I didn't buy into the whole metabolic health thing -- I thought a calorie was a calorie. But as a person who couldn't lose weight for years due to insulin resistance, just a single daily dose of metformin enables me to lose weight. I was advised to take either that or a miniscule dose of a GLP-1 agonist.

Is there a drug I can take to gain weight?

You have so much choice:

For the pure fat experience I suggest corticosteroids, lithium or a random antipsychotic. Insulin is also very useful here, but a tad dangerous.

If it has to be muscle mass, then anabolic steroids of course are preferable. But beta adrenergic agonists like clenbuterol also seem to have some effect.

And there are many more.

Corticosteroids are also pretty damn dangerous

They all have uncomfortable side effects, especially the fatty-inducing ones. But insulin stands out for being able to kill you very quickly from a moderate overdose.

Well corticosteroid withdrawal will kill you also, or ruin your life if you fuck up and dont taper off quick enough.

I don't want you to consider it among the flippant replies here but definitely alcohol will work up to a point, it's somewhat of a contradiction though because severe alcoholics are usually quite malnourished and thin.

Alcohol itself has a lot of calories. Or does it cause even more appetite in addition?

Antipsychotics tend to do the trick.

Its called sugar

Caution: It's highly addictive

Apparently only for some people.

Gaining weight works by putting more fuel into your body than you need. That's physically the only way, there is no way to synthesize energy. Less movement is a bad idea. So more fuel it is. Because of caloric density limits this will necessarily mean that you put a certain amount of stuff in your body (in contrast to the other way around, where physics allows for more options)

What's the job that the weight gain intervention needs to do for you, that any type of food does not? Are you for example disgusted to swallow anything?

> A pill can physically not contain enough calories.

No, but a pill can make you want to eat more or fidget less etc.

Weight from muscle? Or from fat?

mj

Fun fact: eating a bunch of black pepper cancels that out.

This spiked my interest, so I looked around and found a 2018 paper (DOI: 10.1039/c7fo01715d) which, when fed into an LLM, gave me the following information (edited for brevity and clarity). Please note that I did not verify any of the LLM's claims, so take with a pinch of salt. Or pepper.

  The study tested a black pepper-based beverage (BPB) containing 20 mg gallic acid equivalent of polyphenols.
  
  Key findings:

  - Lowered hunger by 17%
  - Reduced desire to eat by 15%
  - Decreased prospective food consumption by 17%
  - Increased satiety by 14%
  - Increased fullness by 16%

  What didn't change:
  
  - Blood glucose and insulin responses
  - Gastrointestinal discomfort
  - Gut hormones (PYY and GLP-1)

  Approach:

  - The beverage was consumed 10 minutes before a meal
  - It contained water-extracted black pepper compounds (not piperine, which isn't water-soluble)
  - The extraction used hot water at 90°C for 3 minutes

  If you want to try this:

  1. Make a black pepper extract: Steep 20g of black pepper in 100ml of hot water (90°C) for 3 minutes, then strain and dilute with 900ml of water
  2. Timing: Consume about 10-15 minutes before meals
  3. Monitor your response: Track your appetite sensations to see if it works for you

  Critical notes:

  - The appetite-suppressing effects appear to be from water-soluble polyphenols (like apigenin and luteolin compounds), not piperine
  - The study was short-term, so long-term effects are unknown
  - Individual responses may vary
  - This won't affect your blood sugar or metabolism directly

I meant it cancels out the effect of THC. Which is handy if you've taken an edible and are getting tired of it. But yes, that too.

Oh, now I get it, you're saying that the black pepper "unhighs" you? Never knew that, I'm going to have to try that sometime. Do you just munch on a teaspoon of peppercorns?

Yep.

> when fed into an LLM, gave me the following information (edited for brevity and clarity). Please note that I did not verify any of the LLM's claims

Please don’t do this.

What's mj?

Sorry was lazy with the typing last night.

mary jane, marijuana, wacky-tobacky, pot, weed...

Ice cream and cheese

Steroids and antipsychotics usually cause massive weight gain.

This concept would be hard to grasp for me if I did not know personally a person facing such issue. I don't think most people can understand that "just eat more" does not work in such cases, because most people can eat just fine even if not really hungry.

As someone in the same boat, what worked for me is to replace ingredients with higher calorie versions. A significant one is replacing milk in recipes (polenta, mashed potatoes etc.) with heavy cream, this provides a good 500 calories boost on the same portion of food. Also adding sugar here and there to recipes that allow it without ruining taste.

Just look at people with cancer. Many simply cannot eat. At all. They just cannot do it. It's not depression, loads of other diseases and conditions are depressing, yet people can still eat.

And while the person is clearly sick, every loved one tries to help by hoping to find food they can eat. Yet it just doesn't work. I've personally seen feeding tubes put in, to help in this regard.

There's some mechanism involved, and I've often wondered if the body knows food will also feed the tumor and is attempting to starve it. Regardless, the 'switch' is there.

> because most people can eat just fine even if not really hungry.

I literally cannot imagine how this is possible. Don't you feel full? Doesn't your body start refusing to swallow? Doesn't the food turn tasteless and start making you nauseous? 100-200kcal over your BMR, sure, but beyond that?

Hunger and satiation are two different neural pathways. Hunger is low blood sugar. Satiation is stretching of the stomach. You can still eat even with normal blood sugar if your stomach isn't full.

Which is a large part of why weight loss diet advice usually included a bunch of stuff about stuffing your face with iceberg lettuce and other high volume low calorie foods. It makes you feel satiated sooner.

Look at approximately any thanksgiving dinner in the US?

Throughout history, occasional lavish feasts have been very common in nearly every culture.

No, those are symptoms of an eating disorder.

> Obviously she broke her metabolic system and she obviously did it through diet.

It sounds 'obvious', but I don't think it's obvious that she did it through diet.

> Obviously she broke her metabolic system and she obviously did it through diet.

No, she picked up a mental behavioral disorder that has nothing to do with her metabolism.