Metabolic damage - tentative plan, feedback/tips?

dollparts2

Hi,

Not quite sure where to start since it's a long story, but the gist of it is that after years of restricting and going about health and fitness the wrong way I'm pretty sure my entire system is kind of in the toilet.

So I'm one of those people that have to eat 1400 and exercise 5 - 7 times a week to maintain weight. I know that I either have to exercise less (and eat less) OR eat more (and exercise more) to start fixing this, and I don't think I would've handled not exercising the way I'm doing now - in addition, since I've struggled with eating disorders my whole life, going lower than 1000 would be asking for a relapse.

However, I'm unsure how I should pace this?

I'm 22 years old, a woman, 175 cm and fluctuate between 77 - 80 kg.
Except for exercise I'm not very active but I do try to reach 5k every day, with some exceptions to the rule.
I lift weights, alternating between upper body and lower body every other day.
Other than that, I do yoga for 30 - 60 minutes most days of the week, and hiit-sessions and general cardio a couple times a week.

My plan so far is to slowly increase my calorie intake + lift increasingly heavier weights, but I'm wondering what would be a good tempo on the increase? I was thinking that if I start out at 1400 - 1600 now, I could increase with 200 every month, eating more on days with intense exercise and less on days where I'm less active?
I've accepted that I'm probably going to gain some weight but I would like to try to do a slow, controlled increase and preferably gain a lot of muscle. So I was wondering if anyone has any tips + feedback? Am I going about this completely the wrong way? I've messed up a lot over the years so any help is appreciated, lol.

KickboxFanatic

my understanding of reverse dieting is to slowly ramp your calorie intake up every few weeks until you stop losing weight. A lady named Cait wrote a great blog on her experiences with reverse dieting. It's incredibly detailed on how she went from from ~900 calories a day to ~1600 calories a day in 4 months while maintaining her weight.

http://www.themacroexperiment.com/blog/category/reverse-diet

Rebecca0224

Do you have a treatment team helping with your eating disorder? You should discuss this with your doctor if you suspect metabolic damage and have them get you the help you need.

JustAnotherOneOfThoseGirls

I've been struggling with the effects of having eating disorders affect my body too, congratulations on aiming to lead a healthier life and seeking advice, I wish you the best of luck!
I can't promise it'll work for you, but I'll tell you what works for me, and maybe some of these things might help you. (This is a mixture tips from my own knowledge as a sport student and from my dietitian). As above has said, also seek help from your doctors, a dietitian etc. as they can help you a lot more than strangers who don't know your history.
1400-1600 is a great place to start, and it really helps to eat back most or all of your exercise calories, especially on very active days, as this will fuel your activity and really helps with any dizziness or weakness (these are symptoms I personally get with metabolic issues, not sure if you do too), and it also lets you develop muscle. Eat plenty of protein, at least 1g per kg of body weight, if your goal is muscle building than you can increase this so that your protein macros is 30-40%. I've also found that eating plenty of protein has really helped me metabolism wise, I function a lot better with plenty of protein.
Avoid doing fasted exercise, try and eat something 1-2 hours before exercising, and make sure it contains a good amount of carbs. Also eat after exercising to refuel and get nutrients to your muscle to build them. I find that if I don't eat within half an hour after exercise my system completely crashes, and this also happens if i don't eat prior to exercise. Make sure what you eat after exercise is high protein, and you can mix in some simple and complex carbs.
Last thing I can think of is try not to let fat be the enemy. I'm not sure your history with food but stuff like fats can be scary, but make sure you get plenty of good, healthy fats, because fat is actually essential for metabolic processes, as well as a lot of other stuff in the body, and it's an excellent fuel source.
Oh, and I'm not sure what your relationship is like with exercise, but don't shy away from taking rest days, they are essential for building muscle as you need time to recover and repair and get stronger.

ugofatcat

Just to clarify, are you trying to increase calories and/or decrease exercise and maintain your current weight?

dollparts2

Rebecca0224 wrote: »

Do you have a treatment team helping with your eating disorder? You should discuss this with your doctor if you suspect metabolic damage and have them get you the help you need.

no, i do not. my GP isn't really qualified to help with anything and a nutritionist would be way too expensive for me as a student in my country. :'i

i've been recovering for years though and i do see a psychologist.

dollparts2

ugofatcat wrote: »

Just to clarify, are you trying to increase calories and/or decrease exercise and maintain your current weight?

i'd like to slowly increase calories and also increase exercise/lift heavier weights to build strength and somewhat maintain current weight (and then hopefully in the future be able to work on fat loss).

dollparts2

JustAnotherOneOfThoseGirls wrote: »

I've been struggling with the effects of having eating disorders affect my body too, congratulations on aiming to lead a healthier life and seeking advice, I wish you the best of luck!

thank you for all the helpful tips! and best of luck to you too <: