Food is not the enemy...

sassypoppet
sassypoppet Posts: 23 Member
in Food and Nutrition
Ok - I've been tracking my food for the last two and half weeks.. and it's kinda freaking me out.... let me explain...

My husband passed away over a year ago, and I "therapy" ate.. aka anything that made me feel better and I didn't have to do anything but "open" it, I ate. I've gained almost 50 pounds in a year - was probably around 25 over when it happened. I'm ok with this. Totally ok... but my body is broke.

But, I'm ready to get back into shape...growing up I was an athlete - softball, volleyball, cheered, and did the same in college. After having a child, I settled into a decent walk/light run routine... so my body remembers, and it will be ok with the working out - I'm looking forward to it.

One of the biggest challenges, is that I'm never hungry, ever. This past week I joined the gym and have started weight training, and doing cardio - and I'm exhausted - flat out butt busted tired. I know it's partly due to getting started again, and the rest is all about the food.

I've never had an issue with food - when I started tracking, I set my goal at 1200 calories because going from nothing to eating consistently and "good" food was a major change and I wanted a goal that was attainable. It's amazingly hard for me to get those calories in because of the lack of desire to eat... much less that eating such good valued food and the amount I can eat is overwhelming. An orange does not = a snickers bar.

My trainer that help me set up the FitLinx program (which is awesome btw) said that I should be at least around 1500-1700 calories if I'm going to circuit/cardio 3 days a week and pure cardio the other 3 days, and one day of rest - so I've upped to 1500 without having a mental breakdown that I seem to be bordering on with eating so much food....

This new number has me scared to death - friends have said that I need to go to a nutritionist, but I just don't want to go down that road plus it's expensive. And yes - I know it's not all about the "numbers", but numbers are tangible for me right now and give me a metric that I can use and aim towards...

Does anyone else struggle with this? Ideas on how to work through? Suggestions on good foods that are easy and give me the biggest bang for my no desire to eat buck? I figure that after a month of getting settled and back on the road that I will settle into this and my mind will relax and pleasure in the changes my body is making... I just need ideas to make it over the proverbial hump :)

And apologies if this kinda rambles - at work and typing between "real work" ;)

Sass

Replies

  • melsinct
    melsinct Posts: 3,512 Member
    Can you open up your food diary so we can see what you are currently eating?
  • sassypoppet
    sassypoppet Posts: 23 Member
    yes :) sorry, had no idea it was private :)
  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 10,224 Member
    You've recently been skipping dinner and consuming less that 900 calories total, that will not work. I agree with your trainer, you need to feed your workouts otherwise you'll burnout and burn through your muscle pretty quickly. Your protein intake is also on the low side, which when someone's in a deficit is extremely important, it slows down and can halt muscle catabolism in a deficit, so increase your protein. Look at your dinner as a place to fix your undereating and lack of protein. If you like steak, eat steak, maybe add a few hard boiled eggs for consumption throughtout the day, cheese, yogurt. Think of food as the means to a slimmer and toned body because without it, your going to feel worn out and your body is not going to give up it's fat just because you aren't eating, it hoards it, in defience, and there's nothing you can do about that, we humans have trained our body to do just that over mellenium, your body is smarter than the internet.
  • sassypoppet
    sassypoppet Posts: 23 Member
    Thanks neanderthin - that's exactly what I've started to do... I need easy stuff, and am doing eggs for dinner, and as you stated, steak! Can't go wrong with steak... it isn't that I'm against food, it's fighting the "not hungry" bit coupled with the amount of food I can eat.. it's really weird and just haven't experienced it before.

    Thank you for your comment - I'll get there!
  • carld256
    carld256 Posts: 855 Member
    I did the same "therapy eating" eating after my Mom died. It didn't really kick in until the next Christmas, but once I gave myself permission to eat, I didn't stop until I'd gained 40 pounds. I struggle sometimes with netting too few calories as well. I've ended up having a PB&J at 10pm, just to get some extra calories in for the day.

    It's its own sort of craziness, but you sound like you're headed in the right general direction. Good luck!

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