How to GAIN weight?
 

I've been taking adderall for several months now, and my weight has dropped significantly. I'm 6'1". I was like 185-190 pounds when I began taking it, I believe, and I'm now at probably about 155 pounds. I have seen a decrease in the rate at which I'm losing weight, but I'm still losing it, and before long I'm going to be at unhealthy levels.

At first, I had a lot of trouble getting myself to eat, because it kills my appetite. I've managed to deal with that pretty well, so now I eat probably as much as I did before I started taking adderall. However, it seems as though I lose weight regardless of how much I eat, even if slower.

Naturally, I could just eat a tub of ice cream every day and gain weight, but I would prefer to gain weight in a way that isn't so unhealthy. Are there foods that will help me gain weight without clogging my arteries?

Try eating 5 or 6 smaller meals a day. This isn't as hard as it sounds, but it does take some dedication. Using a program/website like FitDay can help you calculate your maintenance level for calories. Lets say you burn 2000 calories during your day to day life: sleeping, digesting, doing homework, working out. You want to eat about 300-500 calories over maintenance a day to gain weight healthily. Start with 2300, check your progress in 2 weeks and kick it up if necessary.

taking adderall has probably messed with your metabolism if youre still losing weight, exercise more and switch to a high carb diet ( eating average size meals 2 1/2 - 3 hours apart) and if you dont have time to eat that often, have something like a high carb protein shake 1-2 times ( not too close to your other meals, as they can cause bad gas, and possibly stomach aches)

if you wanto put on weight, don't just eat more as it will most likely just get stored as fat.. the human body is stubborn, you need to give it a reason to wanto grow! so make sure you're doing a decent amount of exercise along with your diet.

Shoot for a 50% carbs / 25% protein / 25% fat diet. Which is to say 50% of your calories will be from carbs. Note that fat is "calorie dense" so you don't need to eat much of it to get to that 25%, just gobble some nuts.

oh and a quick bit of info for you k_a, although you wont really pay much attention to your calorie intake, you should just right down what you eat and at the end of the day just google a website that will tell you how many calories are in the food youre eating, or just look on the packaging if thats easier..

1g Protein = 4 calories
1g Carbs = 4 calories
1g Fat = 9 calories

since you're mainly aiming to put weight back on for now i'd stick to what grav said and stick to 50/25/25. you should never try and eliminate fats from your diet, as long as theyre from things like fish, red meats, eggs, and things like nuts and vegetables.

Can you test your body fat? You might actually get the benefit of being "ripped" out of this. Work out and take advantage of this gift bestowed upon you :P.

there are ways but i think its rather annoying, theres the pinch test ( no idea how it works) and so many others. just google them ;P

Protein shakes maybe?

You are wanting to gain weight?

The easist way to gain weight is to build muscle as muscle weight 5:1 outweighs fat, so start uping your protein intake and hit the gym.

Whoa, careful there. Muscle is only about 20% more dense than fat, not nearly the 5x you claim.

Think about it, one pound of fat obviously does not take up five times as much volume as one pound of muscle. Overweight people would be HUGE.

Still, muscle is a lot healthier to have than fat. You can add between 0.5-1.0 pound of muscle to your body per week.

Muscle doesn't wiegh more than fat, Muscle is just more dense.

OW.

Your logic hurts my brain.

Wrong, and yes my ratio was off, I honestly didn't know. I just know muscle is much higher than fat.

for a skinny person the best way to gain weight is to up your carb intake as well as protein, if you dont have the energy to burn when you workout you're only going to be wasting your muscle cells. and also, if you're planning to lift weights often to help you gain weight, DO NOT overtrain, most people train one body part till they cant even move it anymore.. 9/10 this is overtraining, and can lead to a decrease in muscle volume and it will take a hell of alot longer to recover.

It depends on the context, I guess.

1 lb of fat weighs the same as 1 lb of muscle. In this sense, he's right. But this is being silly.

I'm trying to gain 20 lbs. So far I've gained 8. Whey protein is good.

You're taking it because you're prescribed to it right? If not then duh drop the adderall. If you are, then well, I'm sorry to say, but you wont get your appetite back if you keep taking an amphetamine whether its adderall or not. Try asking your doctor if there's something he's told other people that have your problem. Just eat more normally. The adderall isn't making you lose weight, it doesn't do that, it just makes you lose your appetite. I've taken amphetamines a little bit here and there, and they make you lose your appetite like no other. Just eat an amount you would eat before taking adderall. That's your problem.

I said in my post that I eat as much now as I did before I started taking it.

Oh my mistake, well the only thing you can do is just eat larger servings. I'm sure you know that 3500 calories are worth a pound. All that your situation leads to is that you've been eating far less than your caloric requirements. Maybe you could switch to a different medication? You could try buying some weight gainers at www.bodybuilding.com or www.massnutrition.com those are two of the cheaper websites I've been to. Are you smoking bud lately? That might be your best bet; get some hella munchies and just smash on some food. It'll never let you down.

hmm thats fucked up. the best way to grow is to just eat and eat and eat! just up your calorie intake like slaynish suggested