Scared of eating

CoachFrenchie

well hello!!! I have gone from 280 lbs to 135 lbs in 13 months. Exercising and eating healthy. Now I should be able to maintain my weight, but somehow I am having problems with food. I train 4 hours a day on weekdays and 6 on weekend. I compete, so normal. But so scared of gaining back the weight!!! Anyone else been through this and is ok now???? Thank you so much for time and input!

zhong89

What kind of problems are you having with food?

BoxerBrawler

I know what you mean! I was similar, I went from 180 (ish) down to 115, then bumped up to about 120-125 to stay healthy. I sometimes feel like anything I put in my mouth is going to somehow bring all the weight back! It's silly really... won't happen. I train every day as well, 7 days a week and only take a rest day when my body tells me too. It's all in your head really. If you're still exercising and eating healthy you won't put the weight back on unless there's some kind of medical problem.

Wheelhouse15

Congrats on your success! I have had some similar worries about this after losing weight recently but I have done some reverse dieting and some bulking recently and I've kept logging. I'm now more comfortable with were I need to be for my intake and output.

If you keep monitoring you will be fine; you just need to have faith in yourself. You might want to try a reverse diet to help bring your food intake back up slowly in a controlled manner.

Good luck.

BoxerBrawler

Yes! Wheelhouse15 is right. I did this too and it helped me tremendously. If you build up a little and tear back down you can really learn to control your intake/output and you can focus on how you want to define your body e.g., bulk, tone, slim down, etc. Don't be afraid to eat a little more. My trainer says once you reach a goal instead of staying in maintenance, create a new challenge for yourself, change directions, build it up and tear it down. And yeah.. congratulations on your weight loss!

snowflake930

Yes, me too! Not that quickly for me, but 290# to 130# in 20 months and have been maintaining for almost 15 months. For me, maintenance is much harder than losing the weight was. I have to monitor myself daily. I allow a 5# increase, when I reach this I cut back on calories taken in and/or increase daily activity level. This is the way it has to be for me. Believe me, I know how you feel! It is not easy.

UnicornAmanda

Don't be scared! You are so unbelievably active, you would have to be going over your calories a tremendous amount to even gain a 1lb of that back. If you are worried, just keep consistently logging that way you know how much you are really eating, and that should give you piece of mind that you will not gain!

myfelinepal

Just gradually up your calories 100 cals a week until you start maintaining.

dopeysmelly

I felt/feel the same way. I think it's perfectly normal to feel quite hesitant. I increased my calories slowly (50 or 100 per day every month or so while I was losing), but had to up them when I reached target to stop losing.

I felt as though maintenance was The Great Unknown, almost like I was in free fall, whereas losing was relatively easy for me (eat less, weight comes off), and I had those feelings even after spending a lot of time planning and mentally preparing myself. I've become much more used to it now. Using an activity tracker/HRM has been a helpful prop for me, but even so you just have to learn to trust yourself and continue with the healthy habits that got you where you are now, I guess. For me that was daily weighing and logging/tracking weight, pre-logging and weighing food and aiming for 15k steps or a really good workout every day.

tokyogirl1996

I went from 167 to 116 and I am deathly afraid of eating. I don't know what a normal diet is so I tend to want to just keep dieting . So I understand!

dbanks80

With that many hours of training per day I would think it is safe to say you can eat whatever you want and maintain with no problem.

Congrats on the weight loss that is awesome!!!

farfromthetree

tokyogirl1996 wrote: »

I went from 167 to 116 and I am deathly afraid of eating. I don't know what a normal diet is so I tend to want to just keep dieting . So I understand!

This is worrisome. You cannot keep dieting. If you are that worried, you need to find out your maintenance calories and stick to that. You will not gain your weight back. if you continue to lose, you will find yourself in the hospital.

OP-4 hours/day and 6 on the weekends? that sounds horrible.

...but congrats on the weight loss!!

Robbnva

spartan546 wrote: »

well hello!!! I have gone from 280 lbs to 135 lbs in 13 months. Exercising and eating healthy. Now I should be able to maintain my weight, but somehow I am having problems with food. I train 4 hours a day on weekdays and 6 on weekend. I compete, so normal. But so scared of gaining back the weight!!! Anyone else been through this and is ok now???? Thank you so much for time and input!

what on earth are you doing at the gym that takes that long? With that much training, you won't be putting on weight unless you are eating like an NFl lineman...

cwolfman13

With that training regimen you can pretty much eat whatever you want and you'll probably have a hard time not losing weight. I can pack it away, but when I'm actively training my food never keeps pace with my training...it's coming off the training that sucks and I have to dial it back.

If you're training that hard, you also need the calories and nutrients for performance and recovery. You're doing yourself a huge disservice if you're not properly feeding your body for your training.

coachcynthiagl

I understand how you feel. I was soooo lost on how food actually works inside my body as fuel. Two weeks ago I stumbled across this blog called "eat to perform" and it has OPENED my eyes on what really food does for you. It helps me feel good about nourishing my body with lots of good food. I still struggle sometimes (yesterday) but you should look it up.

acorsaut89

tokyogirl1996 wrote: »

I went from 167 to 116 and I am deathly afraid of eating. I don't know what a normal diet is so I tend to want to just keep dieting . So I understand!

If you are deathly afraid of eating that's a very unhealthy relationship to have with food. There's a difference between fear of misunderstanding maintenance/gaining the weight back and being deathly afraid of eating.

CoachFrenchie

I know.... But i was told it will take time in order not to see food as an enemy.

CoachFrenchie

Well I feel I should have specified something: I train because I compete in all kinds of Spartan races across Canada and the States. So thats why I train so hard. But my relationship with food is really weird. I will check the blogs mentioned. And thank you all for sharing; feels really good to have people who went through this!

paradi3s

I know exactly how this feels. I used to eat 1,200 calories a day (usually less), and when I finally began losing too much weight and the snide comments began to appear, I decided to start eating. But the thought of eating more and gaining weight (I read up on how to maintain weight and most people talk about gaining a bit of weight as they increased their calorie intake) used to make me cry and want to stick to 1,200. I just shrugged it off and decided to slowly increase it to 100 per week instead. No change and even a slight decrease in my waistline! All that worrying was a waste, tihi. It all depends on your body. Just slowly increase you cal intake, keep training and you'll soon get used to it.

There are times I still get scared of eating too much, especially on a rest day (I workout 3-4x a week), but I'm kind of digging the fact that people keep talking about how much I eat but still stay "skinny". That, and my parents are happy I'm eating more and I do feel more energized throughout the day and during exercise.

gothchiq

Boy do I ever understand. Up the calories slowly, bit by bit, until you reach a stable point, like felinefriend said. That way you won't overshoot and start gaining.

rodriuezbl

I went from 140 to losing 35 of it, and I was "deathly afraid of eating" and went down to 80. I was put in the hospital. Now, 2 years later, I'm 124! It really is all about balance and listening to your body. If you are training that many days, a few extra calories are not going to make that big of a difference! Congrats on your healthy living

bigd66218

I'm not sure what competitive sport your involved with, when I was at my goal weight 12 years ago, I could eat a whole large pepperoni pizza and maintain my weight. I was cycling 10+ hours a week/150-200 miles a week and working in retail management 8-9 hours a day. I agree with myfelinepal's post gradually increase your calories.

BritH24

coachcynthiagl wrote: »

I understand how you feel. I was soooo lost on how food actually works inside my body as fuel. Two weeks ago I stumbled across this blog called "eat to perform" and it has OPENED my eyes on what really food does for you. It helps me feel good about nourishing my body with lots of good food. I still struggle sometimes (yesterday) but you should look it up.

Such a great blog!!! I can't get enough of it!

FatFreeFrolicking

spartan546 wrote: »

Well I feel I should have specified something: I train because I compete in all kinds of Spartan races across Canada and the States. So thats why I train so hard. But my relationship with food is really weird. I will check the blogs mentioned. And thank you all for sharing; feels really good to have people who went through this!

I know many people who compete in Spartan races and they do not train for 4 hours a day on weekdays and 6 hours a day on the weekends. You are totally overdoing it and overtraining which is not healthy.

Sounds like there are some underlying psychological issues that need to be addressed by a medical professional.