Posts by 42dnevncmus

If it helps you, that's great.

By the way, 42dnevncmus stnads for the latin motto Fortudine Vincimus (By Endurance, We Conquer).

I think you hit the nail on the head saying your dealing with a lot right now as a new Army wife. I know some of what you're going through as my cousin, who is also my best friend, served 3 tours in Iraq, and I was so stressed and terrified for him that I could barely eat or sleep, had constant nightmares when I did sleepand, and ended up with depression.

Extreme stress can cause the stomach to become very nauseous and even stop digesting food properly. The stomach literally tenses up like a cramping muscle. One suggestion I heard is to drink a sip of hot water in between bites of food. The hot water helps calm and relax the stomach.

Of course eating foods that are easy on the stomach and easy to digest, as well as eating smaller meals more often, will help, but the key is to start dealing with the stress. Do whatever relaxes you. Take deep breaths, listen to soothing music, get out in nature or get a massage, find a hobby that relaxes you... anything you feel will help you with your stress.

I know how you feel - I have extreme stress-related nausea, which has caused me to occasionally vomit food and water back up. I find that I can eat better in restaurants, because the atmosphere is soothing, the food appetizing, and if tend to forget about my soldier and the war and the other stresses in my life. Of course restaurants are only money-permitting, but if you can create a soothing atmosphere around meals at home - candles, music, whatever helps, it could be worth a try. See what works. I wish you the best...

I'm in the middle of the 'recovery seems insurmountable' mode, as a matter of fact I'm in quite a slump, but sometimes reminding myself of my future goals helps. For example, I want to be able to rock climb again, and just thinking about the joy of being on the wall, the freedom of challenging gravity, the pureness of the effort and the dance with the wall, the happiness of being strong and fit and healthy and able, makes me yearn for it so much that I can then eat that next mouthful of food because it brings me one step closer to my dreams and goals.

Walking is good for your digestive system and will help you absorb food better, as well as it is good for your mind and your muscles as well. But only if you make sure you know how many calories you've burned off walking and then replace those calories as soon as possible, or you will be counter-acting your efforts at gaining. And don't get fanatical about walking either - you don't need to power walk and work up a sweat and keep going until you feel sick. Just gentle walking, short distances, and as soon as you feel like you need to stop, then do so. Don't push yourself.

But jogging, in your present condition? No. Your heart probably isn't in the best condition right now and spiking your heart rate could be dangerous. Also, your bones might be brittle and jogging could cause stress fractures. Any serious exercises can be damaging when ones muscles are in a state of severe atrophy. Remember - gentle, gentle, gentle. And jogging is probably far too much of a calorie burner right now.

Are you under the care of doctors, nutritionists, anybody? If they're familiar with ED, they should be able to tell you which exercises are healthy and not healthy for your recovery right now. And if they tell you NO exercise, listen.

Your Dad most likely does not think you're fat, he just doesn't have ED and isn't in the low physical state you are in right now, so he is thinking from a healthy person's perspective on exercise - it's drilled into everyone that exercise is healthy and necessary, the more the better. This may be true if you are healthy physically and at a good BMI, but right now what is light/moderate exercise for a healthy person could be detrimental to you right now. He's just trying to make sure that you're doing healthy things, because he wants you to be healthy, but he needs to know that what is okay for him or others to do exercise-wise is not okay yet for you. However, getting healthy enough to be able to go jogging can be a goal, but you're a far ways from that yet so just concentrate on getting enough calories and good nutrition. 

Soups - yes, I should do more of that. I'm not a big lentil fan, but maybe I'll try out some of your soup recipes anyway, could you post the recipes? Thanks so much.

That amount of weight loss in that short of a period is dangerous. You should check out the weight gain forum on this website, there are a lot of people on it who are recovering from eating disorders (anorexia nervosa, bulimia) who I think you'd find it very helpful to talk to. They can tell you how they began to recover, to change their mindset, and can warn you about the extreme dangers of purging etc.

500 calories per day is deathly low. You should never ever go below 1200 calories, and you probably need in excess of 2000 calories per day just to maintain healthy body function. As you purge and force yourself to lose weight through unnatural means, a downward spiral begins. You can damage your hands, and the back of your teeth, your throat, and your mouth, by forcing yourself to constantly vomit, because of the stomach acid you bring up. You begin to dehydrate yourself, and deplete yourself of electrolytes, which in turn eventually causes heart problems. You may eventually stop your period and can cause yourself to become infertile. You can cause calcium and other minerals to deplete from your bones, giving yourself premature osteoporosis, causing your bones to become brittle and thin and easily breakable. Your hair may begin falling out, your muscles become so atrophied you start collapsing... It's horrible.

Binging after you purge will not help your body or your mental frame of mind either. What you need to do is gradually increase your nutrient intake to normal levels. If eating makes you sick, have a few sips or spoonfuls, wait ten minutes, and have some more. Same with water. Do it all day, every day, gradually increasing amounts until your stomach can handle the food again. Your nausea may be caused by your self-starvation measures or may be psychological, but you should probably get checked by a doctor anyway to make sure there is no other underlying problem.

You need to find help, it's too bad you've been ignored. Like I said, check out the weight gain forum and talk to some people who are recovering/have recovered from anorexia nervosa and/or bulimia. They are very helpful. There are healthy ways to maintain a healthy wait - fasting, dieting, and purging are not among them.

Eating healthy non-processed foods, getting enough water, enough exercise, and maybe getting a colon cleanse are much better avenues to health and fitness than starving yourself and purging, which is a hellish path. Don't beat yourself up for what you do either, this is unhelpful to your state of mind. Just focus each day on recovering, increment by increment. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. May today be better than yesterday, and tomorrow better than today.

Thanks all for letting me know I should remove the post. As my weight loss is the result of being unable to chew because of a facial injury, I had no idea that this post would be triggering to people with ED. But I can definitely understand how it would be, and I'm sorry for not realizing that before posting. Thanks for making sure it wan't on the forum for too long. -42dneVncmus

I wish I had suggestions - just want to let you know I know what it's like. Eating makes me extremely nauseated, and sometimes I vomit. I also have diarhea because of Irritable Bowel Syndrome. I keep losing weight. Hopefully for both of us the doctors will help us find out what's wrong and get things under control, so that even if we're not gaining anything for a little while, we can at least maintain weight. I wish you the best. Try protein drinks mixed with water if you can handle it... Baby pablum also works sometimes for people who can't even keep crackers down. Just plain rice pablum is the best. It won't help you gain wait and probably won't even stop you from losing but at least you might be able to keep it down. Keep your electrolytes up too, since vomiting and diarrhea can dehydrate you.

I have IBS with constant nausea, and a facial injury that causes me not to be able to chew, and the combination has made me lose 21 lbs. I'm 5'4" and now weigh 101 lbs. I just lost 6 pounds in the past week, because I've been too nauseated to eat.

I haven't found anything that works yet but just want you to know yes there are other people going through this who understand what you're going through. High-calorie gainer powders from supplement/bodybuilding stores are good, 600 calories/scoop.

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers, that's so encouraging for a stranger to be so kind... and yes, you're right, eating high calorie 'unhealthy foods' right now is probably better for me in the short time than losing more weight.

Thanks for your reply.

I'm having the same problem - I was just diagnosed with IBS (after a year of agony) and I'm in the quandery of trying to avoid trigger foods while trying to get enough calories. Right now I'm willing to eat trigger foods just because I'm losing weight so fast (another six lbs lost this week, I'm down to 101 now, and was 122 originally) and I think that's an even bigger concern than my IBS. But the tough part is my nausea is making it so hard to eat anything. If I keep eating and try to push past the nausea I just throw my food back up.

I'm so sad to hear all these medical professionals are treating you like an ED case and ignoring the real problem! Luckily I have a really good doctor. And he knows I can't chew (severe TMJ/+facial injury) so he knows that's one of the primary cause of my weight loss. But the nausea is getting to be an even bigger problem for me than the lack of chewing ability.

I used to be a huge eater (I was formerly a bodybuilder), so if I didn't have nausea and IBS, I'd easily be able to get enough calories with protein shakes. But I almost throw everything up after more than three swallows.

Hope you find good help. If you can handle it, high calorie gainer powders for bodybuilders are a good way to get calories. I have a powder (which I can't handle) that when mixed with a glass of milk is 900 calories! If it didn't make me so nauseus I could drink it. But of you can handle it definitely try to find a powder like that. Go to supplement stores for bodybuilders, they'll usually have some type of 'gainer' powder.