Starting Diet Pills at a Normal Weight

i'll do anything right now to be thin

Anything? If you're light but look heavy, then lifting weights seems the obvious solution while ditching diet pills because you'll need to eat to build a decent body. You'll end up heavier but look lighter.

You need a new psychiatrist. I can't think of a reasonable reason why to tell someone who is in normal BMI with a history of disordered eating and self image problems to use diet pills or even losing more weight.

That's great that you'll do anything.

How about doing the right thing and making sure it is something that will help you for life?

So you have a normal weight and want to change how you look? That's often called body recomposition. It takes time and effort but you will end up having not only a different look but the ability to do more things and have more energy.

It's exercise and you need to do some sort of resistance training to increase apparent muscle "tone" and muscle mass. By resistance training, I mean exercises that use the muscle in increasing greater levels - you can mountain bike for legs, or body weight train or do gymnastics or use the gym. Weight training is the single most efficient form of resistance training but you should chose something you like and will stick to. If it is weight training, bravo, get to it.

At the same time, you'll need to lose a litte bit of body fat by slowly dieting (easiest way not to lose the muscle you have.)

Now, here is the issue, in general it is difficult to lose fat and gain muscle at the same time because dieting reduces the available amount of material needed to build muscle. A lot of people go through loss/gain cycles called bulking and cutting to do body composition. You can google those.

But, my suggestion, since you are already at normal weight is that you start training now and try to do it at maintenance or at a small calorie deficit (your choice - a deficit will keep you from freaking out as you gain weight from initial muscle mass changes or water retention from exercise increase). Find an exercise program you like. stick to it for at least 6 weeks. Come back to the boards to discuss.

Good luck!

Edit: Oh, yeah - forget the pills - they will absolutely do nothing for body recomposition and have serious risks.

this is disordered thinking,
you dont need pills, sweetness.

Eat a reasonable amount of food, get enough protein, and pick up a barbell...The resistance work will allow you to look better at a higher number.
Body recomposition is exactly the way to go...and will make you strong, AND help prevent osteoporosis.

OH and you get to eat and enjoy life.

*also i did read that you cannot exercise much, but you may be able to do some weight training because it is not aerobic and you can go slowly...ask a doctor.

Your doctor is an *kitten*... a huge *kitten*. What kind of pysch. doctor tells his patient something like that? Yes prednisone will make you puff up but its not a good idea to use diet pills with it b/c prednisone already weakens your immune system b/c it is a steriod. Add diet pills that mess with your body chemistry and it could be a deadly combination. Diet pills shift electrolytes and mess up your metabolism. Be careful messing with your body chemistry, once it is messed up, it takes a long time to get it back to a healthy place.

That's great that you'll do anything.

How about doing the right thing and making sure it is something that will help you for life?

So you have a normal weight and want to change how you look? That's often called body recomposition. It takes time and effort but you will end up having not only a different look but the ability to do more things and have more energy.

It's exercise and you need to do some sort of resistance training to increase apparent muscle "tone" and muscle mass. By resistance training, I mean exercises that use the muscle in increasing greater levels - you can mountain bike for legs, or body weight train or do gymnastics or use the gym. Weight training is the single most efficient form of resistance training but you should chose something you like and will stick to. If it is weight training, bravo, get to it.

At the same time, you'll need to lose a litte bit of body fat by slowly dieting (easiest way not to lose the muscle you have.)

Now, here is the issue, in general it is difficult to lose fat and gain muscle at the same time because dieting reduces the available amount of material needed to build muscle. A lot of people go through loss/gain cycles called bulking and cutting to do body composition. You can google those.

But, my suggestion, since you are already at normal weight is that you start training now and try to do it at maintenance or at a small calorie deficit (your choice - a deficit will keep you from freaking out as you gain weight from initial muscle mass changes or water retention from exercise increase). Find an exercise program you like. stick to it for at least 6 weeks. Come back to the boards to discuss.

Good luck!

Edit: Oh, yeah - forget the pills - they will absolutely do nothing for body recomposition and have serious risks.

OP - please listen to this advice.

Diet pills will not give you the body/look you want. Lifting will - and it will help keep you healthier while you are required to take medications.

Crunches will do very little for you. You can't spot reduce so you'll lose wherever you're predisposed to lose first. Especially when your issue isn't fat at all but is a result of the bloating Pres causes.

My coworker is also in Pres and she can go from normal to looking pregnant throughout the day. Not fun for the self esteem...

I can most definitely sympathize...:(

If you're interested in lifting I highly recommend New Rules of Lifting for Women. I've just finished reading it and I will be starting the author's program next week.

Good luck!

I'd focus on weighted lunges (whether you use a pair of dumbbells or a full suitcase - depends on how strong you are now). Ideally, hit the gym and pick up heavy weights. http://www.wimble.com/irl2/strength-training-for-beginners/

I acknowledge you have a lung condition so you will have to change things accordingly so that you don't suffer from any problems due to lifting with the lung condition. Perhaps take it more slowly? If you join a gym, you can get some advice from a qualified Personal Trainer. You could also ask a physiotherapist who works in a hospital in rehabilitation.

Hi all,

I've had body image issues for a while and yeh as a result end up with some pretty strict dieting! I go on a medication called prednisone for my lung disease a lot and it has awful weight gain/weight distribution effects at high doses and leaves me not wanting to leave the house....then having to go to extremes to get the weight off again. I have lost 8-9kg in September alone.

I saw a psychiatrist a few days ago after being referred by a GP to him- he said to me "your weight is in the normal BMI range for your height- but lets face it- you do look overweight"....which was probably the last thing I needed to hear when i'm so self-conscious.

We agreed that 56kg would be an appropriate weight for me to be at- we started a mood stabilising medication this week and next week he told me he is going to start some diet pills to kill my appetite so I can lose weight easier and feel better about myself.

Has anyone here tried the prescription weight loss medications? - what are your opinions of them and do you think i'm doing the right thing? it was the first time i'd seen the dr and i'm not sure what to think really...but i'll do anything right now to be thin and have confidence to be over the body image issues and be able to try and live my life a bit more normally...

I take Prednisone for Lupus daily and have an injection every two weeks. After a lot of research over the last 5-6 years I have to say that Prednisone does not cause weight gain. What it however causes is increased appetite to which you can react or not. And sadly, myself included, most people react to it and eat more and gain. From my experience I would say that you were probably thinner in the past and have gained but are still within normal range for now. The same thing happened to me . I was 54 kilos, then 58, 63, then became overweight , reached 75 and five years later I was 107 kilos and had to learn/accept that my medication was only partly to blame.
I personally think that taking Prednisone ( which is seven times stronger than normal Cortisone ), a mood stabilizer which are both pretty strong medicines is enough for your system to deal with. I would not add to that a diet pill, which might give you higher BP, make you jittery, cause insomnia etc. I would probably wait until your mood stabilizer works and start what so many people here successfully do,; work with a calorie deficit.
While I usually do not encourage people to eat one way or the other ( natural v. processed food ) as long as a deficit exists, I would do so in your case. It is not so much that you eat either way, but that you avoid or cut out entirely for a while your trigger foods ( which are almost always a fat-sugar-carb combination ) to lessen the craving for them. In the absence of or with diminished cravings you can handle the effects of meds like Prednisone much better and hopefully you will lose and return to your preferred lower weight. I have lost just under 35 pounds since April doing exactly what I described.
I should mention that the distribution of the extra weight has nothing to do with the meds you take, but with your body type. I am an hour glas-pear type and all my weight is distributed around my hips and thigh. At my worst I had a 35" waist and 50" hips. This fortunately has changed a lot with just a 35 pound loss and moderate exercise and I no longer look grotesque....:o).