can create a negative impact on yourself mentally and physically.  For instance, your stress hormones increase. This is caused due to your cortisol, the primary “stress hormone”, being high in the mornings around 7:00. Eating breakfast lowers the level of cortisol and prevents you from feeling anxious or jittery.

Apart from keeping your cortisol levels high, not eating breakfast in the morning also drops your blood sugar levels down. When people don’t “break the fast” after sleeping, you don’t restore the lost glycogen or stabilize the insulin in your body. This causes you to feel overly hungry and tired in the mornings.

In addition, no breakfast slows down your metabolism leading to you to gain weight. When you don’t eat for long periods of time, your body’s metabolism slows down and stores as many calories as possible in order to prepare for the possible period of starvation that is coming. Eating after being deprived of food for a long period of time, your metabolism will be slow and the fat stored in your body will increase.

Having a good breakfast in the morning can help you stay focused in the mornings. It will help you feel less anxious and stressed. It can also help encourage your body to burn more calories throughout the day. Eating a good breakfast can help you stay focused, concentrated, and full until lunch time.

Although a plate of bacon and eggs is wonderful for a breakfast meal, not many people have the time to wake up early and cook. Breakfast doesn’t always have to consist of home cooked meals. Many good breakfasts are small and light with little to no preparation time. 

For breakfast at home, you can have a bowl or cup of cereal with milk from home. Picking up some fruit on the way out is also an option: bananas, apples, oranges, etc. Stopping by Mills down the road can also be a great choice in the mornings.

The cafeteria also provides breakfast in the mornings. The cafeteria does a good job of having a variety of choices. You have the option of getting a chicken or sausage biscuit, cini minis, poptarts, cereal, and milk and/or juice.

Next time you’re running late in the mornings or have to study for a very important test, do yourself a favor and don’t forget to pick up a quick breakfast from home or stop by the cafeteria. You will end up thanking yourself later.