Stuck and Need Advice, Guidance...Anything

Quick background; male, 20, 5ft 11. From 17 suffered an eating disorder which developed into anorexia, with weight dropping to around 112lbs. Got over anorexia, then began obsessive exercising to permit me to eat more… 6 months ago started trying to get over it, and now weigh 153lbs…

I’ve done some thinking and realized today that living life around food isn’t just difficult, it plain sucks. And I’m talking about this in regards to bodybuilding, as well as to having suffered from anorexia. I would give almost anything to simply be able to eat properly so as to fuel my wokouts and satisfy my appetite, but not to obsess over calories and weighing food, not to obsess over doing SO much exercise (which I only do to permit me to eat what I want to,) and to eat foods that I can enjoy eating.

I know people who are in great shape who can manage these things, and if I’m honest I’m incredibly jealous of them. I’ve lost years of my life to a dependence on food and an obsession over exercise, and I still don’t think I’m going to be able to stop, regardless of how much I want to. Today I had my typical routine planned, but once I woke up I just went back to sleep- this is the second time this week I’ve done this.

I just want a day of doing absolutely nothing; literally, nothing. Yet the thing that stops me from doing this is my appetite, because I’ll want to eat more than my body requires for such a ‘lazy day’. Hell, I ate 5500 calories yesterday and woke up hungry in the night. I don’t honestly know what my body requires on a day like this because I’m so used to giving it so much on every other day when I’m so active, because I KNOW what it requires then.

So, if I’m honest, on these sort of days, I don’t know how much to eat, so resort to barely eating at all… And if I did get into a routine of eating in that way that I wanted, I would have no idea how much to eat then either. I don’t want to give up with my weightlifting, but I’m really struggling here as to what to do. Anybody help me out?

Well, there’s the flip side idea, of embracing the obsessive nature of an eating disorder. calculate a mainteance calorie intake for your day. And then eat exactly to that level. On workout days, calculate a higher maintenance level, and eat exactly that.

This is what any bodybuilder would do who’s strict about their diet. Personally, I have a harder time hitting maintenance exactly. I tend to under or overshoot.

But this is mainly in your head. You don’t want to eat uncontrollably, you don’t want to do cardio uncontrollably. If you do pig out, you need to strategically structure it so it’s a “bulk” or a “refeed”.

You need to see a psychiatrist immediately.

This sounds like a problem for a psychologist rather than some joe’s on a forum. you seem way too obsessive over calories and your diet in general. I guess that could be a good thing for a bodybuilder though

[quote]TD54 wrote:
I guess that could be a good thing for a bodybuilder though[/quote]

The point of view in the OP is NOT a good thing for anyone, much less a bodybuilder.

Bodybuilding is about perfection, not obsession.