Need advice!

[morgan505]

Ok, I have a query whihc may or may not be possible to find an answer for, but here goes anyway!

Basically I'm in treatment at a hospital and am on a weight gain diet. I have to get to a target BMI of 20 and am curently at 19. Now I have a history of exercise and have been weight training 3 times a week since january last year. I had a pause from this during the summer for about two months and now I'm in hospital to gain some weight as I ended up getting rather thin and ill. Uusally the target is a BMI of 20 but I have now been told that this may have to change depending on my body, because the team at this facility are concerned about how much muscle I have, as they think my current BMI is very innacurate becoz of the fact that my periods havent returned, and they way I look to them.

As far as I'm aware women dont build muscle that easily, I can see that I have more muscular arms than the other patients however I cant imagne im carrying around eough to make a significant difference to my BMI, so my question to you is, how much muscle can a women expect to build in a year, by training 3 times a week, i.e how much 'heavier' is my muscle making me?

Hope this is clear, im all confused!

Thank you

[Euqinom]

For me, gaining 10 pounds of muscle was easy, and at your current weight, even that little muscle makes a huge difference.

[freebirdmac]

BMI isn't a good indicator of health. It would easily show muscular people as overweight or obese. A much better, but hard to measure, indicator is bodyfat %. It sounds like yours is terribly low. Maybe researching how competitors put weight (bodyfat) back on after competitions would help. But basically you need to eat more calories than you burn.

[morgan505]

Oh yeah I know I need to gain weight, the nurses just think my current BMI is too high, due to muscle, I'm juts wondering how much muscle I could possibly have, because even If they think I shud reach a higher BMI (say 22) in order to 'look and feel' like I'm BMI 20, thats assuming Im carrying around a couple of kilos of muscle, is that possible?

I've requested a body composition test but i dont know if its possible on the NHS.

I realise my muscle will make me heavier but i didnt think it wud really make me much heavier.

[Mindi912]

what's your actual weight kg's or pounds

your height

as said above the BMI is honestly nothing to go by - it was developed in 1830 when scientists didn't have access to living subjects so they created the index using dead subjects

therefore as it's thought that you weigh more when dead the charts wouldn't reflect the true purpose of the chart

[freebirdmac]

I think I'd be educating those nurses on body composition and the flaws in BMI. If they really want to understand your composition and gauge improvements, they have to have a different metric. Even if someone went out and bought a handheld bio-impedance device it'd be better than BMI.

And there's really no way to know how much muscle you've gained.

Heck! Get a family member to buy a scale or handheld device and have the nurses get on it too! That'll educate them!

[morgan505]

I've requested a body composition test but the best they can do is a caliper, which im getting sometime nxt week.

I am 5'2 and weigh about 47 kilos, putting my BMI at 19.11, but they say I don't look it. My bodyspace pictures arent up to date but theres not much change I dont suppose.

Lean or not lean, as long I have the weight on it shudnt matter anyway really.

[Mindi912]

I've requested a body composition test but the best they can do is a caliper, which im getting sometime nxt week.

I am 5'2 and weigh about 47 kilos, putting my BMI at 19.11, but they say I don't look it. My bodyspace pictures arent up to date but theres not much change I dont suppose.

Lean or not lean, as long I have the weight on it shudnt matter anyway really.

add about 5 kg's that'll be good for your height

tell the nurses that muscle weighs twice as much as fat ergo you will look leaner

47 is light but you know this hence why you are trying to fix it :)

[freebirdmac]

Being lean is fine, as long as you're not so lean as to affect your health. And it sounds like the lack of enough bodyfat has impacted your health, meaning it's too low.

Your BMI is probably inflated due to your muscle mass making the medical staff scratch their heads a bit as they'd expect your numbers to be even lower.

Just focus on eating clean and getting enough cals. You'll look and feel better.

[imperfectly_lou]

If you are in hospital for treatment for an eating disorder, you need to trust the professionals and listen to their advice. Looking for flaws in their ways of thinking, or trying to justify why their advice is wrong is only going to impede your recovery. Trust me, been there, done that.

[morgan505]

thanks guys for all the advice, i wud reach BMI 20 if i gained 2 more kilos, and i think they wud rather i gained about 5 overall which is what u've said, so i shud trust them, it's just difficult when u have issues with your weight and dont see what others see. once i reach 20 we'll have another look at things im sure and decide where to go from there. trust me to be the anomoly, i guess they dont expect to see muscle on the patients around here :)

[Mindi912]

thanks guys for all the advice, i wud reach BMI 20 if i gained 2 more kilos, and i think they wud rather i gained about 5 overall which is what u've said, so i shud trust them, it's just difficult when u have issues with your weight and dont see what others see. once i reach 20 we'll have another look at things im sure and decide where to go from there. trust me to be the anomoly, i guess they dont expect to see muscle on the patients around here :)

I could sneak you in some steak and protein shake if you like to get that little bit extra in :D

I've been your weight and lower - it's not good at all, even 50kg's sounds light

52 - 53 kg's with good muscle mass should be just about perfect for your height

[SophieM]

When I was hospitalized, I had to reach 90% of what they said my "ideal" weight was. They wanted me to be BMI of 22 and I'm shorter than you. They let me out sooner, at a BMI of 18.8. They didn't use BMI, just a weight that they thought would be healthy for me. I also went straight to college after being discharged and was on contract there to gain weight.

When I got to in-patient they did tell me that if I didn't have all the muscle I did, I'd look and be in a lot worse shape.

Like others have said, BMI is crap. If they're going by BMI and they think your muscle is over inflating it, I can see why they'd want you to stay longer.

And the period thing is also stupid. People lose they're periods for a whole host of reasons and some take longer to get it back while others seem to never lose it no matter how low their BMI is.

Listen to them though. Even if their reasoning is flawed, they have some valid points about muscle weight and probably not having as much body fat as you should.

I KNOW it's not fun being there and gaining weight but it's so much better than continuing to make yourself sicker.

[morgan505]

please do bring me steak, the protein here is sometimes very poor quality, had a 'chicken' curry y'day and cudnt find any decent chicken in there, very annoying.

My periods stopped before all my eating habits changed, which i keep trying to tell them but they wont listen, im just prayin they come back within the next few weeks, but ur right periods can stop not just because or low weight.

I'll trust them tho, there are people who dont want to go beyond a BMI of 15 for christs sake.