<p>As an HS senior I'm not quite in college yet, but I am wondering if I can keep my old eating habits, since I hear it's quite common to gain weight in college. Since swimming season ended for me two months ago I've been inactive in sports, and I've done minimal exercise like the occasional 40-minute walk home from school and running out in the morning. I have however, continued the same eating habits I have had before -- the ones I've kept for years. I don't know how it's possible that I can eat loads of ice cream, pasta and other high-energy goodies when all I have done this year is mostly stress out for exams, apps and play mind-engaging computer games.</p>
<p>My desired reason: Intense mental activity like exam-taking, chess-playing and essay-writing actually requires a lot of carbs, which accounts for the lack of weight-gain.</p>
<p>My feared reason: Weight gain is not occurring because of the high metabolism of youth, allowing for the consumption of 8000 calories per day without the gain of a single gram. Once you age past 18, watch out! </p>
<p>I rather enjoy the feeling of being able to eat what is sensible to me (I balance my eating of junk food with nutritious items, naturally...) in a laissez-faire kind of way. Counting carbs and watching your diet seems like a rather torturously repressive thing to do that I'd rather not do in the future. </p>
<p>So basically, as long as I manage to keep my mind thinking hard and burning insane stores of glucose debating, playing chess and so forth, accompanied with the occasional sport, is it likely I can avoid weight gain in the next four years?</p>
<p>Actually your brain burns a significant amount of calories per day. I believe I read a study once which said it burns the most of any part of your body if extremely stimulated. Not sure if that took into account muscles during a hard workout though, and certainly it wouldn't be enough to eat huge numbers of calories. Unless you eat like a pig, just put yourself on a low-intensity training regimen and that should be enough.</p>
<p>Intense mental activity does nothing. I'm not sure why you haven't had any weight gain, it has definitely come for me since my swim season ended and I have been eating less and still working out some.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Good lord, just work out. I can see this thread attracting all of the WoW players. You think debating is intense? Chess?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I don't know where I heard this (so I need to track it down, find the scientific paper that verifies it, etc.) but it was inspired by the idea that a two hour chess game often ends up being physically exhausting because of the energy it consumes...</p>
<p>I'm sure there must be limits to my metabolism though, because if there's one I haven't hit it yet ... I consume something like a tub of ice cream per week, along with whipped cream. I don't have a car so I'm often forced to walk to a lot of places though. </p>
<p>WoW isn't really mentally strenuous, since you're not trying to plan 2^32 different attacks.</p>
<p>Fine, I looked it up. Apparently you DO burn more calories thinking than just sitting there. About 1.5/minute. So an hour of hardcore thinking nets you 90 burnt calories. Still not enough to significantly offset a lack of physical exercise.</p>
<p>Wow.. is 30 minutes of moderate exercise most days of the week really THAT difficult? That's all the recommendations are: 30 minutes a day most days of the week. Not hard.</p>
<p>You burn more calories sleeping than watching tv. But thinking at all and thinking "hard" make a negligible difference in the amount of calories. Another reason you may be maintaining weight is that you're losing muscle mass and replacing it with fat.</p>
<p>Yea, when you study real hard, you feel tired and even a bit hungry, but I've never felt like it was a 'work-out'. Like someone said, 30 minutes every day or two won't kill you and will keep you relatively healthy.</p>
<p>I'm not talking about exercise though -- just whether I can maintain the same habits through most of my 20s, since I've been eating about the same since I was 10. </p>
<p>As in, if you haven't been watching your diet for years and you're relatively fit, when should I expect to have to do that sort of torture?</p>
<p>Some exercise is a minimum (since I don't drive, and don't expect to in the future), but I'm not talking about that.</p>
<p>You will get fat if you keep up what you are doing unless your body just doesn't get fat... but trust me, you aren't staying skinny because of your "rigorous mental workout" lol. If you don't lift you are just going to be a wuss with a beer gut with no muscles.</p>
<p>A 30 minute workout is torture? You are destined to be a fat mess.</p>
<p>
[quote]
As in, if you haven't been watching your diet for years and you're relatively fit, when should I expect to have to do that sort of torture?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>You're looking at it totally wrong.</p>
<p>Tell me which fits your schedule better: Exercising 30 minutes a day most days of the week or being DEAD 24 hours a day every week???</p>
<p>Physical exercise like swimming and running never seems to affect my weight ever, only stamina and muscle firmness, which AFAIK are issues quite unrelated to weight.</p>
<p>Actually, cardiovascular activity (ie, running and swimming) are the best way to lose weight. It has to be combined with a good diet, of course.</p>
No...and unless you're a pro basketball player, you can't eat 8000 calories a day without being morbidly obese.
</p>
<p>That is, purely as a matter of fact, totally and blatantly incorrect. I have a number of friends who eat in that region daily, and because of their ridiculous metabolisms maintain a normal weight (or in one friend's case, almost too low a weight). It is uncommon yes, but not impossible for people to eat that much and maintain weight.</p>