Could you be undereating and not even know it? If you have more than one of the most common signs and symptoms I'm talking about today, you might need to take a look at your caloric intake!

SIGNS YOU MAY BE UNDEREATING

First of all, you need to know exactly what the role of the hormone, cortisol, is in your body. It's also known as the stress hormone and it absolutely has an effect on your appetite. We also need to understand some baselines for what some of the circumstances are that could actually lead to you undereating.

Did you know that it's possible to eat so few calories that you actually stop losing weight? This is one of the reasons why so many people believe they can't be undereating since their weight isn't going down, which leads them to eat even fewer calories.

I'm talking about 12 signs that you could be undereating on this episode. You should be having a bowel movement at least once a day. If it's less often, this could be a sign that you're not eating enough calories. Another sign is if you're cold all the time since your body isn't getting enough calories to keep it warm.

One of the biggest signs of undereating, and one that I work with a lot of women for, is the lack of a menstrual cycle. If you're malnourished, your body will think that you're not in a position to have and raise children, common during times of famine, so will naturally stop producing a period.

Have you ever found that after thinking a lot, you're feeling even more tired than if you do physical activity? This is because your brain uses glucose, a type of sugar, to function - and thinking can take a lot out of you!

The last sign is a surprising one: getting up to pee during the night, even once, could indicate a lack of calories in your diet. When you're eating enough, you should be sleeping through the night with your bladder, along with all your other organs, resting, too.

Are you finding yourself checking off more than one of the items on this list? Are you someone who used to feel this way and find that eating more helped resolve these issues? Let me know in the comments on the episode page!

Got a question you'd love to hear me answer on the show? Leave me a voice message here!

In This Episode

What cortisol's role in our body is
What some of the circumstances are the could lead to undereating
How a lack of weight loss might not be an indication that you're not undereating
How many times a day you should go to the bathroom
What your basal body temperature should never drop below
How inadequate calorie intake can affect your menstrual cycle
Why we feel more tired when we are thinking a lot
What it can mean if you're getting up to pee during the night

Quotes

"If undereating is creating a chronic stress response in your body, dropping those stress hormones by eating more is something that initially can make you feel more tired." (19:32)

"The truth is that being underfed chronically keeps your nervous system in a fight or flight mode. So, essentially you're body is going to think anything that's a threat is going to be much larger a threat than it actually is and it's going to have that heightened stress response, even in the face of simple daily stressors.." (37:22)

"In a perfect world, if we're not having any stress at all, our cortisol should be at it's highest point within 30 minutes of waking up. So if you're having a spike in cortisol at night when you're supposed to be asleep, this can actually wake you and your organs up." (45:31)

Links

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