Many people find it hard to believe that health problems experienced when going Paleo are from a lack of calories and appropriate macronutrients, but I’ve seen it in my private practice countless times. Clients who were experiencing mysterious, nagging symptoms suddenly disappeared when we evaluated and corrected their daily food intake.

I have seen clients who thought they were eating enough but were not losing weight. They began to lose weight after they increased their food intake. Quite the opposite of the “calories-in-calories-out” mentality!

Why is under-eating so common? It can happen for a number of reasons:

• A restricted diet
• Above-average activity levels
• Stress
• Fear of certain foods and food groups
• Busyness
• Chronic dieting
• Pregnancy/breastfeeding

Signs and Symptoms of Under-eating

There are certain signs and symptoms that I often see in my clients who are chronically under-eating. These include: The following text discusses whether or not you might just need more food to feel better today.

1. Your Weight Isn’t Budging

This is a symptom of someone who is under-eating and it is often accompanied by overtraining. The majority of clients I work with who are trying to lose weight are not overeating. Many of my clients come to me on very low-calorie diets, exercising intensely six to seven days per week.

clients who are not seeing changes in their weight despite working out more and eating less are understandably frustrated. For some of these clients, their weight has actually increased. Many of these clients are also following a very low-carbohydrate diet in order to lose weight quickly.

We have been taught that the body is a machine and that we can burn calories through exercise to cause weight loss. Weight loss is expected when clients create a significant caloric deficit. However, they are unable to lose the remaining 15 to 30 pounds no matter how little they eat. Why is this?

If you want to lose weight in a sustainable way, you should create a moderate calorie deficit of 300 to 500 calories per day. If you create a much larger deficit, your body will make changes to its metabolism in order to maintain a balance. Your body doesn’t like it when you make big changes all at once, so it responds by changing your thyroid, adrenal, and sex hormones to make sure you’re not burning too many calories.

The changes that will occur include a reduction in active thyroid hormone, the shutdown of sex hormone production, and an increase in stress hormones like cortisol. Chronically high levels of cortisol can make a person resistant to both leptin and insulin, which can make it difficult to lose weight.

The hormonal changes caused by weight loss can lead to many negative health effects, including weight loss resistance. If you are not seeing any results from eating less and exercising more, you may want to consider changing your strategy.

2. Women Can’t Get Pregnant

Scientists have known for a long time that a low-calorie diet and inadequate body fat can lead to fertility issues and amenorrhea in women. A condition known as hypothalamic amenorrhea, which is characterized by irregular or absent menstrual periods and low energy levels, is often seen as a result of this problem. This condition can occur with or without an eating disorder.

A woman’s menstrual cycle can be considered irregular if there is no egg released during the ovulatory period, even if she still gets her period.

Chronic caloric deprivation can cause hypothalamic amenorrhea, which is also associated with physiological changes like overactivity of the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis (also known as adrenal fatigue) and disturbances in the hypothalamic–pituitary–thyroid axis (also known as euthyroid sick syndrome).

I’ve had many clients who have happily returned to their normal calorie intake after previously struggling with their period. One of my clients was told by her doctors that she would never be able to have children, but after switching to a diet with more calories, she was finally able to get pregnant.

If you are having difficulty getting pregnant and have previously tried to lose weight through dieting and exercise, it is possible that your low calorie diet is the cause of your infertility.

3. Your Blood Sugar Is on a Roller Coaster

Too few calories can result in blood sugar swings just as much as too many carbohydrates. The most common issue that comes from chronic under-eating is an insufficient amount of glucose in the blood, also known as hypoglycemia.

Hypoglycemia occurs when blood sugar levels drop below 70 mg/dL. However, some people experience symptoms at higher blood sugar levels. Common symptoms of hypoglycemia include:

• Hunger
• Shakiness
• Anxiety
• Dizziness
• Sweating
• Weakness
• Confusion
• Changes in mood

If you’re not eating enough, you can easily become hypoglycemic, especially if you’re also exercising. Many people feel better after eating sugary foods when their blood sugar is low. However, this can lead to a cycle of high and low blood sugar swings that cause chronic dieters to overeat or binge on unhealthy foods.

Another reason that a sustainable diet for weight loss is one that provides adequate calories to keep your hormones and blood sugar even-keeled is that it helps to prevent cravings.

4. Your Mood Is Totally Unpredictable

Have you ever heard the term “hangry” before?

This refers to the feeling of being angry and irritated because you are hungry. Inadequate food intake can lead to a volatile emotional state, which has been backed by scientific evidence.

Lack of eating enough food can lead to hypoglycemia or low blood sugar, as previously mentioned. Self-control is one of the first cognitive processes to suffer when the brain’s blood sugar starts to drop. Your ability to exert self-control allows you to:

• Focus your attention
• Regulate your emotions
• Cope with stress
• Resist impulsivity
• Refrain from aggressive behavior

If you episodes of bad moods or anxiety, make sure you are eating enough before changing your diet or taking medication.

4 Mistakes Men Make With Diets

Avoid these nutrition mistakes and never develop a dad-bod. Are you making any of them? Check out the list.

1. USING DIETS MADE FOR SEDENTARY WOMEN

Many diet books and weight loss programs are designed with a target audience or “avatar” in mind. The product is designed for people who are like this. These diet books and weight loss plans are not aimed at men or active women, but at sedentary women.

If you fit the description of a middle-class housewife in your 30s or 40s with 2.3 kids, working out to you might mean going for a walk around the block with your gal pals. Why are you dieting if you don’t want to lose weight? The goal of layperson diets is typically to lose weight, as evidenced by the desire for smaller numbers on the scale. Many men have become obsessed with their body weight without realizing the ideas of body composition and muscle catabolism.

“Hey, I lost 10 pounds!” Yeah, you lost mostly water and some muscle. – You’re smaller and weaker than before, produce less testosterone, and have a slower metabolism. You’ve just changed your gender without having to inject estrogen or chop off your penis. You’ve done well to lose weight, now go and enjoy The View.

Unless you are extremely overweight and are only looking to improve your health for the next year, it is unlikely that the pop diet will be able to help you reach your goals. You want to be less fat and more muscular, stronger, and more able to do athletics. The frozen dinner nutrition plan your mom uses or the latest Dr. Oz book cannot deliver any of these.

SOLUTION

Make sure that any diet plan you follow is appropriate for your lifestyle. For example, if you are someone who goes to the gym regularly and is concerned with their appearance, make sure that the diet plan you follow reflects that. It is important to remember that if you want to build muscle and be strong, you need to make sure you are getting enough protein.

2. TAKING “YOU GOTTA EAT BIG TO GET BIG” TOO FAR

Most men like to eat, and eat a lot. A person can easily eat too many calories when trying to gain muscle mass. It is necessary to eat enough to support working out, recovery, and muscle growth, but it is possible to eat too much and look more like a fat guy with decent traps than a muscular lifter.

Having large arms is not as impressive if a good portion of that size is due to fat. If your gut is growing, it means you are eating more calories than you need to optimally fuel muscle growth. If you’re not careful, you could end up just layering on stubborn fat deposits and permanently stretching out the skin, rather than building muscle.

Anabolic resistance is the impaired ability to build muscle caused by excess calorie consumption over time. This is the worst case scenario. The cycle begins with insulin resistance, which then leads to leptin resistance. When the cycle is in full swing, it results in excess fat gain, lack of enthusiasm for workouts, halted strength gains, inflammation, and low libido. As you continue to put on mass, it becomes increasingly difficult to lose the excess fat, until you eventually resemble a pregnant woman with a large belly, which shortens your lifespan.

SOLUTION

Approximately a few hundred additional calories above your maintenance level are all you need to consume in order to gain muscle mass. Think bodybuilding, not belly-building. To fuel your workout, you should consume targeted workout nutrition, rather than candy bars and fast food. Food quality matters. Those who say otherwise are selling ebooks and fantasies.

3. EATING LIKE A PRO BODYBUILDER

Many men make the mistake of copying the diet of their favorite bodybuilder or action movie star, which can lead to problems. The problem? So, what makes them think they can compete with the pros? Men who are not professional athletes often think they can compete with professional athletes even though they have different genetics, do not work out as much, and do not use the same drugs. Even guys using steroids are not using as much as the pros. All of those things add leeway to the diet. The pros can have crazy diets because of the drugs they take.

You can’t. If you follow the diets that these people use to gain muscle, you will instead end up gaining fat and ruining your health. Following their fat loss diets will result in losing muscle and harming your health. Many people who are competitive bodybuilders or gurus make a living by selling diet plans that do not work well to people who are easily impressed. And those customized meal plans they sell? After assessing what you need, they will send you a plan that is close to what you require. It’s far from “customized.”

SOLUTION

The advice given by professionals in the diet industry should not be taken blindly, but rather should be critically examined before being accepted. You could try learning from these people, as many of them are intelligent. However, you should remember that their strategies are designed for THEM, not for you. Not yours. You will need to experiment with different diets to see what works best for your body. That requires some thought and some work. Don’t like that? If you continue to pay someone else to tell you what to eat, you will always be at their mercy.

4. “CUTTING” WHEN THERE’S NOTHING UNDERNEATH TO SHOW OFF

The majority of men today believe that if they were to lose 10 or 20 pounds, they would then have a body that is fit enough to be on the cover of a fitness magazine. After they discover that there wasn’t anything under the layer of fat, they realize that it wasn’t worth showing off.

It’s understandable. You are not very muscular even though you lift weights. Having visible abs may increase your chances of seeing a naked woman in person. So you go on a fat-loss diet. The result? Scrawniness. A weakened metabolism. The inability to eat three carbohydrates at a sitting without gaining fat.

First, let’s remember that those “small” men’s physique competitors who are in the upper ranks mostly weigh around 200 pounds, and they are very fit. And most are taller than their broader brethren in the bodybuilding category. You will not be happy if you lose weight and become a leaner 150 pounds if you currently weigh 170 pounds and are considered soft. Muscle matters, not just low body fat. Make sure you have some before adopting a “cutting” plan.

SOLUTION

It is popular belief that one should gain muscle mass before cutting down fat. And sure, they do need to gain muscle. skinny-fat guys often have the same nutrient issues as fat guys – they can’t process nutrients well and have trouble distributing them throughout the body. When they eat to gain size, they gaining mostly fat. When people diet to lose fat, they often look frail. When people eat more calories than they burn, the excess is stored as fat, rather than being used to build muscle. You shouldn’t diet to lose fat, or bulk up. The solution is to fix those underlying issues.

Yes, get rid of the obvious junk foods that are problematic for everyone, but don’t “diet.” Instead, fix those metabolically active but broken fat cells with cyanidin 3-glucoside — sold as Indigo-3G® — to selectively increase insulin sensitivity in the muscle. This means that your body will be more efficient at burning fat and gaining muscle. Essentially, food is used to fuel the body rather than being stored as fat. With this in mind, you can now build muscle and lose fat without following an extreme diet.