We have an odd relationship, you and I.

What you want to get out of it are results. It may be that you want to weigh less, feel better throughout the day, have more energy during workouts, or have more success in the sport that you play.

I would love to be able to give those to you. But I can’t. Not really.

That’s because I am limited to written words, to being nothing more than a metaphorical intermediary. But if those words I write align just right, they provide the insight to help you get what you want.

Results.

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No, I didn’t accidentally email to the Times News a journal writing assignment for a course offered at some fly-by-night online college. What you read was what came to mind when I realized you were once again about to begin what I call a shades-of-gray article.

Clearly, getting your head around such an article requires more mental work than doing the same with a black-and-white one. Consider that your Saturday-morning summons and let’s get at the heart of the matter: the lack of black and white when it comes to eating breakfast.

For years, medicos moralized and parents pontificated about the importance of children beginning the day with a hearty breakfast. Yet the results of the 2011 Kellogg’s Breakfast in America Survey determined that only 34 percent of adults actually begin their day that way.

The logic usually used by these do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do adults is that a substantial breakfast keeps your blood sugar level stable early in the day, which keeps you from eating excessively later — which in turn lessens the chance that you will become overweight, obese, or develop type 2 diabetes.

But last October, a study published in the British Journal of Nutrition poked more than a few holes in the lid of that long-time line of thinking.

Researchers had 40 girls between the ages of 11 and 15 consume a low glycemic index (GI) breakfast of 468 calories for three days. Generally, a low-GI breakfast keeps your blood sugar level relatively stable — minimizing that mid-morning craving for carbs — and makes you feel more energized throughout the day.

Later, the girls went three days straight without a breakfast. During all six days, the girls kept a food diary and monitored their physical activity by using an accelerometer.

The results were far different from what those well-intentioned doctors and parents would have expected. On the non-breakfast days, the girls consumed 353 fewer calories on average, yet the lack of breakfast — and calories! — had no ill effect on their physical activity. The girls were just as active.

As a result of these findings, study co-author Dr. Keith Tolfrey, of Loughborough University in Loughborough, England told Medical News Today that prior studies “may have led to premature assumptions that breakfast can be used as an intervention for weight control” when in reality, the medical world doesn’t really know “whether eating breakfast can be used effectively as a weight control strategy.”

Yet a 2016 study done by researchers at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut with school students discovered that for weight control, having two breakfasts is actually better than having none. Those studied who ate a breakfast at home and then one at school as part of an in-school program were less likely to be overweight or obese than those at their school who passed on breakfast at both places.

Moreover, prior studies have established other benefits from beginning the day with breakfast.

A 2015 study also performed at Loughborough University determined that a lack of one can lead to a dip in athletic performance later in the day, thereby reducing the effectiveness of daily workouts. A 2015 Australian survey of over 500 teachers estimated that students who skip breakfast lose up to two hours of learning a day because hunger leads to an absence of concentration and an abundance of behavior problems.

Which leads to the latest shade of gray mixed on the breakfast palette.

A November 2017 study published in the Journal of Physiology discovered lean adults are more likely to stay that way if they take a pass on breakfast. Extending the fast created by sleep, it seems, causes a lean person’s fat-burning genes to kick into a higher gear.

But those who are obese and avoid breakfast, unfortunately, do not experience the same.

What needs to be noted, however, is that the 350-calorie breakfast consumed by all the subjects consisted of mainly carbohydrates. Prior studies with overweight and obese subjects have found low-carb diets are generally better at producing weight loss.

At this point, the confluence of conflicting information needs to stop, and your mental work needs to begin. Embrace the “gray,” experiment intelligently because of it, and become healthier as a result.