Recently I had my 25 year old
cousin walk up to me and ask me for my advice on her weight. She is 5’ 4"and
weighs 95 pounds. Having had recent trouble conceiving a child she was beginning
to worry about her body. Her doctors have always told her she’s too small, but
she never took their advice seriously. Now 25 and possibly infertile she was beginning to regret it. Being underweight is a topic that is not very often discussed, because
majority suffers from the opposite.
Being underweight
is when someone has a BMI (body mass index) less than 18.5, a healthy women is
18.5 and 24.9. People can be underweight for many reasons like high metabolism,
not having enough to eat, eating on the go, illness, poverty, genetics, stress,
and eating foods with little nutritional value.If someone is at risk for being
underweight its crucial they see their doctor, your weight can be an underlying
health problem.
If you’re losing weight because of
an illness, stress, or not having enough food it can be the beginning of many
health problems such as infertility, Diabetes, Anemia, and Osteoporosis. So again
see your doctor. After an evaluation
your doctor will more than likely suggest putting on healthy weight. Gaining weight
for someone who is underweight can be just as difficult as an overweight
individual losing weight. However it’s not impossible by eating healthy nutritional
dense foods, adding meal replacement smoothies, incorporating strength training
to build muscle and gain weight an individual can work towards a healthier body
weight, like my cousin. If you’re looking for ways to put on weight check out
websites like
this, and if you think you might be underweight see your doctor.
I love that you wrote about being underweight when so many people tend to talk about being overweight these days. It is very sad to hear about your cousin, but I'm sure she will learn the right things to do to help make her healthy weight. You gave so many great suggestions, and some that I am actually familiar with, having struggled with being underweight during my high school years. I especially enjoy your suggestions about adding to normal dishes and eating nutrient dense foods. This is the healthiest way to gain weight I believe, but definitely not the fastest. I also have to praise you for mentioning that exercise is very important, because most people today believe that you exercise to lose weight. In reality though, exercising to build more muscle mass will help to gain weight.
ReplyDelete-Madeline Thueson (NTR 351)-
I think that so many women are unaware of how important it is to have a healthy body weight when thinking about conceiving a child. Not only is a healthy body weight crucial to get pregnant, but during a women's pregnancy as well. I think by advising your cousin to see a doctor wt the right choice, because they can provide her with the right information as well as other options in regards to conceiving a baby.
ReplyDeleteKayla Jones (NTR 351)
I agree with both of you ladies above. I think that because most people do typically worry about being overweight, that people who have an extremely active metabolism, and trouble gaining weight, seem to be overlooked in society. I know that for females, maintaining a weight that is insufficient can cause many health problems, including infertility. It is really sad that a woman of such a young age is worried about not being able to have children. It makes me wonder what if society has impacted her in a way where she felt like she needed to maintain a really low body weight to be accepted. The media really has an impact, especially on young ladies and their body images.
ReplyDeleteI think this is an interesting topic, I struggle with being under weight also. Living in a society that is consumed with loosing weight its is strange to be in a situation where you need to again weight to be healthy. I don't have a body image problem it is just difficult to gain weight. It is very frustrating sometimes, through high school it meant that because I was skinny I couldn't compete in sports against larger people. Gaining weight has been slow but it's definitely possible. It has been a lot of the things that have already been mentioned above. Such as eating nutrient dense foods and supplementing with shakes, smoothies, and having extra snacks. Also I would heavily agree with exercising, it keeps from being lazy and putting on the wrong kind of weight. The most important to realize is that is while weight gain is possible it takes time.
ReplyDeleteI think that everything that you wrote is valuable advice to help any girl gain healthy weight, but I felt that you lacked to identify other key factors that contribute to this issue. These girls are being influenced by public media. "We should all be tall, skinny, and a be size zero," to represent beauty. A week ago I witnessed something that just made feel angry. My mother has a friend that has a twelve-year-old daughter. We were at a party and she said to me, " Do you think that I'm fat." I responded of course not, and I was deeply disturbed. I believe that social media is driving little girls to start this "skinny" mentality at such an early age.
ReplyDeleteThis is a blog I can relate to! I'm only 5'1 and weigh 98lbs, and I'm ALWAYS told how tiny I am! It can be very frustrating because I don't like being this small all the time. It's hard to find clothes that fit and even harder to gain weight. I've had scary thoughts about becoming infertile because of my small size. I think it's so funny how bigger people wish they were smaller, and smaller people wish they were bigger! Thanks for the helpful website about how to put on weight, I'll definitely be giving that a visit!:-)
ReplyDeleteThis is such a great blog. My interests are in childhood obesity and juvenile diabetes and I want to work with these children when I’m done with school, it is so important to me. However I never actually thought about the underweight issue. I never realized how dangerous (I guess the right word usage is?) it is. I always thought obesity was the worst but after reading this I realize that underweight ranks right up there with it. It is so sad, thank you for opening up a new door to me!
ReplyDeleteAs a young child, I had always been picked on by my wieght. I was underwieght growing up into my teens. It was not that I had any eating disorders because I would eat everyone in my household at the time. But I think it was that I was always active and could burn calories very easily. So, perhaps I had a very high metabolism. I know doctors would worry my parents in forcing me to eat all the time to gain weight, and no matter how much I ate, I could not pack on the pounds. You wrote a very important topic, becuase being underweight has its complications but at the same time, I do not believe that eveyone body composition should be reveiwed by a standdard BMI. Because at times, you can have a healthy person, who eats adequately and still meausres short on the BMI scale.
ReplyDeleteI think that a lot of people struggle with this actually. I had a good male friend in high school that worked out every single day, drank protein shakes like crazy, and had to work extremely hard to gain weight. I also have a friend that is very self conscious about her weight and it's because she feels too thin. She doesn't even want to work in out fear of losing any more weight and is constantly trying to eat more. I just have definitely seen how being too thin is a problem, as well.
ReplyDeleteOn the flip side though, many people think that skinny means healthy, and that is not it at all. This is a perfect example above of how it can be harmful!
I enjoyed reading this. My sympathy for you cousin about possibly being infertile. In previous nutrition classes, I would be told via an automated message saying I was underweight. Then I would enter in my diet log and realized that though I ate so much in volume, and regularly, my caloric intake was still low. My doctor had warned me several times that I am underweight and I always thought "well, I feel fine". It was frustrating because I could not control my weight. Foods I liked couldn't help me gain. People always have tips on how to lose weight in good health, but rarely ever to gain it.
ReplyDelete