Not noticing a pretty big weight loss?

MissBelle777

I'm 5'0 and 96 pounds. I'm 21 years old.
I have struggled from bulimia since age 11, jumping backwards and forth from recovery to relapse.
I hit my very hardest relapse in June of this year, and have since lost 40 pounds.. And I can't tell. I know this is common ED behavior, but I'm looking to overcome it. I just need some general direction as to what I should eat, and how much. I'm looking to gain muscle and lose fat. Also, any advice as to why I haven't noticed a 40 pound weight loss when I have such a small frame? Thank you for everything.
-Kayla

SLLRunner

I'm 5'0 and 96 pounds. I'm 21 years old.
I have struggled from bulimia since age 11, jumping backwards and forth from recovery to relapse.
I hit my very hardest relapse in June of this year, and have since lost 40 pounds.. And I can't tell. I know this is common ED behavior, but I'm looking to overcome it. I just need some general direction as to what I should eat, and how much. I'm looking to gain muscle and lose fat. Also, any advice as to why I haven't noticed a 40 pound weight loss when I have such a small frame? Thank you for everything.
-Kayla

Hi Kayla. Welcome. Good for you for talking about your eating disorder. It takes a lot of bravery to admit that truth.

The direction I'm going to give you is to make an appointment with your primary healthcare physician and tell him/her that you need help getting into recovery for your eating disorder. If you've had bulimia since you were eleven, you cannot recover from it just by changing what you eat. You need help in figuring out why you eat and purge.

I was bulimic when I was a young adult after my mother died. I used to make deals with myself to stop myself from bingeing and purging, but it never really worked long term. What worked for me was to do both individual and group counseling specifically for bulimics and to learn why I was doing what I was doing. Once I figured out I was eating to push down the painful feelings, then throwing up to get rid of those same feelings, the urges to binge/purge went away.

That was almost thirty years ago, but I think recovery still applies.

Siansonea

You probably should be eating at maintenance, since you're looking for body composition rather than losing weight. Find out your TDEE, and eat that number of calories each day. If you start losing weight, up your calories. Counting calories is always a good idea, you'll know for a fact that you're eating the appropriate amount of food. What you eat isn't important, but of course nutritious foods will contribute more to your health than junk food. Don't cut out junk food entirely though, you shouldn't look at maintenance as any sort of sustained period of deprivation. You simply have a set number of calories you allow yourself each day. If you go over, you try to make up the overage with a slight deficit either the next day or the day after, but a few extra calories a week isn't going to be a big deal.

You probably don't have much "fat" to lose, so just focus on yoga, strength training, and things of that sort, there's no reason to really do tons of cardio. But whatever you do, don't go overboard.

What's your goal? It should be to be healthy. You could have the "perfect" body by your standard or someone else's, but if you're miserable, it's kind of a waste of effort. Your health and happiness is more important than any dress size or number on a scale.

gigglesinthesun

I'm 5'0 and 96 pounds. I'm 21 years old.
I have struggled from bulimia since age 11, jumping backwards and forth from recovery to relapse.
I hit my very hardest relapse in June of this year, and have since lost 40 pounds.. And I can't tell. I know this is common ED behavior, but I'm looking to overcome it. I just need some general direction as to what I should eat, and how much. I'm looking to gain muscle and lose fat. Also, any advice as to why I haven't noticed a 40 pound weight loss when I have such a small frame? Thank you for everything.
-Kayla

You haven't noticed a 40lbs weight drop, because you have an eating disorder. Until you address this fully, you can lose as much as you want and you won't see the difference. Given the amount of time, I think you are past the point where you can address it yourself. You need to get medical help, if only to run a blood test and see what nutritional deficiencies you have. Find a support group in your area and someone who deals with eating disorders.

And stop trying to lose weight, there will be very little fat on you, in fact what you think is fat, might be just skin.