Problems with fatigue, starving feelings, cravings, and eating

[azumashinobi]

I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask this so I apologize if it isn't. So I'm a 20 year old male. The last couple of years I've lost about 100-120 lbs. I used to weigh somewhere around 290 now I'm about 170. I did this mostly by only drinking water and eating a lot less although my diet was still pretty junky most of the time. One of the reasons I decided to lose weight was severe debilitating fatigue I was having. This hasn't improved, as a matter of fact it probably got worse but I'll go into that later.

So in the last couple of moths I started getting sweet cravings. Very severe sweet cravings. This is something completely new in my life, I'm not even sure i'd actually had a real craving before this. I had never ever went out of my way to buy sweets or ice cream EVER and Now I'm doing it regularly. At first I just wanted ice cream all the time now it's turned into something completely different and a lot worse.

Describing this will be a bit difficult but I'll try my best. So, recently I started feeling hungry a lot more often than usual and I never ever felt "full". I would get a sort of over eating pain in my stomach but that satisfying feeling from being full has been gone from me for quite some time. For about a week this turned into what I could only describe as a constant starving feeling. I don't mean starving as in "Mom I'm starving!!!" starving, more like that horrible pain you get in your stomach when you actually go into starvation mode. It was more mild in the day time but at night it literally would drive me crazy and I was forced to eat something sizeable. This didn't get rid of it by any means but most of the pain would subside for a while. It always felt as if eating ice cream or sweets was the best cure for that feeling for some reason. So now I was constantly thinking of food every waking moment while still trying to lose weight and feeling like I'm starving the whole day. The rest of my weight loss is EXTREMELY important to me (the fatigue might be caused by severe anxiety I get from being overweight and things related to that) but I've considered just stopping because of the pain all this was causing me.

So as of this past week or two the starvation feeling has become a bit better. I think I still feel it throughout the day but it's more mild although it's still kind of bad at night. I still get hungry very quickly and never feel full however. The main problem now is that every time I eat food it seems to hurt my stomach a lot. What this seems to result in is me not wanting food but starving at the same time. As of right now for instance I had a small bowl of cereal for breakfast about 30 minutes ago and I still feel extremely hungry. Something about any food I can think of sounds really bad to me. I have a feeling that it'd make my stomach hurt but my opposition to eating goes beyond that. Something about it seems extremely unappetizing and unappealing. I still feel like I just NEED food all the time though.

You might think I'm not eating much but every time I get my hands on food I get an uncontrollable urge to keep eating (despite the food often seeming very unappetizing/gross to me) so I have to watch what portions are available to me. One of the only things that doesn't seem like it makes my stomach hurt when I eat it is... ice cream. I'm assuming it's because it still sufficiently fills you up but it goes down smooth. Sweets like cookies and things that have bread also seem unappealing to me and make my stomach hurt.

My eating habits lately have been a bit better. I eat plenty of fruits, chicken, yogurt, whole wheat bread, a bit of vegetables. I also work at a pizza shop so I often make chicken sandwiches and things like that while occasionally eating a bit of pizza. Not the MOST unhealthy stuff but not exactly great for you I'm sure. I've been trying to intake about 1800 calories or so a day. I still only drink water unless I have alcohol (beer has too many calories haha). I still eat ice cream almost every day however. I also do about a 10 minute work out every day. push-ups, jumping jacks, sit-ups, exercise bike, and the punching bag.

In the past my calorie intake per day has fluctuated a bit but I imagine the lowest it was ever at was around 1400 calories a day. maybe a bit less. I also would like to mention I took phentermine, welbutrin, and Ritalin for a while which did nothing for anything.

So to summarize I lost a bunch of weight and am now plagued by an almost uncontrollable hunger and a starving feeling I have throughout the day. Food usually hurts my stomach and I'm starting to not want to eat food very much at all despite feeling really hungry. I'm not even sure if I crave ice cream anymore or if i just want it because it doesn't hurt my stomach. I still have horrible fatigue that keeps me from doing many things I want to in my life and even causes me some depression. I'm still trying to lose weight which I consider the most important thing in my life but well... it's pretty difficult as you may have guessed. All of this, quite obviously, is driving me insane.

The first thing I thought is malnutrition. It's hard for me to think that this is the case however, my diet has improved remarkably and I'm eating more often than before. I don't have health insurance so I'm all self payed for medical stuff on a minimum wage job while living by myself. Just going to the doctors isn't much of an option. I can save up for a bit just for a shot in the dark to try some medication but nothings working and that's getting pretty old to be honest. So I'm looking for at least a point in the right direction on here or maybe someone who experienced something similar and got it resolved. I would really appreciate any help and sorry for writing a paper here on the forums haha.

[azumashinobi]

I know what you meant by high. The only thing that keeps me from feeling pass out miserable is when I'm in social situations. Otherwise, like I said, I feel extremely tired regardless of what I'm doing or eating. I have had my thyroid checked and have been checked for a few deficiencies already. I will probably try some non fat yogurt though I've been meaning to do that. Thanks for all the help.

[Barb135]

I'm not talking about getting a "high"; I'm talking about a more satisfied feeling.

"My fatigue is pretty consistent throughout the day, I just get done what I have to get done and bare with it."  Fatigue is a major symptom of hypothyroidism, as well as vitamin B12 deficiency....... you should get them both tested. For hypothyroidism, you need TSH, Free T3 and Free T4; for vitamin B12 deficiency you need vitamin B12....  You should also get checked for insulin resistance.

Maybe you could try a non fat greek yogurt, in place of the ice cream.  It comes in a variety of great tasting flavors and leaves a satisfied feeling, without a lot of calories. A low fat cottage cheese would also be better than the ice cream.

[azumashinobi]

Ok I'll try that. I never really get a high though. My fatigue is pretty consistent throughout the day, I just get done what I have to get done and bare with it. I haven't really ate any ice cream in the past couple days so I guess that's good.

[Barb135]

Get your thyroid checked to make sure it's not malfunctioning, then try to follow Caryopterus' suggestions.

Ice cream could have a soothing effect because it's made of milk/cream, which has lots of protein, vitamin B12, as well as fat, which always make us feel fuller. Plus dairy naturally has a soothing effect on the stomach.

10  minutes of exercise/day is not enough to work off a dish of ice cream, so the extra calories would be stored as fat.

[Caryopteris]

You are causing your blood sugar to go up and down, which gives you a high and then a crash.  You need to eat vegetables and lean meat, some fruit.  Colorful, unprocessed foods you cut up yourself and cook or eat raw.  If you eat lots of vegetables, leafy greens, some nuts, a little fruit (not juice) and a little lean meat, poultry or fish every day, you will get off the binging blood sugar roller coaster and you will start feeling better.  Supplement with magnesium in the morning and calcium and vitamin D at night and a probiotic.