What Happens If You Eat Less Than 1,200 Calories A Day And Workout?
Do you lose fat or muscle or both? What happens if you lose muscle, does it come back? Do you gain the weight back really fast if you lose any? I know that is alot of questions and I was just wondering because lately that’s what I’ve been doing? NOt purposely, but I had been taking meds for the last week for twice a day and it said that one of the side effects was lost of appetite. So I wasn’t really eating too much while I was taking it, and I did try to eat more, but that only made me feel sick. But now I am done taking the medicine and I still can’t eat that much anymore and I am getting in less than 1,200 calories in, even though I try to eat more so my body doesn’t think it’s starving, and I am drinking 8 or more glasses of water a day.I am also exercising.And I eat small meals every 2-3 hours or whenever I get hungry.
Can someone please tell me what can happen and what are the health risk and some ways I can fix this.I tried eating bigger meals also, but it doesn’t work. Advice?
September 22nd, 2009 at 7:42 pm
You will lose both fat and muscle. You will also find that you are less able to work out than you were before. It is better not to work out if you can’t eat as much as you should so you can conserve energy for stuff that is important (like brain function).
If you can’t eat that much, try to eat high calorie foods. Instead of a salad for one of your meals eat a fast food burger or something. It is important to stay within a normal range of calorie intake (especially if you are just getting over some type of illness). Also, make sure to take a multi-vitamin to give you what your food isn’t.
September 22nd, 2009 at 11:45 pm
The body absolutely must convert something into energy, or life processes will cease.
It will generally always take the easiest way out. First, it will burn sugar, then carbohydrates, then fat, then protein (muscle), regardless of how much you exercise. Starving people in Nazi death camps or Japanese POWs were worked very hard and did not retain muscle mass for long, once the others were burned off.
Water has no calories, so it won’t help you much. This is why people who work out like whey protein. It helps build muscle, without introducing a lot of carbos and sugars and fats that will just result in more useless stored energy (fat) hanging around their bodies. And keep the vitamins and veggies going. Your body needs these whether your meds are letting you feel hungry for them or not. And as for the meds, make sure you’re under a doctor’s guidance…
September 23rd, 2009 at 3:40 am
you lose the fat and you gain muscle
you can’t lose muscle if you work out
September 23rd, 2009 at 7:21 am
you never loose musle. You will loose fat. The only way to loose muscle is if you become inactive for a long time.
September 23rd, 2009 at 8:39 am
You will probably lose weight. You are drinking too much water; substitute Coca-Cola (not diet!) or other beverages for some of it.
September 23rd, 2009 at 9:59 am
You will always lose muscle first, and a tiny bit of fat, when you eat less then what your body needs each day and are exercising. 1,200 calories isn’t for everyone. It depends upon your height and bone structure. Say you have small bones, but you are 5′6” and exercising 20 minutes a day. Then eating $1,200 calories will mean that your body has about 7 to 9 hundred calories to use as energy and for most people of that height and bone structure, it wouldn’t be enough. The 1,200 calories is for someone who isn’t exercising and isn’t doing a lot of other physical activity.
Talking to a diatician could help you find out exactly what you need to eat each day, types of foods, how much, and how much exercise you need to lose weight or to maintain if they say you are already your ideal weight.
As a former Anorexic, allow me to caution you and any other person DIETING. You noticed the word DIE in there don’t you? It’s becuase dieting causes our bodies to store fat, it’s hard on the bones, it seldom burns up fat effectively and it causes the body to burn up muscle for energy. Dieting affects in a negative way almost every organ of your body. You want to creat more lean muscles, not take away.
If you are over weight, changing how you eat and exercise is more helpful then going on some diet. You’ll lose weight by eating better foods, frequently throughout the day and exercising.
You usually gain back all the weight, plus five pounds, when you diet. Diet is a failing path, learning how to eat well and what will burn calories is the best method. At least half of the people who are fifty pounds or more over weight have dieted repeatedly and they are not weak. In fact it’s the dieting that has cuased them to get bigger and bigger and bigger. Most fat people eat less then people their same age and height, but they remain fat, because all the dieting has taught their body to store calories instead of burning them, that is what dieting does.
You’re stomach shrunk when you couldn’t eat as much. So it no longer will hold as much. If you are your ideal weight, just eat small meals throughout the day and you’ll be fine. If you are over weight, eating small meals actually will help you to lose weight, because the body gets the food it needs to burn for fuel, so it stops storing it all for when you don’t feed it.
If you are really eating and not just salads, then you are giving your body what it needs. Eat balanced foods. A good book on balanced eating, burning calories, in a healthy way, one I’d recommend. Is called FLIP the SWITCH by Robert K. Cooper. PHD. His book will teach you how we use food, how to have a metabolism that runs high so you can eat more and still maintain or even lose weight if needed.
A way to get more healthy calories is through nuts and dried fruits. Eating them together is a great snack. WHY? Because nuts give us a healthy protien and carb, and dried fruit will give you a healthy sugar and fiber. By balancing out carbs, other sugars and protien your body Glucose levels will stay normalized. This is important to health and energy. Also you’ll get some calories your body can use, instead of empty calories.
If you are drinking a lot of pop or other drinks, in addition to those eight glasses of water, there is part of the problem. Eight glasses of water is your total LIQUID requirement for the day, so if you have other drinks, you are filling up on liquid, so of course you won’t be able to eat more food. If you have a glass of milk, you subtract that from your eight glasses of water a day. If you want to drink eight glasses of water per day, which is the best way to fulfill you’re liquid requirements, then you won’t need other drinks or you will fill up on that instead of the food you should be eating.
GOOD LUCK, hope some of what I have said can help.