They say that if you starve yourself that just makes more fat and you'll actually gain more weight, but...

Question

then why are anorexic people skinny?? Health advice says not eating will actually cause your cells to trap fat instead of making you lose it.. but why are all anorexic people skinny? What's the real truth about 'starving' youself?

Answer 1

When you starve yourself your body goes into "starvation" mode, and it does hang on to the fat. But starving yourself is quite relative.
Anorexics don't just starve...they exercise, purge, throw up, etc. Overweight people usually have a very hard time losing weight. Anorexics are USUALLY not overweight to begin with...they just "see" themselves that way.

Answer 2

The formula for weight gain/loss is simple.

If you eat MORE calories than you burn, you gain weight.
If you eat LESS calories than you burn, you lose weight.

Starving yourself is a terrible idea for losing weight though. The reason is that a large calorie deficit will cause your body to go into "starvation mode" in order to survive.

Starvation mode means that your body will try to hang onto whatever calories it can. It does this by slowing down your metabolism, storing calories as fat whenever possible (fat is efficient), and consuming your muscle tissue for energy. You see, with less muscle, you burn less calories and can live longer on less food.

Our bodies are pretty remarkably designed, aren't they?

When you start to eat again, of course, your body is still in starvation mode! So even if you consume less calories than before you starved yourself, your body's no longer burning so many calories and you will put on weight rapidle. Hence, the "rebound effect" that plagues yo-yo dieters.

The only sensible way to lose weight is to eat healthy food, eat 5-6 small meals, drink plenty of water, get enough sleep and exercise at least 3-4 times a week (it should really be daily, but a little more intense a few times a week).

That's the real truth about starving yourself. In short, it's a BAD idea.

Keep Well,
Rob

Answer 3

Weight?
Sciene found that when people eat the same amount as they normally did but at different times, they lost weight!

The secret is to eat in the morning a good breakfast and the protein foods, which normally come with fats. Thus the body makes energy from it for the day.

Lunch can be moderate.

At night a small portion of light food should be consumed, may be a salad, may be grains or potatoes with vegetables.

Taking flax oil in the morning helps lose weight and lubricate the joints, at night it helps to gain weight.

Japanese wrestlers eat a lot at night and go to bed immediately thereafter to gain the weight they need for their job. And they gain it!

Eating about three hours before going to bed helps to lose weigth, for the food is then digested at bed time and the body makes less fat.

Not eating at all can be dangerous nowadays, since fasting brings up the toxins from tissues and bones, toxins we all have accumulated in an unnatural world. The toxins were stashed away by the body, out of the blood and lymph streams, as far as the body could do this to function. The toxins coming up too fast can make us severely ill. Not worth a try!

However, we can cleanse out gently and slowly with an alkaline-forming diet.

With the insights of science and a proper, fresh diet, we should be able to lose weight.

Wishing you the healthy weight you may desire.
Cordially, India.Magica

Answer 4

It's because starvation mode is a temporary way that your body defends itself. It slows down your metabolism to preserve anything you do take in. Anorexic people are so skinny because after a while, this self preservation runs out. It doesn't take long. And then you drop weight. There is a science to caloric intake/burn that even our bodies cannot overcome. The thing is, most of us can only keep calorie intake that low for a very short amount of time, and then give in and binge. The metabolism has been damaged, and we gain the weight back faster than we lost it.

In short, you have to starve yourself for an extended period to achieve the Nicole Richie look.

Answer 5

If you starve yourself your metabolism slows way down so that when you do eat more of the calories are used for fat. But anorexic people eat so little that they burn off all the calories they do consume. But if an anorexic person started eating a lot or normal amounts of food all of a sudden, they would gain weight faster than if they ate the same amount and weren't anorexic.

Answer 6

Yes, obviously starvation will eventually cause fat loss, but initially your body goes into starvation mode and will try to preserve as much fat as possible and start breaking down your muscle tissue instead.

So the reason these girls get so skinny is because they lose both fat and muscle. But the problem is, when they gain fat back, they don't gain back the muscle and they end up with a higher body fat percentage than they did before. HTH : )

Answer 7

Not eating an proper amount of calories can slow your metabolism thereby slowing your calorie use. Super low calorie consumption will not make you fat but it will slow down your calorie burn rate and the decrease will last for some time even after you have begun eating again.

Starvation diets can also lead to gall stones later in life.

Answer 8

see i asked the same question and this is what iv descovered... okay when you stop eating, first it starts slowing your motabolism see your motabolism is like a burning fire, when you have a fire you have to keep putting wood to keep it burning right? well when you dont eat, the fire (your motabolism) will eventually just stop burning so that when you do eat it will take every bit of fat it can out of whatever you feed it because it doesnt know when it will be fed again. after you are past that phase, then it will start eating at your muscle whitch when it does you will apear to look skinnier but youv actually just lost all your muscle. after that, then it will eventually eat at your fat.

Answer 9

so the chicken asks the pig, ''how about we get together for bacon and eggs some time?'' the pig answers ''no way! for you, that's just bacon and eggs, but for me, that's a lifelong committment!''

that's the difference. dieters will eventually eat again. anorexic folk pretty much make a lifelong committment. they're ''successful'' (gosh i hate using that word to describe anorexia with weight loss) b/c they really don't eat anything. dieters actually eat.

Answer 10

You'll gain at first and then it will go away.
Either way it's insanely unhealthy.