As many people know, I pride myself on my strength, ability to push through some pretty stupid stuff because of that strength and was expecting a much higher number on my Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR) test. This test tells one how much, or in my case how little, they should eat. With my bulk (weight) and muscle, I was hoping for well over 2,000 kcal a day. Apparently, giving yourself a borderline eating disorder and not working out for over 6 months due to injury, your RMR goes down the toilet.
Let me explain the 'eating disorder' comment. For someone that is supposed to be an 'athlete' (I use that term loosely now, really, I know this), I have mentally shunned food for fear of gaining weight since my injury. Well, it backfired. It caused my RMR to decrease, working against me, and I have gained weight anyway. I'm not surprised. To go from running regularly, the gym and/or CrossFit every day (in Iraq) to nothing for over 6 months and eating only once a day, is a shock to the system. Back to food...with my huge life changes right now, I am almost the opposite of an emotional or stress eater.
I can't look at food.
I can't eat it.
It makes me nauseous in a horrible way. I'm lucky if I eat once a day. Or not at all, save for coffee and some ice cream at dinner. Really, that's it. :(
Right now, to look at 1714, while I'm disappointed it's so low, is still a lot of food for me at this point. Yesterday was the first day I tried to eat that many calories and...I wanted to vomit. Well, mostly emotional reasons, but it is a lot of food for me right now. I'm not used to it. I made myself eat to get close to that number. I got to about 1630kcal for the day. Close, but not enough.
I'm not even really working out right now, in "Ironman" world that is. When I start doing more, I need to eat more. I need to replace those calories, stay above 1714 if I even want to think about losing weight and improving my athletic performance...that I know can be awesome...if I just get some energy! I want to still be successful at CrossFit, which I'm told I can still do while IM training (yay!) and I need to do all I can to move myself towards that finish line since I can't run.
I encourage my fellow Village Idiots to get their RMR tested. It's eye-opening and gives you some hard numbers to work with. If you say it's not necessary, or too early in our training, well, you're all doing more than me and I am still finding it useful!
So some goals I can work on, while I can't do real training, are:
- eat 1714 kcal a day
-log it at on a calorie tracker website
-start losing this 15lbs I gained in one year
(having a major life event, like going to Iraq, is good for remembering what awesome shape your body was in...I was 15lbs lighter when I left and when I broke my leg)
-log on BT. It keeps us accountable. I have issues with this as I don't want to write personal stuff about leaving the military, but I can just log and not write anything else.
Time for breakfast! (ugh...not even hungry!)
Hi Haley - how does one go about getting RMR tested? I think it would be really helpful for me, too. I spent the last two years going through menopause (a war in itself) and things are REALLY weird now in my body. Thanks for sharing all this - it helps me, too!
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