Are You Eating Enough For Your Fitness Routine?

This question is something I ask myself often because I workout hard six days a week and I wonder am I getting enough fuel for all the hard work I am doing?

My workout partner and I recently met with a personal trainer and he told me I should be ingesting at least 1500 calories a day and some days when I’m at work, I’m just too busy to feed myself and have way less than 1500 a day.

Since college friends and family have told me I don’t eat enough, but I have always had a healthy weight and always eat. To maintain a lean body mass, the average active person needs 87-130 grams of protein every day.

What is the point that someone has an eating disorder? Only eating 500 calories a day? Seeing them self as fat in the mirror?

You can take a test on psychcentral.com to see if you have an eating disorder, I took the “Eating Attitude Test” and scored a seven which 0-19 is unlikely to have an eating disorder. They say in the test that it is not a diagnosis; you should still consult a physicain. After reading through the questions on the test I 100% know completely that I do not have an eating disorder. I answered the questions truthfully and some of them were “do you think about food all the time?” and “have you ever made yourself throw up after eating?” I answered no on both of those questions.

If you aren’t eating enough your body goes into starvation mode and that effects your metabolism, it slows your metabolism down and makes it harder to lose weight. Not eating enough also makes your body store fat and go into emergency mode and breaks down muscle tissue as well.

I completely understand all of this and I also know I eat a lot more when I’m working out and active but I also can never just like eat freely. Bob Harper from The Biggest Loser said “Skinny people go to bed hungry,” so at night instead of eating a dessert which I used to indulge in I have a cup of tea and I see the results when I look at my abs, from replacing a sugary dessert with a cup of tea. This is an example of replacing an unhealthy food with something that won’t affect the body. I am not saying to do this with every meal.

I realize that I must eat more during the day and consume more protein and that is something I am actively working on. If you feel like you have an eating disorder please contact your physician because if you want a healthy body starving yourself is not the way to get it; your body needs food for fuel and energy.