How to Lose Weight Without Changing What You Eat

Not up for rehabbing your menu? Simply switching up your eating schedule can make a pretty big weight-loss impact. (Bonus: If you eat at the right times, you’ll automatically eat healthier, too.)

“Meal timing is extremely important in regard to weight control,” says dietician Jaime Mass, R.D., president of Jaime Mass Nutritionals. “People often believe ‘eat less and lose weight,’ but it doesn’t necessarily work like that. You need to feed your body throughout the day to lose weight.”

MORE: How to Calculate How Many Calories You REALLY Need

First, your crash course in fat-burning biology: In addition to a caloric deficit, the pounds you lose depends on your blood sugar, insulin sensitivity, metabolism, and the exact mix of satiety versus hunger hormones floating through your body at a given time. What influences all of those factors? When you eat.

That’s why breakfast really isn’t an option: After fasting for seven or eight hours throughout the night, your body is low on blood sugar and reserves of stored carbohydrates, called glycogen. Until you eat—Mass suggests getting some food in your system within an hour of rising—your body assumes food is in short supply and it needs to conserve the energy (a.k.a. calories) it has. Your metabolism stalls. (Not a fan of breakfast? Even one-fourth of a banana with a bit of almond butter will help get the body going.)

After that, eating at least every three to four hours can prevent insulin spikes, which usher blood sugar straight into your fat cells and keep your metabolism out of starvation mode, she says.

What’s more, how often you eat (protein, that is) also affects how much muscle your body builds, which can in turn increase your metabolism, says Mass. For instance, to increase your lean tissue, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics recommend eating 20 to 30 grams of high-quality protein after exercising and every four hours while you’re awake.

MORE: Can Eating a High-Protein Diet Increase Your Metabolism?

Follow those guidelines, and not only will you can help keep your metabolism revved, your blood sugar balanced, and your body from storing excess fat—you’ll automatically prevent the late-night cravings and binge sessions that prey on women everywhere.

Consider this: Research shows that many women take in nearly half of their daily calories at or after dinner—and a third of people eat 15 percent of their calories after 11 p.m.! Even worse: Bingeing before bed can spike your blood sugar levels for 24 hours, per research in Obesity of Research & Clinical Practice.

However, by simply not heading into the evening ravaged (how many times have you sat down to the dinner table and said, “I’m starving! I haven’t eaten since breakfast!”?) you can prevent loading your body with excess calories that you surely won’t burn off before hitting the hay.

So whether you want to cut down on the junk foods or you’re constantly toggling back and forth between “hangry” and “food coma,” a change of mealtimes may be all you need to lose the weight you want.

MORE: 7 Ways Nutritionists Deal When They Get Cravings for Unhealthy Foods

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