ozm8ey

Hello again well I've been trying to figure out what has made me go from around 81kgs to 100kgs. I take a medication called olanzapine 5mg which apparently makes you gain weight but i also drink quite a lot like 4-10 beers a night depends how i'm feeling. So what would be the most likely cause of the weight gain, oh and i don't really eat much except for when im pissed and get cravings for a packet of chips or whatever.

teatreeoil007

Whatcha takin the olanz for. . Out of curiosity .. I'd say it's the beer puttin on weight... And you might wanna take a look at the diet..it could use some tweaking...

suicideseason

Id agree with her, but I try not to judge.

ozm8ey

I used to get these racing thoughts and negative thought patterns really bad to the point I couldn't cope

suicideseason

Well I aint a rocket scientist but beer makes you get bloated depending on your body. I noticed most people when they quit drinking tend to get fit, aswell. Lifestyle change more than not. At one point all I would eat was them hostess snow balls, skinny as hell. I ate a whole box in 5 minutes when my son was born stressed the hell out not being able to see. Stick to proteins if you can...

teatreeoil007

Ah ... Is it helping .. ?

PurpleKnight

I lost weight when I quit drinking without changing my diet/exercise, so that was a clear sign that I was taking in extra calories, plus factor in all the bad eating decisions, sure I wasn't eating too much when I was drinking, but all those late night snacks and unhealthier foods I guess all added up.

Sobriety realigned my diet/exercise/routines to be more healthy, and that included better sleep, being more hydrated etc etc!!

endlesspatience

You will gain weight if your calorie intake exceeds the calories you spend as energy in movement during the day. If you take a lot of beer and crisps that will add calories to your diet and will lead to weight gain without a lot of exercise.

Sunflowerlife

The easiest way to find out is to use an app like Myfitnesspal. You could log a typical day of beers and food to figure out how many calories that is. Then calculate your BMR (basal metabolic rate). Use this calculator for that:

BMR Calculator

That will tell you the calories you need to maintain your weight. Anything above that will make you gain and remember that it takes 3500 calories to add a pound of fat.
I am in the same boat, taking zoloft and was drinking 2 bottles of wine a day and gaining weight. The zoloft itself affected my food choices, carb and alcohol cravings so I ended up eating/drinking more and therefore gaining weight.
To lose the weight, you also have to create a deficit. So take that BMR and try to cut 3500 calories a week for a 1 pound loss a week (using diet and exercise is the best way).

I think in the end medications that cause weight gain tend to affect the way we eat. I am sure some can change our metabolism but I am not sure to what degree. Have you researched it at all?

BlissWithin

I started taking antipsychotics after I stopped drinking and using drugs, and I gained 25 kg over 2 years, so I'm pretty sure it's the medication, the bad thing is that you can't lose that weight while you are taking antipsychotics because it slows your metabolism and also fatigues you very easily when you try to exercise, now that I'm tapering them down I was able to lose 10 kg in the last 6 months. Another side effect of taking antipsychotics for so long is that my blood sugar got very high, as these drugs makes your insulin innefective.

Edit: Now I see that you are still drinking, so I would say it's probably a combination of both.

Change4good

10 beers is about 1500 calories, minimally. A pound is 3500 calories. So in two days, those empty calories could add up to almost a pound. And there is zero nutrition or benefit in those wasted calories.

No way around it. . .if you consume too many calories in a day, it turns into weight gain.

If you are trying to lose weight, I hope this is helpful. Seems that cutting out the beer might offset weight from medication.

biminiblue

You subtract 3500 a week from your BMR + Daily Activity.

NOT from your BMR.

Here is Myfitnesspal's BMR calculator and explanation of BMR. Don't subtract calories from your BMR, use an activity calculator, and then subtract! MFP actually uses the Mifflin-St. Jeor equations to calculate your daily activity + BMR and then subtracts from that number.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/tools/bmr-calculator

Here is a group with good information on Myfitnesspal - Eat, Train, Progress

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en...train-progress

ozm8ey , welcome to the site and well done for decided to quit drinking. It can only help with your weight issues, and likely with your racing thoughts and anxiety as well. I stopped my medication, which was causing me to not want to do much at all and that makes it hard to lose weight, too. I found I didn't have nearly as many racing thoughts when not drinking. I maintain my weight just fine without using alcohol and meds. Just my experience.

SoberinSyracuse

For me, the combo of hardly eating food and downing 12-15 drinks/day was the perfect recipe to gain about 25 lbs in a little over a year. Threw my metabolism into a real tailspin!

ItWillBeWorthIt

It would be both that are causing weight gain.

The bigger concern would be why you are drinking while you are on olanzapine ... the beer will not make the medication work right.

I have been on that medication before and my doctor said NO drinking.

Dangerous combination in my opinion - did your doctor say it was fine????

Concerned for you.

Sunflowerlife

Well yes, that part is explained at the bottom of the link I provided for calculating BMR. However, I don't personally count the calories I burn during exercise towards my weight loss goals. I use the sedentary activity level as a baseline and the OP never mentioned anything about exercise.

If you can burn 300 a day in exercise and cut 200 in diet, that's 500 a day. It would be pointless to eat back that 300 calories.