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I am a 22 year old guy and weigh only 120. I think I am suffering from some kind of disease because I have been skinny all my life and just find myself eating. Only thing I want badly is to be at an healthy weight and it seems so hard to make my brain do it. I feel so sad and depressed that I am not being able to achieve this thing in a world where majority are overweight. I am a vegetarian and it iss definitely not helping but I want to stay vegetarian. What are some ways to motivate myself and force my brain to start consuming more food. Any help pointers insights and suggestions are appreciated. Thanks.

Answers (2):

Answer 1:

Your height would be helpful to determine if you are at a healthy weight. Beyond that here is the advice I can offer.

Don’t wait until your hungry to eat. Schedule your meals. Either three meals and 4 or 5 snacks or 6 mini meals and 2 or 3 snacks. I’m not sure of the specifications of how many times a day you’re supposed to eat so that’s just a guess. But definitely schedule your mealtimes and always eat at those times. This will help your body get used to being hungry more often, and once you start recognizing your hunger you won’t need the schedule as much.

Don’t overeat when you do eat. That will just mess you up more. Pay attention to when your body is telling you that you’re hungry and telling you when you’re full. Remember that it takes 20 minutes for your body to tell you you’re full after you have been for 20 minutes.

Drink ensuree (I don’t know if it’s a vegetarian thing or not), eat higher calorie food that is still nutrious (i.e. chips are not a good choice as there are very little nutrients in them).

Get yourself a few vegetarian cookbooks. Do a search for vegetarian recipes and the vegetarian lifestyle. You could even do a search for gaining weight on a vegetarian diet.

Eat a lot of protein it will help you build muscle. Beans and rice are the only thing I can think of atm that are a complete protein. Start a workout program. Remember that muscle weighs more than fat so if you have well developed (not necessarily body builder developed) muscles that should help even if you do still look skinny, you’ll weigh more.

Don’t stress about being 120, well depending on your height I guess you could stress. Do a search for a BMI chart, that can give you an idea if your weight is healthy for your height. If you take care of yourself and you’re healthy it should be alright to be 120. If you think there may be a disease you are suffering from go see your doctor, have them run blood tests, diabetes, cholestorol and a basic vitamin assesment (I’m not sure what all the tests are but your doctor should know.)

I had a friend who had a really high metabolism and it was just the way he was born. He wasn’t sick or anything he was just skinny. It was harder for him to gain weight but he was still able to do it. Some ppl are just born that way.

You don’t want to eat too much or be afraid to eat because you aren’t sure you’re eating the wrong thing either. You could check with a nutritionist who specializes in vegetarian food. They would definitely have advice on what types of food to eat in order to gain weight, and they’d be able to tell you if you are at a healthy weight or not.

Answer 2:

Like you pointed out, this is very different than the majority of western civilization who has to pry themselves from thinking about food. Okay, the most critical thing is that you don’t accidentally start to eat too much or start getting on the path that a lot of people are on, where they just eat and eat and eat…even subconsciously. I would suggest that you start eating foods that are high in protein. And because a lot of protein comes from meats, and you are a vegetarian, try buying the protein drinks or mixes. Also eat things that will combine in your stomach to make proteins. Here, read this:

PLANT FOOD PROTEIN COMBINATIONS
To make a complete protein source and obtain all the essential amino acids certain plant foods need to be eaten together in one meal or at least a balance during the day. There are different combinations of plant foods that can be selected so you can choose which foods you prefer. The diagram below shows how to successfully combine plant proteins.

GROUP #1
“Breads, Cereals, Grains”
Bread, Rice, Wholewheat products & Wholegrain cereals
these include: breakfast cereal, pasta, spaghetti, noodles, wheat products, flour products, etc.

Any item from group # 1 above to be combined with any item from the three groups below.

Group # 2
“Legumes”
Peas, Beans
& Lentils:including all dried beans & peas – aduki, kidney, runner, soya, chick peas, mushy peas, processed peas, baked beans, petit pois, beansprouts

Group # 3
“Vegetables”
Potatoes &
other Vegetables: including frozen vegetables

Group # 4
Nuts & Seed
Walnuts, Cashews, Peanuts, etc Sunflower, Sesame & other seeds

Adding more protein and lifting weights should help you gain weight in a healthy manner. Good luck!