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How long should you not eat each day?

Experts recommend waiting about three-five hours between meals. The wait time between meals should be between three and five hours, according to Dr. Edward Bitok, DrPH, MS, RDN, assistant professor, Department of Nutrition & Dietetics at the LLU School of Allied Health Professions.

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There’s a lot of conflicting advice out there telling you when you should eat next meal. You’ve likely heard that you should eat every two to three hours to boost your metabolism. Oppositely, you also may have heard that you can stick to the usual three meal a day regimen to maintain a healthy weight. To find out which of these are actually true, INSIDER spoke with several health experts to find out how long you should be waiting between meals. Deciding when to eat can be tricky with so much information out there giving you conflicting advice. Some dietitians recommend that you eat every two hours for a boosted metabolism. Others say you can just eat three meals a day without any snacks in between to attain and maintain a healthy weight. We spoke with several health experts to find out how long you should actually wait between meals for optimal health.

Experts recommend waiting about three-five hours between meals.

The wait time between meals should be between three and five hours, according to Dr. Edward Bitok, DrPH, MS, RDN, assistant professor, Department of Nutrition & Dietetics at the LLU School of Allied Health Professions. This waiting period is ideal because it is the average time it takes for the stomach's contents to be emptied into the small intestine after a standard meal, Dr. Bitok explained. Waiting this long will also ensure that a true appetite has returned to sustain the body instead of just eating out of habit or as an emotional response, according to Dr. Priya Khorana, D.Ed — doctor of Nutrition Education. Waiting too long can create issues like low blood sugar levels, shakiness, and irritation. A wait of six to eight hours between meals can cause problems in your everyday activities, according to Dr. Khorana, as it can lead to a lack of focus, acidity, irritation (hangry), shakiness, low energy, low blood sugar levels, and eventually, over-eating.

You should listen to your body. Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock

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"Folks are likely to overeat to make up for the lack of calories, and taking this food in too quickly can lead to nausea, bloating and exhaustion as you are more likely to ignore your body's satiety cues," Dr. Khorana said. Waiting too long can also lead to long-term health complications such as low blood sugar levels, according to Stacy Tucker, RN, nutrition expert for Almeda Labs.

Not waiting long enough can cause weight gain and digestive problems.

If you don't wait long enough between meals, you may face problems that can hurt your vascular system, as well as make you gain weight, according to Jianqing Wu, Ph.D. and J.D., founder of Igoosa.com and author of "Health Optimization Engineering." Waiting only two hours between meals, Wu explained, can result in high glucose levels in the blood. The peak of the glucose generated from the first meal will superimpose with the glucose from the second meal and result in a bigger glucose peak. This can lead to excessive glucose levels in the blood that can slowly ruin the vascular system. Additionally, not waiting long enough also result in adding in more calories to the digestive process than what's needed, according to Tucker. She echoed Dr. Bitok on the three to five hour wait period between meals to keep this from happening. But there really is no one size fits all answer to this question. Meal frequency is largely person-specific, according to Mike Clancy, C.S.C.S., health and wellness expert from MikeClancyTraining. The amount of time you should wait between meals, Tucker said, depends on your level of activity, state of health, and your nutritional requirements. "People with chronic health conditions like diabetes typically have a strict diet plan and eat at the same times every day to stabilize their blood sugar levels," Tucker said.

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