u/Traditional_Spare282

I am 19, 5 foot 9 (175 cm) and i weigh 117lbs (53kg) on average, depending on where I am in my cycle

I'm a new firefighter, and so the nature of my job is very physically taxing. When my mental health is good I go to the gym 5x a week. I'm allergic to wheat according to medical tests, and I'm pretty sure I have IBS or something similar because many foods make me extremely sick. I get lethargic, diarrhea, stomach pain, and cramping and it doesn't stop. I have gone weeks without eating wheat just to keep getting sick. Because of this i'm low on a lot of nutrients and so I take supplements. I'm also always dehydrated.

Because I have a very fast metabolism (runs in my family) and I've been chronically under-eating since I was a little kid, I have always struggled to gain weight. I also get sick (like, extremely so, think strep/COVID/flu) every four ish months, every time I manage to gain a little weight I lose it all and then some. Example; I was up to about 125 on average (cuz period cycles mess with weight) and got sick about two weeks ago and lost ten pounds within three days.

I very easily forget to eat, and end up not eating a lot. Sometimes i think of my calorie intake and find that I've eaten less than 1000 calories over the course of two days.

Now, you might be thinking (as most all of my family and friends do) that I just need to eat more.

Heres where my issues horribly collide. My diet is essentially restricted to eating different meats, potatoes, and rice (excluding fruits and veggies of course). Sometimes i can manage to eat tomato sauce or light spices but I'm usually restricted to salt and pepper. No garlic, no onion, no paprika, no strong spices. Most dairy products make me sick so I stick to Oatmilk and non-dairy butters. Cottage cheese for some reason tends to go down well. In any case, my extremely restrictive diet means eating is a chore. It makes me not want to eat. I used to cook all the time before I had these issues and now I just don't even know what to eat. I think about getting myself some food and I've been eating the same things for months on end and I hate it. Nothing sounds good, and I usually end up going "well I wont eat then" and going to bed. I feel totally stuck. I can't afford to get professional help - my monthly income right now is less than 2k and I barley make it paycheck to paycheck - I can't afford to buy more food, but my health can't afford for me to keep living this way.

Right now I'm trying to get a job at a cafe so the food options I have are better (right now I work at Mcdonalds full time so I can volunteer as a firefighter, and I can only eat the breakfast food al la carte there) since I can't afford to buy enough food for myself every paycheck even for the small amount of food I do eat. Once I get a job at a more edible food place that will be very helpful. But the majority of the time I'm just at a loss.

I can't ever really eat out with friends, I hate eating now. Thinking about it all makes me want to cry. And because my issues include allergies, I'm terrified I'll go into shock one of these days from eating foods I'm allergic to out of necessity.

feel free to ask follow up questions, but I'm mostly just ranting and wanting any and all advice you have for me. Everything feels so hopeless right now and I've been in an absolute slump for weeks.

My only idea is to maybe have my boyfriend remind me to eat and hold me accountable, but I don't want him to feel like a caretaker.

I am 19, 5 foot 9 (175 cm) and i weigh 117lbs (53kg) on average, depending on where I am in my cycle

I'm a new firefighter, and so the nature of my job is very physically taxing. When my mental health is good I go to the gym 5x a week. I'm allergic to wheat according to medical tests, and I'm pretty sure I have IBS or something similar because many foods make me extremely sick. I get lethargic, diarrhea, stomach pain, and cramping and it doesn't stop. I have gone weeks without eating wheat just to keep getting sick. Because of this i'm low on a lot of nutrients and so I take supplements. I'm also always dehydrated.

Because I have a very fast metabolism (runs in my family) and I've been chronically under-eating since I was a little kid, I have always struggled to gain weight. I also get sick (like, extremely so, think strep/COVID/flu) every four ish months, every time I manage to gain a little weight I lose it all and then some. Example; I was up to about 125 on average (cuz period cycles mess with weight) and got sick about two weeks ago and lost ten pounds within three days.

I very easily forget to eat, and end up not eating a lot. Sometimes i think of my calorie intake and find that I've eaten less than 1000 calories over the course of two days.

Now, you might be thinking (as most all of my family and friends do) that I just need to eat more.

Heres where my issues horribly collide. My diet is essentially restricted to eating different meats, potatoes, and rice (excluding fruits and veggies of course). Sometimes i can manage to eat tomato sauce or light spices but I'm usually restricted to salt and pepper. No garlic, no onion, no paprika, no strong spices. Most dairy products make me sick so I stick to Oatmilk and non-dairy butters. Cottage cheese for some reason tends to go down well. In any case, my extremely restrictive diet means eating is a chore. It makes me not want to eat. I used to cook all the time before I had these issues and now I just don't even know what to eat. I think about getting myself some food and I've been eating the same things for months on end and I hate it. Nothing sounds good, and I usually end up going "well I wont eat then" and going to bed. I feel totally stuck. I can't afford to get professional help - my monthly income right now is less than 2k and I barley make it paycheck to paycheck - I can't afford to buy more food, but my health can't afford for me to keep living this way.

Right now I'm trying to get a job at a cafe so the food options I have are better (right now I work at Mcdonalds full time so I can volunteer as a firefighter, and I can only eat the breakfast food al la carte there) since I can't afford to buy enough food for myself every paycheck even for the small amount of food I do eat. Once I get a job at a more edible food place that will be very helpful. But the majority of the time I'm just at a loss.

I can't ever really eat out with friends, I hate eating now. Thinking about it all makes me want to cry. And because my issues include allergies, I'm terrified I'll go into shock one of these days from eating foods I'm allergic to out of necessity.

feel free to ask follow up questions, but I'm mostly just ranting and wanting any and all advice you have for me. Everything feels so hopeless right now and I've been in an absolute slump for weeks.

My only idea is to maybe have my boyfriend remind me to eat and hold me accountable, but I don't want him to feel like a caretaker.

I live in America, right now I'm 19, F, 117lbs on a good day, and I've been struggling with food my entire life.

I found out a few years ago through testing that I'm allergic to wheat, but honestly I think it's more that that. It feels like everything can make me sick. I've tested and restricted, and I found that cold drinks, iced coffee and most drinks, milk and cream, peas and corn, sugary foods, high fiber foods, and many others make me sick. It feels like I can't eat anything. Food used to be such a delight for me, I love cooking and I love making and eating delicious food. But now I'm restricted to like meant potatoes and rice. I can't even season my food cuz onion and garlic also get me. I like to eat a lot of Asian foods and rice noodles etc. but just in general it's so upsetting.

I also have chronic pain from a snowboarding accident when I was like 13 which injured my neck, and my parents never took me into the hospital. I really really want to achieve my career goals and health goals but it feels so impossible. I want to be strong and gain weight, I want to work hard, I want to have kids one day. It all just feels so impossible.

I'm also broke like everyone else, and I got kicked out of my parents house in January. I've been struggling ever since and it feels like getting food that doesn't make me sick is so hard. I'm also very active and trying to become a paramedic right now, and gaining weight has been downright impossible.

I'm tired all the time every single day. Yesterday I slept all night the day before but when I got home around 5pm I fell asleep immediately, and was in and out of sleep until I had to go to work this morning at 7am. That's well over 12 hours of sleep and it's from exhaustion not even depression which I've felt with before. It feels like my body is constantly fighting me. I feel bad on dates with my boyfriend because everything makes me sick. I'm worried every day that my allergies are gonna get worse and get me hospitalized. I don't know what to do. I think I'm going to see a nutritionist soon if I can, my deductable is filled this year so it should be affordable.

Does anybody have advice for my situation? I just don't know what to do.