u/Human-Situation9944

Hello, I see a lot of posts in the fitness communities about prioritizing recovery. Does that mean I shouldn't do my normal 1 1/2hrs of cardio a day? I want to gain muscle but I am also an endurance athlete and train daily to improve my performance. Am i overloading my body? I only do zone 2 so it really isnt physically taxing. I workout upper and lower twice a week and my core twice as well. They are spaced out and each muscle group gets atleast a day of recovery.

Hi guys! Ive been on T for five years and am unsure about how to calculate my tdee. Do I put female or male? And also if I weight lift daily for 30 mins and do 1 1/2hrs of cardio (separately) then would I put lightly active? Thank you!

Hello,

I am a physics sophomore transfer student and just wanted to poke yalls brain on what you found to be the most effective in finding friends. I assume clubs but wanted to know if I am missing anything. Thank you guys!

I relapsed. Its been three months. I was never trying to stay sober but i still feel disappointed that I still fucking do this. I just want more scars. I want to feel pain again. Theres something so relaxing about it

Hello,

I been super duper pale my whole life and my family has horrible risks for skin cancer. I am a man and so I have a lot of hair. Am i still able to self tan without shaving? Do people self tan all the time or just for events? Is it worth the money? Is it better to just use a lotion instead? I know i sound clueless, sorry🥲

Hello all,

I have really been struggling with c/s and i dont even know what im doing to my body. I try to research because I know it cant be good but i cant seem to find a lot about it. Could you guys share your experience/what youve researched? Thank you guys!

This is a jumbled wall of text. I apologize for bad grammar etc. it feels nice to send this into the online void.

Over two years ago I met a man on grindr(what a great start right?). Id just turned 18, my whole life I have had a level of limerence. It started with the fantasy of my parents caring for me, I coped with this meglect by obsessing over a boy my age. This eventually ended but the need for external validation didnt. Anyways at 18 I hooked up with this guy, way older than me, way more experienced, and he was my first kiss(among other things). We only met once, talked maybe for two weeks. He was horrible emotionally. I thought I was over it but I am once again constantly fantasizing about him, everything reminds me of him, I talk to him in my head almost all the time. We talked off and on for awhile but again the reality was so far from how I have made him up in my head. He was disrespectful, unavailable, and treated me like an object. The man in my head has his looks, his eyes, that voice and those hands that I cant forget. I know I am so far off from the truth. That reconnecting with him would not only be foolish but borderline creepy at this point (I cannot count how many times i have blocked and unblocked him). He always reciprocated *enough* but never fully. I think he enjoyed how dependent I was on him. I mean i would often kid myself into thinking when I lived in another state he would come fly down...I haven't talked to him in 6-7 months. I thought I was over it. Everyday I mourn what we couldve had. I feel so stupid writing this because its completely nonsensical but my stupid brain looks for him in everything. When I go somewhere I hope he's there, when i drive i hope i see his car, when I go on dating apps I hope he'll somehow find me, i check if he added me over and over. Im just feeling put out. I want to have a actual loving relationship with someone who wont treat me like this but with where I am at(completely occupied with these thoughts) I cant even be attracted to other people. Its gotten to the point that I truly think I am somehow spiritually calling out to him and we will reconnect and he will be all the things I want him to be. This feels like a curse.

I have been wanting to adjust what is most important in my workout routines and often wonder which is a better idea to be consistent on.

45 min high intensity cardio a day or 10k steps a day. I want to do both but sometimes life gets in the way so I just wanted to know which is better for leaning out/staying healthy.

I have been wanting to adjust what is most important in my workout routines and often wonder which is a better idea to be consistent on.

45 min high intensity cardio a day or 10k steps a day. I want to do both but sometimes life gets in the way so I just wanted to know which is better for leaning out/staying healthy.

Trigger warning: discussion of habits, some numbers mentioned/bmi/ and if you do not know what C/S stands for dont read this please it has made things so much harder.
This is basically just me being miserable nothing revolutionary or productive.

I just finished a therapy session and I have no one to talk to so here I am posting into the void. I relapsed 7 months ago. I had been in semi recovery for almost 4ish years. Now being an adult and living with this evil fucking disorder my life has become so lonely and unmanageable. Yesterday I relapsed on c/s and it had been atleast 2 months where I havent. I feel so ashamed and embarrassed going to the store buying food i wont let myself swallow. I just want to spend my days doing it. I want to do it again today. I have developed stranger and stranger behaviors to compensate for my restriction. Ive lost more and more weight, I havent been at this bmi in years. Im so dissatisfied and im so addicted and i cant stop wanting to lose more. I wake up at 5:30 and exhaust myself with hard cardio to then pass out and not eat for hours. Then i over eat and feel horrible and then restrict and feel horrible. Ive injured my legs from the cardio and now I am sitting here breaking down because I'm so afraid im going to gain weight from not working out once. From not hitting my step goal once. For being so lazy. I have never been prouder and somehow also more insecure about my body. My family is full of eating disorders and they know i have been losing weight and instead of helping or offering support they insist on taking me to nasty restaurants forcing me to eat while they watch and eat a bite (maybe) of their food. Im completely isolated and I have refused invitations to social events purely out of shame or because i have planned a c/s binge or that i need to workout. I hate how sad my life has become. I used to draw, i used to enjoy going outside, i used to laugh and wear clothes that made me feel like me. Now i can barely put on a pair of ill fitting jeans. I feel like a fog has surrounded me and i can no longer touch or feel or live. Im just stuck thinking about my next meal and when i will hit my gw. I have breakdowns when i cant weigh my food and even when i can i am never satisfied. I upped my intake recently and it has only caused me more and more suffering. Im so worried I will never be done. I will never be skinny enough. I never thought id end up here again. I never thought I would keep lowering and lowering my goal. That i just wanted to lose the pudge not become emaciated. But now i cant stop, truthfully i dont know if i want to. Maybe thats my own sickness sayin that but i never feel attractive unless im severely underweight. I want to heal but recovery meant being a size I now look back at with horror. All i feel is shame that i allowed myself to get so big. I want so badly to have friends, to go out and eat without worry, to enjoy intimacy without sucking my stomach in or being so stressed someone is touching a body i find to be so horrific and unlovable. I feel like a monster wearing the skin of an ugly pale man who will never be able to pass as human. That everyone can tell there is and always will be something fundamentally wrong with me. I just want peace but i dont think ill ever find it.

TW non descriptive mentions of csa
This whole thing is me being a sad sack sorry in advance

Dating is so hard. I'm sure if you're reading this then I'm preaching to the choir here haha. I often feel an immense amount of guilt when I develop feelings for people. I cant help but want connection and love but the constant hard conversations I have to have prior to intimacy or even getting into a relationship feels so fucking demeaning. I feel so bad they even have to listen to what I tell them. I'd rather never be with anyone but I mean of course I dont truly mean that. I wish I could just throw it all out the window and pretend it never happened. Im scared of being vulnerable with the wrong person(the irony). Im scared they will use it against me, or to exploit how willing I am to disregard myself. Im scared they'll hear what has happened and run for the hills or eventually feel worn down by how horrifically unmanageable my episodes/mental health issues are. I go to therapy, I do emdr, I try so hard to not be affected by it all. But everyday I remember, everytime I feel romantic or flirtious I remember what happened. Everytime I see other people in a relationship I am so incredibly jealous. I want to be cared for like my parents never did in the aftermath of it all. I want someone to listen and not treat me differently. But it feels like too much to ask. Who would want to deal with a self loathing traumatized dude who cant get it up without there being some level of abuse involved. I hate how my body betrays me. I hate how I cant just enjoy being sexual. The dating world is so sexual, so many requests for photos, for hookups, to have sex so early on, to talk about your body count. How am i supposed to truthfully answer that question knowing my 'bodies' were never ones I wanted. How do I deflect from being praised for certain acts that I had continually performed out of necessity. I cant differentiate between love and being used. I dont see what value I have if not what my abusers chose me for. I just wish it never happened.

Recently from the whole protein fad grocery items I have thought it would be interesting to track how much protein i eat a day. Turns out for basically my entire life I have maybe been eating 30g daily MAYBE. I have always been "skinny" and technically underweight but I look as soft as Pillsbury dough. I have now been eating around 80-90g consistently (5'4, 99lbs, 20 years old). I walk around 8 miles a day and started doing very minimal lifting albeit somewhat consistent (maybe 3 weeks). I know i wont see results for awhile but I wanted to post here about how long I have had basically no substantial muscle and if this will impact my journey also if anyone has gone through something similar and any specific tips etc... my goals arent crazy i just would like to look semi muscular/more hardened

thank you!

Tdlr: sexual trauma victim seeking help on vaginal atrophy with doctors that refuse to find a way to help me without a pelvic exam.

Recently I reached out to my GP to discuss vaginal atrophy which I am 99% I am experiencing. The symptoms line up and I have been on T for 5+ years now. Penetration is painful, dryness etc... I communicated this to my doctor who is apparently a gender specialist even though she spent the majority of the appointment trying to push birth control and an iud onto me. Mind you she has absolutely no clue what my sexuality is!! I insisted multiple times that I am NOT sexually active in that manner and would have absolutely ZERO reason to be a birth control. This alone made me feel dysphoric and gross. Then on top of this she refuses to believe that I am experiencing vaginal atrophy and says I will need to go to the gynecologist (another major point of dysphoria for me). I expressed that I am uncomfortable with any type of pelvic exam and she just told me "well too bad then".

I understand vagina issues = go to gyno but I have been sexually abused and cannot have people interact with that area, even partners, without having a major fucking freak out/flashbacks/panic attack. I am trying my best to work this out in therapy but I still need fucking medical care.

Does anyone have any ideas on how to navigate this? To be clear though I cant and will never be open to a pelvic exam. I am happy to swab myself or get my blood drawn or whatever the fuck. Im so pissed off and dysphoric and I hate that I even have to deal with this. I mean shits already stacked against trans ppl in healthcare and now i have to what allow doctors to pressure me into being re traumatized in a field that frankly gives zero shits about actual female healthcare. Sorry for the wall of text/rant.

Hello! I wanted to ask what my acitvity level would be if I get 20k steps and 15 minutes of weightlifting a day(yes everyday no sedentary days). My walks are not strenuous but it usually is 3-4 hrs in total I walk. The weightlifting is minimal but does get my heart pumping a little. Would this be moderately active since it's not very demanding/strenuous?
Sex: M
Age: 20
Weight: 100lbs
Height: 5'4
Yes I know I am underweight I am actively trying to gain weight and want to figure out a healthy surplus based off my tdee

Hello! I wanted to ask what my acitvity level would be if I get 20k steps and 15 minutes of weightlifting a day(yes everyday no sedentary days). My walks are not strenuous but it usually is 3-4 hrs in total I walk. The weightlifting is minimal but does get my heart pumping a little. Would this be moderately active since it's not very demanding/strenuous?
Sex: M
Age: 20
Weight: 100lbs
Height: 5'4
Yes I know I am underweight I am actively trying to gain weight and want to figure out a healthy surplus based off my tdee