5'0 & gaining?

Just wondering if there are any people on the board with similar stats as me as everyone on here seems to be about 15-20 and very tall.  Im 20, about 85 lbs and 5'0. Would just be interested in knowing someone with a similar goal of gaining who is like me on the shorter side.  I know everyone is different but do you think that being on the shorter side makes a difference in the amount of calories I should be consuming to gain weight.  right now Ive been consuming roughly 2,000/day and it seems like it goes straight to my stomach.  I really do not want to fall into a phase of relapse but all of the weight seems to be residing in my stomach and not distributing much at all and I cant seem to shake the thoughts of just becoming a short and fat blob.  Anyone relate?

Don’t stress! It is fairy common for the weight to look out of proportion at first, and the weight re - distributes for a lot of people eventually!

It is not going to feel comfortable gaining weight so just push through it and ignore the not so nice feelings, it is definitely worth it in the end!

I tend to carry most of my weight in my stomach and breasts and my weight evened out after I gained to a healthy weight

There are some great abdominal exercises you can do that will make you feel much better about your mid section - I’m a personal trainer and I have some great exercises that target the deep abdominal muscles that I can send you if you like.

I swear by them, I only do a little each day and it makes a difference!

Thanks for the advice, you are so right...def. have some not so nice feelings & thoughts going through my mind.  I would love it if you could send me the adominal exercises that you do!

hi

I have similar stats to you. I`m  24 years old, female, recovering from anorexia/bulimia and currently weight 94 pounds at  5'0. I gained about 12 pounds since i started recovery on 1st September and have been gaining on around 2000-2100 calorie/day with little exercise.

I also have the same problem as you, most of the weight that i have gained is in my stomach, but my butt and thighs seem to be catching on, but my boobs have yet to get any

personaltrainer87, if you have any exercises that can help with my stomach issue, please send it to me as well

Stomach exercises will not help you. When you're recovering from anorexia and underweight status your body will first naturally distribute to the abdominal area before evening out. And yes, it does even out. You just have to have this thing called patience.

You also need to be eating at least 2500 calories a day if you're sedentary and more than that if you exercise. For advice on this please take a look at The Aim is to Gain: Advice on Weight Gain, Whatever Your Reason.

You do not need less calories to gain just because you are shorter. It doesn't apply to weight gainers. 

If your body is storing all your weight around your mid section then you are not going to be able to get VISABLE results until your weight evens out, but there are just as many other benefits to strengthening your mid section the then how it looks physically.

After I gained weight from anorexia I started to strengthen my mid section and it has made me feel a lot better about my self, I can hold myself with more ease NOT SO MUCH due to the physical aspects, but because once I put effort into it I just felt more comfortable

If you feel uneasy about all the weight accumulating in that one area then it will probably make you FEEL better if you did something that felt proactive, rather then just do nothing.; and remember you CAN get the physical results eventually, you just have to be patient and wait until your body weight evens out!

Another GREAT THING YOU SHOULD ALL DO that many other people on this site have mentioned in other threads, is to PULL YOUR BELLY BUTTON IN towards your spine while standing, just like you are trying to squeeze into a pair of tight jeans! This contracts the abdominal muscles and will also help strengthen them, and you can do it any time any where!

I’ll send you both some exercises that will strengthen the area so at least you know you are doing something good for your self that will benefit your body, the physical results will come later!

I hope your weight evens out eventually, mine did after I recovered but I do not know what it is like for other people!

Well I am similar to you in weight and height but I am 29 years old and have never had an eating disorder just a very tiny small frame. I weighed 85 lbs. all the way until I was almost 28 and then gained up to my current weight of 90-92 lbs.

I am not sure what kind of body frame you have but 85 lbs. is tiny....I know and I hated it all my life. Also I have no medical issues. I made sure to have a good doctor check me out to make sure I was healthy.

I have tried to gain only for vanity reasons because I don't like being so little. It is very hard because I am naturally this tiny and what I gain will probably just be fat and will not be healthy for me.

I don't have any great advice for you like the others. I just eat a lot and very healthy foods and get a little excersice which helped me gain where I am now.

Thanks personaltrainer87 soo much. I will start with abdominal exercises to help out with my midsection problem. Also, I was just diagnosed with PCOS, so that could explain why i have been gaining steadily on 2000-2100 cal/day, and why it went direct to my stomach

Oh dear - PCOS is bloody unfair, it can make it more difficult for sufferers then it is for others to lose weight and easier for you to gain weight. It CAN, but doesn’t affect every one as badly.

I might have PCOS too, I am not sure, I had symptoms but my hormones were messed up for other reasons so I am going to find out next year by doing the tests and etc.

PCOS is also known for causing the weight to store around the mid section. You cannot alter your hormones, some medications can help people with the disorder but your doctor will need to tell you all the information about that! Maybe there are some medications that can help balance the hormones so the weight is not encouraged to me stored around your stomach as much

Go to GOOGLE and look up “ planks” or “ prone brace” these are great abdominal exercises that work the deep abdominal muscles.

HI, I'm a small frame too. I'm 5'1, 23 years old and 95 lbs, my lowest weight has been 85 and my goal weight is 105lb. It seems like an impossible goal, I try to eat, but I just feel really full all day. I don't like that feeling, but I guess we gotta do what we gotta do. I think we can do it! :)

Thanks personaltrainer87 for being so understanding and for the excersises... My doctor gave me a herbal medicine to help with insulin resistance, which may help me after hormone replacement pills failed to help with the PCOS.

And if you are worried about PCOS, it can be diagonsed with ultrasound as well as hormone tests. My doctor did the ultrasound and showed me the pystics on the screen, and boy they were huge!

But the best way for you is not worry, because some of what you are experiencing might be just caused by hormonal imbalances, and not PCOS

Thanks for the information, I had an ultra sound scan for another reason and there were a few cysts in my ovaries, they were not huge though and I did not have heaps of them.

I also had acne and 1 or 2 facial hairs at the time.

My hormones became unbalanced when I went from starving myself, to eating normally again; at the same time, I went off the pill after YEARS of being on it

Going off the pill after being on it for years AND gaining weight after starving your body can BOTH affect hormones, and the doctor assumed that because I had physical symptoms as well as the cysts on my ovaries, that I had PCOS.

I am not convinced that my hormones were “ naturally” out of balanced, I think they could have become that way because of what I put my body through

I have read that a lot of women have cysts on their ovaries WITHOUT having PCOS so MAYBE I just had the cysts and the hormonal problems developed because of the other valid reasons.

The fact I messed with my body through anorexia and then going off the pill TRIGGERED PCOS. Once it is triggered, I STILL think I can basically cure it, even though they say it cannot be cured.

i am 5 feet as well, although my low weight was 80 pounds and im 14 years old and in under a month, im up to 95 pounds, its puzzling but my body needs food to recover and im going to give it LOTS!   I'm eating a diet of 3000 calories/sedentary and most of the weight i'm gaining is also going to my stomach.............hopefully it evens out for us nicely.   Trust your body.

Wow, I didn't realize how many people on here had the same stats as me.  I though that everyone was much taller because I guess that most of the frequent posters are actually around the average height.  I too am 5'0 and I am 24 years old.  My low weight was 83lbs and I am currently at 89.  I am trying to push myself each day, but it is very hard and uncomfortable.  It seems like I gain weight really quickly though, and it is very frightening. I also notice that my stomach is constantly bloated and large looking.  It is really hard to keep eating when this happens, but I am trying to listen to everyone say that it will redistribute.  It is just frustrating because I thought that everyone else on here had so much more space for all this to redistribute considering i hadn't seen very many shorter people.  I definitely understand your fears of pushing because I have not yet gotten above 2000 calories a day even though I know that this is doing more harm than good.  Prior to my ED, I always had a large stomach.  I never ate a very healthy diet, so learning to eat healthy is also very challenging for me.  Good luck in your gains and keep pushing because we all deserve a better life.

Does anyone know about how long it takes to distribute? I'm almost 10 lbs less than pre-ED but I look exactly the same due to poor distribution.