How to gain weight when underweight

Many look at people desperately fighting for every kilogram gained with obvious surprise. Is it possible to want to get fat when everyone around only thinks about losing weight? Being underweight can be no less of a problem than being overweight or obese. It carries a hidden or already obvious threat to life and health.

Nutritionists and nutrition consultants know how difficult it is sometimes to persuade a client to get even a little better and how difficult it can be to gain weight in the conditions of a habitual diet and lack of proper motivation. Today, experts talk about why there is a lack of body weight and what nutrition should be to get rid of thinness.

Where does underweight come from?

This problem can have several different causes or a combination of them. So, weight loss is most often found when:

• Malnutrition, when its calorie content is below the basic needs of the body (small portions, only low-calorie foods, rare meals, for example, only two times a day);
• poor absorption of nutrients by the body (most often the result of certain metabolic problems and diseases);
• lack of a healthy appetite (decreased reaction of the center of hunger, lack of hormones responsible for the desire to eat, post-morbid or painful condition);
• eating disorders (EDD) such as anorexia, orthorexia, and selective disorders;
• hormonal disorders;
• prolonged fasting and frequent fasting days;
• Serious illnesses.

Before prescribing examinations and tests to a client, just talk to him about his diet. Find out what he eats, when, and how often. You can ask him to keep a weekly food and physical activity diary to see the whole picture.

If a person complains of poor appetite, try to understand what caused it: a deliberate restriction of nutrition or possible health problems. This is especially important in the case of underweight children or adolescents, who often do not admit that they do not want to eat at all and can hide the real volumes of their diet.

In cases where the client is simply malnourished and provided that he does not have an eating disorder or other mental disorders, weight gain is most often achieved by simply creating a daily surplus of calories. This will work for people who don’t have the major health issues that caused the thinness in the first place.

However, you may be dealing with vegans, raw foodists, and other restrictive dieters, as well as with clients who have primary symptoms of eating disorders. Working with them will be long and multifaceted.

Vegetarians must develop a sufficiently high-calorie diet, considering their food preferences and principles. Still, correcting eating disorders will, by and large, take place in the plane of psychotherapy.

There is another interesting category of clients – professional athletes and dancers, such as gymnasts and ballerinas, who are forbidden to gain weight above a certain norm. Long-term strict dietary restrictions and grueling workouts lead to a person’s weight becoming noticeably lower than adequate indicators.

Psychologists also often have to be involved in weight correction in athletes since their eating behavior can be based on deliberate dietary restrictions. If you do not intervene in time, such a position in the long term leads to the development of anorexia or bulimia.

How to understand that a person is underweight

Here you can use the usual body mass index (BMI) assessment. The following formula is used to calculate it:

BMI = weight (kg) / (height in meters)²

Thus, if the girl’s height is 175 cm and her weight is 55 kg, her BMI will be 55 / (1.75 × 1.75) = 18.3. Note that for women, underweight is stated if the BMI is less than 19; for men – if the BMI is below 20.

To assess the weight of children, the body mass index is not used; here, you need to use special centile tables in which the analysis is carried out depending on the sex and age of the child. However, remember that all children are different; each has its complexion and physiology.

Therefore, pay attention to the child’s height when checking weight norms. In some cases, the conditional deficiency of body weight in children is associated only with their growth not reaching the age norms. If a child is lower than he should be at his age, then his weight will also not correspond to age norms.

In this case, you need to correlate the height and weight parameters. If the ratio does not deviate from the norm (even if it is at the lower limit), then there is no reason to state a lack of body weight in a child.

Underweight with a normal diet

It also happens that the client’s diet is quite high in calories, he has no problems with appetite and eating disorders, but at the same time, his weight is below normal. Then you should look for the cause in a state of health.

Here is a list of diseases that can potentially lead to being underweight:

• hyperthyroidism and other problems in the production of thyroid hormones;
• Type 2 diabetes mellitus (in some cases, instead of weight gain, it leads to its rapid decrease);
• Severe stress and prolonged depression, when the nervous system is depressed;
• tuberculosis;
• long-term infectious and inflammatory diseases;
• celiac disease (gluten enteropathy or severe gluten intolerance);
• oncological diseases;
• chronic intestinal infections;
• diseases of the digestive tract, including the insufficient enzymatic activity of the pancreas and under digestion of food;
• Helminthiasis (in other words, worms).

However, without appropriate tests and examinations, it is impossible to say exactly what could cause a decrease in weight and appetite. So advise your clients to go through the following:

1. Ultrasound of the thyroid gland and consultation with an endocrinologist.
2. Ultrasound of the abdominal organs and consultation with a gastroenterologist.
3. Fluorography or X-ray of the lungs and consultation with a family doctor or phthisiatrician.
4. Pass a general and biochemical blood test and blood for thyroid hormones, gluten tolerance, and worms.
5. Make a tumor marker.
6. Capprogram and analysis for intestinal dysbacteriosis.
7. Electroencephalogram and consultation with a neurologist.
8. Consultation with a psychologist or psychiatrist.

If certain diseases are identified, the client will have to start treating them. Otherwise, without removing the cause of weight loss, gaining extra pounds can be very difficult. And yet, underweight people need to adjust their diet anyway.

Underweight: Consequences

Low weight is just as dangerous to health as obesity. Here is just a small list of what awaits a person if he does not normalize body weight in time:

• hypovitaminosis due to a sharp lack of nutrients and nutrients;
• a decrease in general immunity and the associated tendency to infectious diseases with a severe course and complications;
• difficulties in the treatment of diseases due to the weakness of the body and lack of energy resources for the work of the immune system and recovery processes;
• omission of internal organs due to a lack of fat and muscle mass in the body;
• violation of the menstrual cycle in women and the development of infertility in both sexes;
• serious hormonal disorders with all the ensuing consequences;
• prolonged depression, up to the appearance of suicidal thoughts;
• dizziness, weakness, loss of consciousness, hypotension (low blood pressure);
• Lack of strength to move, which will force you to lead a completely recumbent lifestyle;
• neurological and mental disorders, including paralysis of the limbs, convulsions, and coma;
• An extreme form of dystrophy with a possibly fatal outcome.

After such a list, it becomes clear why you need to quickly eliminate the lack of body weight. The best way to do this is with a well-balanced diet.

Nutrition with a lack of body weight

A nutritionist should first calculate a daily calorie requirement (DCA) based on the ideal weight for a particular client. It is possible to calculate the SEC for real weight, taking into account the basic metabolism, physical activity, sex, and age of a person. Still, another 15-20% or 300-500 kcal must be added to the obtained value.

A small hyper-calorie diet will allow the client to gain weight smoothly and safely for health. With a strong mass deficiency, you can temporarily increase your calorie intake by 700-1000 kcal. After normalizing body weight, you should switch to a diet that corresponds to the value of the SEC.

For proper weight gain, the emphasis on nutrition will have to be on proteins. The client must consume 1.5-2 g of protein per day for every kilogram of ideal weight. Due to the sufficient use of proteins in combination with adequate physical activity, its mass will increase due to fat and muscle.

You can get high-quality protein from lean meat, poultry, fish, seafood, eggs, dairy and sour milk products, cheeses, legumes, and nuts. Whey isolate is allowed as an additional source of protein.

From carbohydrate foods, preference should be given to complex carbohydrates: whole grain cereals, pasta, bread, vegetables, and fruits. They will give a better weight gain and will not lead to sharp jumps in blood glucose levels, as with simple carbohydrates.

The idea that thin people need to eat more fatty foods is wrong. It is important to strike the right balance between saturated and healthy fats so that the client does not increase the level of bad cholesterol in the blood.

In addition, it will be useful to add high-quality vitamin and mineral complexes, omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, and lecithin to the diet.

And, of course, you should not try to increase the weight with brewer’s yeast – these are relics of the past that have not justified themselves in terms of safety and rationality of use.

The main bet should be on the right balanced diet and not just on calories. Otherwise, the weight will increase only due to fat accumulation, which will not add beauty to the figure and, for sure, will cause problems with well-being and health.

As for eating habits, here you need to adhere to the following principles:

• Practice fractional nutrition 5-6 times a day (3 main meals and two snacks) – this will allow you to maintain the desired caloric content of the diet without overloading the pancreas.
• There are large deep plates in which even weighty portions will seem insignificant.
• Drink a lot of purified non-carbonated water (30-40 ml per kg of body weight), but not before or during meals.
• Gradually increase the caloric intake and portion size so as not to cause problems with the digestive tract.
• Use nutritional supplements with levocarnitine to stimulate appetite and improve mass muscle growth.

In addition, do not forget about physical activity. They help muscle growth and proper weight gain. Advise the client to focus not on cardio training but strength training. Moreover, sport improves appetite, especially when it comes to swimming, after which you almost always want to eat.

However, be prepared because the client will not be motivated to increase his weight. This problem is usually characteristic of people with eating disorders, professional athletes, vegans, and raw foodists, in cases of prolonged depression or severe stress.

The following materials will definitely tell you how to deal with such clients and what a nutritionist needs to do to make a person want to get better.

If you don’t want to wait, then today, you can choose the online course you like at the nutrition school at the Wellness Consulting Academy and close all the gaps in your knowledge. Pay attention to the course “Eating Disorders” – it discusses in detail the mechanism of weight loss in eating disorders and provides valuable recommendations for the psychotherapy of such clients. Good luck, and achieve the desired results!

We need to know your opinion about the topic you have just read. Be sure to share with us in the comments if you had underweight clients and how did you manage them?