by Michelle Wilkinson

Created on: November 19, 2009

You don't have to give up eating snacks completely if you are on a diet and trying to lose weight. Many people think that you have to give up snacking because they are used to eating calorific snacks, such as chocolate and cakes, and don't necessarily think that these could be replaced with a single apple, for instance. Sometimes, when you're trying to lose weight, experiencing hunger can make you believe that sticking to a diet is actually working, and thus if you avoid snacks you feel hungrier. However, there are people who find that it is hunger that actually undermines their commitment to weight loss, and thus they may find snacking staves off their desire to give up completely.

People in the past were probably more likely to sit around the table to consume their three main meals, which they would eat in the morning, at midday and then later in the evening. Nowadays, however, people tend to be a lot more flexible about when and where they eat so that often families don't sit down together, with individuals grabbing what they can, when they can. It can therefore be more difficult for people to keep track of the number of calories they consume.

When you're aiming to lose weight it helps to put a structure in place so that you know the times of day you are eating, as you can then exert greater control over the number of calories you consume. If you are the kind of person who grabs handfuls of cookies any time you are hungry it may be worth trying to avoid letting yourself get extremely hungry, as this can affect the strength of your willpower and commitment to losing weight. You may plan to eat three meals a day, but this doesn't mean you can't leave room for snacks, as long as you consider the number of calories you consume in a day.

When you're on a diet you have to count calories, so that you end up with a greater number of calories being burned than consumed, but how you choose to divide those calories is entirely up to you. You may prefer eating a large breakfast and only a small lunch and dinner, or you may be the complete opposite. You might decide that you only want to eat smaller meals so you can have more snacks in between, but as long as you keep in mind the number of calories as well as making healthier choices, rather than going for the sugar-laden, fattiest options, you will still lose weight. Besides, if eating snacks helps you stick to a diet you have a greater chance of losing the amount of weight you had hoped to in the first place.

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