Everyone checks their body to some extent, but many people ...



WEIGHT CHECKING

Everyone checks their body to some extent, but many people with eating disorders repeatedly check their body and often in a way that's unusual.

Sometimes body and weight checking becomes second nature and many individuals with eating disorders don't even realize they're doing it," said Dena Cabrera, PsyD, psychologist at Remuda Programs for Eating and Anxiety Disorders. "Commonly, they check to feel for fatness, bones and any physical change in their body to subconsciously or consciously motivate their eating disorder behavior."

Many individuals with eating disorders weigh themselves at frequent intervals, sometimes many times a day. As a result they become obsessed with the daily weight fluctuations that are a normal part of the body and would otherwise pass unnoticed. The movements on the scale then determine their mood and eating patterns.

A few things must be kept in mind before we put ourselves on that scale:

• For starters, always check your weight first thing in the morning with an empty stomach. Weight tends to fluctuate in the course of the day. With all our various activities such as eating, sweating, water retention in the body and sometimes even constipation, the fluctuation can be as much as a kilo or two.

• What we wear also contributes to our weight. For instance, a pair of jeans for women can weigh up to 700 gms, a shirt about 250 gms, so on and so forth. So if you have a weighing scale at home in your privacy, its best to try and weigh oneself in the nude! That way you have no extra kilos…

• Some people have the tendency to retain water in their bodies; this includes both men and women. Due to this, their weight might be different during various times of the time. In some cases, even food stays longer in the body and digestion is slow. For example. if you eat extra salt or Chinese food, the next day your weight will be more than a kilo extra. To figure out if you fit into the category of people who retain food and water, you could have apples only for dinner and check your weight next morning. Incase the weight drops more than 600gms than normal, then you automatically come into that category.

• To watch out for certain foods that can cause water/food retention, its best to avoid white flour, corn flour and all their products. All things sweet (especially Indian sweets), fruit juices, coconut water, soups, rice and heavy pulses should be avoided at night.

• Something for women to watch out is checking your weight during their menstrual period, as it can go up by close to one and half kilos. Although it would automatically come down by the end of the period.

• Anyone with a sedentary lifestyle will find that their weight fluctuates during travel or even when they are exposed to high levels of heat and cold.

• Another interesting fact is that stress has the side effects of weight gain.

• Last but not the least, being on any sort of medication (antibiotics) can sometimes cause a bit of water retention, so during the course it’s best to avoid checking your weight.

There are many reasons as to why are weight varies through our lives. The only way to be healthy is to eat right and exercise, there are no short cuts!

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