Impact of breakfast skipping compared with dinner skipping
The best thing I did for my health the last year or two was taking a few weeks to form the habit of cooking a substantial breakfast every day. With no affiliation for the brands:<p><pre><code>  * 2-3 eggs
  * an Impossible breakfast sausage (bacon is fine too but the ethics of it are hard for me)
  * a bowl of Nature&#x27;s Path pumpkin seed granola with whole milk
  * a cup of OJ
  * 1-3 cups of coffee for ADD-like symptoms, depending on how compressed I am with work
  * multi vitamin, &quot;stress&quot; B-complex with ~100% RDA (instead of 5000%), omega-3
  * zinc, low 1000s D3 for immunity a few times per week
  * something with an adaptogen like RESTOR cycled as needed, I hear that mushroom coffee substitutes like MUD\WTR are good too
</code></pre>
I also try to have a bowl of corn or rice cereal (wheat can be inflammatory) and Orgain veggie protein before bed.<p>The main reason for this is that the body can&#x27;t store protein for more than 4 hours before it starts going catabolic. So most athletic training generally improves with eating every 2.5-3 hours and never skipping meals.<p>The above menu is admittedly ableist. Conditions like high blood pressure, high cholesterol and high blood sugar are primarily genetic. Unfortunately western medicine has to look at averages and make assumptions like &quot;patients never exercise&quot;. So it&#x27;s good practice to generally disregard well-meaning advice and adapt diets and workout programs to your own physiology.<p>I don&#x27;t put any stock in intermittent fasting. It&#x27;s always better to eat, even if the meal is a plain lettuce salad with little or no dressing other than an acid like vinegar diluted with water, maybe a dash of olive oil.<p>-- not that anyone cares, but since it&#x27;s Saturday:<p>The best workout I have found so far is 2 working sets of 12 reps, starting with the bar and adding 40-50 pounds per warmup set, 1.5 hours every other day on a legs&#x2F;chest&#x2F;back&#x2F;shoulders split each week. Always full range of motion, with light runner&#x27;s stretch afterwards and corner or door stretches to open the chest. 5 minutes of cardio on the treadmill before workout and after stretching to warm up and flush lactic acid.<p>Why 12 reps? Because the &quot;giving 110%&quot; is built-in and it stays around a rated perceived exertion (RPE) of around 8-9 for maximum muscle growth without overtraining. I spent years plateaued at 3 sets of 8-12 reps, and 5x5 works great but with a higher risk of injury. 3 reps hacks the nervous system so sets get easier as they get heavier, but injury goes up, so I reserve those for deadlifts under ultimate concentration. A set of 20 reps at 50-60% working weight once per week 2 days before a body part overdrives work capacity and all but guarantees a 12 rep success on the later date. And 1 rep heavy singles as a warmup 40-50 pounds heavier than the working set primes the nervous system for a 12 rep success as well. So an example intermediate bench press program might look like: BARx12&#x2F;95x12&#x2F;135x12&#x2F;185x6(reserve)&#x2F;225x1&#x2F;185x12x2, adding about 10 pounds to the working set every other week until another warmup set is added. Warmup rep count above 135 is usually a pyramid down from 75% or less to the heavy single to reserve endurance, for any exercise. All priming the body to expect another 50 pound set, so 1 RM PRs don&#x27;t feel like they take everything you&#x27;ve got to achieve anymore. They might even happen next week! This might not sound like much, but the above blueprint could have saved me a decade of plateauing, so I&#x27;m writing it out for past me.<p>All you need is this:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;strengthlevel.com&#x2F;one-rep-max-calculator" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;strengthlevel.com&#x2F;one-rep-max-calculator</a><p>I squat&#x2F;bench&#x2F;deadlift, overhead press, row and pull up more weight now at 45 than in my 20s, having never used performance-enhancing drugs. And more importantly, the high reps rebuilt my connective tissue so I&#x27;m injury-free after hurting my lower back over 2 dozen times. I feel that it&#x27;s not possible to change one&#x27;s weight healthily without exercise. In fact, I would say that the main struggle with weight control is around overcoming the workout avoidance and giving oneself 90 days to experience what it&#x27;s like to change the body. That&#x27;s where my love of working out started. Once it clicks, there&#x27;s just no way to eat enough food anymore. And each day in the gym is a day younger, like aging backwards.