Inability to gain weight

[Filip1993]

I eat 3500 calories everyday (137 g protein, 120 g fat and 479 g carbs according to cronometer). I take a walk everyday, otherwise I'm quite sedentary. I'm not gaining weight... I'm still a bit underweight so I want to gain some weight. I have always been very thin and fragile. Should I eat more fat or something? 120 grams seems enough in my opinion. I feel pretty good and my temps/pulse are fine. Does anyone else has this problem? Or is 3500 calories even that much?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[jyb]

I'll share my experience because "thin and fragile" is how I would describe myself prior to peating. I first started by consuming liters of whole milk, gelatin, tubs of ice cream, and a bit (not so much) of OJ, sugar, meat, liver. Maybe 3000-6000kcal daily, no exercise other than walking. My upper body expanded with muscles and has remained stable ever since. Compared to you, I probably consumed a lot more fat and less sugar.

 

[Filip1993]

Thanks for your answer. I'm gonna try upping my fat and protein intake a bit more and see if it makes a difference. Do you still eat like that if I may ask? Or do you eat more sugar/less fat nowadays?

 

[jyb]

Thanks for your answer. I'm gonna try upping my fat and protein intake a bit more and see if it makes a difference. Do you still eat like that if I may ask? Or do you eat more sugar/less fat nowadays?

I experimented with various things after I tried that, including more sugar and less fat. Now, similar to what I posted but higher in fat and lesser in sugar.

 

[Filip1993]

Okey, I tried low fat/high carb for a while... feel a lot better with more fat. Thanks for sharing your experience.

 

[Gl;itch.e]

I guess the non diet side of this would be are you doing enough to stimulate your body to want to put on weight? In other words if you want some muscle put some demands on your body for it to see the need for it.

 

[Filip1993]

I don't lift or anything right now, I play a lot of golf though.

 

[Mittir]

I guess you meant gaining muscle when you are talking about gaining weight.
If you want to gain fat, then eating high glycemic carbohydrate can be very helpful.
Thyroid hormone plays a big role in building muscle.Have you ever tested your
total T3 and reverse T3 value? RP has mentioned that in some cases people can stay thin eating excess calories. Body waste a large part of the ingested carb. He needed less calories when he fixed his thyroid. Lack of ATP causes loss of magnesium through urine. Thyroid hormone increases retention of magnesium and you need magnesium to stabilize ATP.
You can try bag breathing to lower lactic acid formation, which happens in inefficient metabolism of sugar. Excess lactic acid also lowers liver's ability to store glycogen. I started gaining muscle when i switched from meat based diet to dairy based diet with a lot of emphasis on alkaline mineral intake with low phosphorus. B vitamins play a big role in glucose metabolism. Have you checked your vitamin and mineral intake in cronometer? I used to drink full fat milk and now i skim off most of the fat. I feel better on coconut oil than milk fat. RP recommends eating carb with protein to spare conversion of protein to sugar.
Do you think you have high cortisol?

 

[Hugh Johnson]

I eat 3500 calories everyday (137 g protein, 120 g fat and 479 g carbs according to cronometer). I take a walk everyday, otherwise I'm quite sedentary. I'm not gaining weight... I'm still a bit underweight so I want to gain some weight. I have always been very thin and fragile. Should I eat more fat or something? 120 grams seems enough in my opinion. I feel pretty good and my temps/pulse are fine. Does anyone else has this problem? Or is 3500 calories even that much?

Any help would be appreciated.

I can't find it now but I recall Peat talking about hypothyroidism causing inability to gain weight. I think he was needing 4000 calories a day while sedentary. When he took thyroid he could almost immediately eat less and gain weight.

Muscle building, which is what you want depends heavily on thyroid function. I think you should check out his interviews on the subject, or just try thyroid and see if it helps.

 

[Filip1993]

I guess you meant gaining muscle when you are talking about gaining weight.
If you want to gain fat, then eating high glycemic carbohydrate can be very helpful.
Thyroid hormone plays a big role in building muscle.Have you ever tested your
total T3 and reverse T3 value? RP has mentioned that in some cases people can stay thin eating excess calories. Body waste a large part of the ingested carb. He needed less calories when he fixed his thyroid. Lack of ATP causes loss of magnesium through urine. Thyroid hormone increases retention of magnesium and you need magnesium to stabilize ATP.
You can try bag breathing to lower lactic acid formation, which happens in inefficient metabolism of sugar. Excess lactic acid also lowers liver's ability to store glycogen. I started gaining muscle when i switched from meat based diet to dairy based diet with a lot of emphasis on alkaline mineral intake with low phosphorus. B vitamins play a big role in glucose metabolism. Have you checked your vitamin and mineral intake in cronometer? I used to drink full fat milk and now i skim off most of the fat. I feel better on coconut oil than milk fat. RP recommends eating carb with protein to spare conversion of protein to sugar.
Do you think you have high cortisol?

I had lowish t3 and very high reverse t3 after paleo, but that was kind of long time ago now. Bag breathing helps a lot, thanks. I drink lots of milk these day, so I get a lot of calcium but my intake of phosphorus is also pretty high. I think I get all my vitamins from liver, milk, coffee, some OJ, oysters etc. I've been drinking some full fat milk lately and upped my sat fat intake a bit, I think I feel a bit better.

 

[Filip1993]

@Mittir How do you skim of the fat? And is there any way to know how much fat there is left after skimming? I feel better on more fat but coconut oil seems to digest better than milk fat.

 

[Mittir]

@Mittir How do you skim of the fat? And is there any way to know how much fat there is left after skimming? I feel better on more fat but coconut oil seems to digest better than milk fat.

I buy raw milk from a local farm once every week. I use about 2 quart a day.
I freeze rest of the milk. When i thaw the milk, almost all the fat floats on the top.
I scoop out the fat and tried using as butter but later stopped. I think it slows down
my metabolism compared to coconut oil. Fat-free milk does not taste good, it taste almost like 1 percent milk.
Every day i boil the thawed milk and keep it the refrigerator and use it through out the day.
When i pour milk from the bottle there are semi solid fat on top and i use spoon
to remove most of it and there is still some fat left. I do not think all the fat separates
after boiling. It tastes lot like 2 percent milk.

 

[jyb]

I buy raw milk from a local farm once every week. I use about 2 quart a day.
I freeze rest of the milk. When i thaw the milk, almost all the fat floats on the top.
I scoop out the fat and tried using as butter but later stopped. I think it slows down
my metabolism compared to coconut oil. Fat-free milk does not taste good, it taste almost like 1 percent milk.
Every day i boil the thawed milk and keep it the refrigerator and use it through out the day.
When i pour milk from the bottle there are semi solid fat on top and i use spoon
to remove most of it and there is still some fat left. I do not think all the fat separates
after boiling. It tastes lot like 2 percent milk.

I found the heating up of thawed milk a bit slow. I supposed if I cut opened those bottles, I could squeeze out the milk and then boiling it would quickly turn it liquid. But then you'd have to wait a while until it's room temperature to put it back in the fridge?