Fat from not eating? Anyone?
 

Heya peeps! I'm new to the forums and was wondering if anyone else has the same problems that I am currently having. I'm 30 years old (omg when did THAT happen?!) and I presently weigh in at 208 lbs. I'm considered obese. But, I can honestly say that I don't over eat. I under eat. Take for example: Breakfast today-nothing; Lunch today-nothing; Dinner today-microwaved stomboli from stoffer's. Yesterday-Breakfast-nothing; lunch-nothing; dinner-chicken patty sandwich. With all that food I weigh over 200. I wear a size 18. One would think that I would be a rail by now but nope. Still Elsie. Moo.

Any ideas anyone? Thanx for any help/advice anyone can give me:-)

P.S. And to answer the question of exercise: Nope. Too tired for exercise.:?:

You are not eating enough calories. Your body is holding on to anything you give it because it is starving. You must eat more if you want to lose weight. I would go somewhere between 1200-1600 calories a day, if not more.

You really need to eat more. Eat oatmeal for breakfast, eat a chicken salad for lunch.

I'm currently with you on the whole exercise thing, but if you push yourself, you'll give yourself more energy and you won't be tired. Exercising makes you more energetic.

Why don't you eat breakfast or lunch? I don't eat breakfast every day because sometimes I sleep in until noon. But I eat lunch.

YES, YES and YES!

I did the SAME THING...skipped breakfast and lunch ALL the time. I would have a fairly large dinner, sometimes giving me about 1000 calories at best, but for the most part, I cannot imagine that I hit 800-900 some days because I eat a lot of the same dinners now.

You are KILLING your metabolism. I am proof that a metabolism can bounce back after doing this for years. I also have hypothyroidism, which makes the metabolism even more sluggish (and killed my appetite even more).

I got my meds in order, began FORCING myself to eat breakfast and lunch and a snack before dinner, started exercising and I have lost close to 10 lbs since May 25th. I do count calories. I think I started out having to count to make sure I was getting enough. I zig-zag mine and so I have 3 low days (1200), 2 medium days (1500) and 2 high days (1800).

Like yesterday was a high day and I ate:

Breakfast:
2 cups coffee w/ 2tsp. sugar and 1/4 cup whole milk
Whole wheat bagel with 2tbsp ff strawberry cream cheese

Lunch: (Probably should've had this for breakfast but I was in the mood, lol)
2 slices whole wheat toast
1 whole egg w/3 egg whites
1 slice turkey bacon
1 sf tuxedo dark/milk chocolate sf jello pudding
Sweet Tea

Snack:
1 apple
2 cups skim milk with tsp ovaltine

Dinner:
4 oz. lean ground beef
1/2 cup of spaghetti sauce
4 oz. whole wheat spaghetti noodles
1 slice of whole wheat bread toasted with garlic butter
Sweet Tea

Dessert:
Little Debbie 100 calorie cake

I STILL came just a little under 1800

And I LOST close to a half a pound when I weighed this morning.

More than likely when you begin feeding yourself, your metabolism will raise to a point where you can begin some type of exercise (considering you have no other health problems). Your body just wants to sit there and do nothing at this point because that is all you are feeding it to do.

So my advice to you is eat :)

Our bodies are designed to protect us from dying during famine. When we don't eat enough, the body then starts reducing the number of total calories it uses to keep itself alive (that's also why you're exhausted...your body is directing every single calorie toward keeping itself alive, not keeping you awake and energized).

You need to track your total calories, eat throughout the day to keep your metabolism going at an even keel, and slowly raise calories from where you are now to the 1400-1500 range. You want to increase your daily calorie consumption by 5-10% a week, though, or your body (which is still in conservation mode) is going to see a huge influx of calories it isn't used to and you'll temporarily put on weight.

Eat? Ugh. I don't eat because I'm just not motivated to eat. Nothing sounds good and it is just too much effort lol. I cannot imagine eating more. I'll make that my first goal rather than weight loss. Just eating on a regular basis. See what happens with that? Who knows. Maybe I'll get more motivated to move around some lol.

And to answer, I don't eat breakfast because normally i'm sleeping I'm just so tired all the time, and I don't eat lunch because I forget and it's close to dinner time so I might as well just wait until dinner. Stupid but that's what I do.

Yeah, what they said! Wanted to add that it's no surprise that you are too tired for exercise. You are barely fueling your body with enough energy to survive, much less expend any extra energy! I know it sounds counter intuitive that you need to eat to lose weight, but it is true.

To be honest, that sounds very much like depression. I know from personal experience.

I'm coming out of a four year depression...kind of woke up and said "WOW! I'm fat! When did THAT happen?!" So yeah. Four years of eating like this.

I don't understand. You can not lose weight from not eating enough? Then why are aneroxic people skinny?

Because eventually you overwhelm your body's attempts to compensate. And then you get that lovely look that truly starving gets you.

Best I can figure is this: Aneroxic peeps don't eat. Period. So their bodies start attacking the muscles and other body parts to get the calories.

My case: I eat just enough to cause my body to horde the calories and store as fat. Ergo...size 18 jeans

Am I saying that right?

That's pretty much it.

Try mixing it up. Eat foods you wouldn't normally eat. Try mediterranean, try arabic, try greek. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hummus

I started eating mediterranean food and I love it. Hummus and pita with chicken for lunch is great. Eat Greek salads.

I think it might benefit you to set up a schedule to eat and wake up. For example, make an honest effort to wake up at 8 or 9, eat oatmeal, eggs, whatever, and then around 1pm, eat lunch, then around 6 or 7pm, eat dinner.

What do you drink during the day? Is it possible any of what you drink has calories in it that you aren't accounting for?

I would record everything that goes into your mouth every day for a couple of weeks and see what it is you are really eating before making any changes. That's everything you eat and drink for 2 weeks. Then you can really assess where you are. And don't forget weekends -- they count, too! ;)