Losing weight is one aspect where lots of talks have been going on, but there are many people who are still struggling to gain weight. The reason for underweight can be attributed to anorexia / “lack of sleep”, unhealthy eating habits, hyperthyroidism and hormonal imbalance, or it can be other inherent medical conditions too. It has been also found that it can be related to genetics, i.e. hereditary in nature.
The key to gaining weight is gaining body and muscle mass proportionately. Well, the basic concept behind gaining weight is “consuming more than what you are spending”. Process wise, our body follows a uniform pattern for gaining weight, i.e. the calories taken in the form of food are spent as energy; however additional calories which were not spent as energy are stored as fat and leads to weight gain.
Hope that it is now clear that we have to “consume extra than what we are utilizing” to gain weight. Well, you have options to either gain weight in healthier way or gain it unhealthier way. The healthy diet not only includes energy rich fatty foods, but also all of the recommended daily allowances (RDAs) for vitamins, minerals, and protein. The healthy food will lead to increase in more muscle mass than just the fluffy / unhealthy fats in your body, thus you will look leaner and masculine rather than having an obese look. The unhealthy weight gain contributes to various diseases like diabetes, hypertension, heart attack, obesity, etc.
Well, now you should be wondering what a healthy diet should include. The healthy diet includes right proportions of carbohydrates, proteins and fats.
- Proteins: Proteins makes your body lean and muscular. The good sources of proteins are: Chicken, soybean, fish, egg, cottage cheese, pulses, yoghurt, nuts and whole nuts (includes, almonds, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds), sprouts and legumes.
- Carbohydrates: Carbohydrates are source of energy. If your daily meals do not have enough carbohydrates which can fulfill the energy requirements of your body, then body starts using proteins as energy source. Thus, there will be deficiency of proteins and it will be unavailable to carry out its original function of making your body leaner and muscular. Good source of carbohydrates are: Whole wheat bread, rice, whole wheat pasta, multi-grain bread, whole grain cereals, fruits, vegetables, etc.
- Fats: Fats are very important ingredients of food which help to gain body mass; however one has to make sure to take quality fats in proper quantity. If you do not maintain proper intake of quality fats it can lead to obese body prone to many diseases like hypertension, heart diseases, diabetes, arthritis, etc. Good source of fat are: Olive oil, groundnut oil, rice bran oil, etc. Omega-3 fatty acids are also good source quality fats. Fish oils are good source of Omega-3 fatty acids. In market, fish oils are available in the form of capsules.
Initially, if you are making sure to gain weight in healthier way…..you needn’t have to look for various weight loss plans or weight loss supplements available in the market.