Is It Permissible for Me to Eat More Food in Order to Gain Weight?
Answered by Ustadha Shazia Ahmad
Question
Is it permissible for me to eat more food in order to gain weight?
Answer
Thank you for your question. It is permissible for you to eat more food to gain weight. However, I would recommend the following steps.
1) Consult a doctor first to see whether you are indeed underweight, or if you are just tired, weak, lethargic, or feeling unwell.
2) Check your body fat percentage to determine whether you are at an optimal body composition for optimal health. It may be that you just need to build up muscle and not just gain fat. It sounds to me that you absolutely need to exercise, with a balance of weight training and cardio.
3) Consider different diets for gaining weight. Never ever use junk food to gain weight because it will just lead to heart disease or diabetes. Instead, use these healthy foods with good fats to gain weight.
- Homemade Protein Smoothies.
- Milk.
- Rice.
- Nuts and Nut Butters.
- Red Meats.
- Potatoes and Starches.
- Salmon and Oily Fish.
- Protein Supplements
- Avocadoes
- Dried Fruit
- Whole-grain bread
- Healthy cereals
- Dark chocolate
- Cheese
- Eggs
- Healthy oils, extra virgin olive oil, and coconut oil
- Full-fat yogurt
Also, if you are young, you should not worry too much about being underweight, children and teenagers tend to be naturally skinny and they gain weight when they are older. Consult a nutritionist, doctor, or dietician to learn the right way to do it.
Always take care of your body because it has a right over you and we will answer to Allah on the Day of Judgment if we protected it from disobedience and took care of it, or if we were neglectful. May Allah help us all take care of this obligation and take it seriously.
Here is a Prophetic du`a for you, “O Allah, grant me health in my body, and grant me health in my sight, and make it the inheritor from me, there is none has the right to be worshipped but Allah, the Forbearing, the Generous, Glory is to Allah, the Lord of the Magnificent Throne, and all praise is due to Allah, the Lord of all that exists (Allāhumma `āfinī fī jasadi, wa `āfinī fī baṣarī, waj`alhul-wāritha minnī, lā ilāha illāllah, al-ḥalīmul-karīm, subḥān Allāhi rabbil-`arshil-aẓīm, wal-ḥamdulillāhi rabbil-`alamīn).” [Tirmidhi]
[Ustadha] Shazia Ahmad
Checked and Approved by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani
Ustadha Shazia Ahmad lived in Damascus, Syria, for two years, where she studied Aqidah, Fiqh, Tajweed, Tafseer, and Arabic. She then attended the University of Texas at Austin, where she completed her Master’s in Arabic. Afterward, she moved to Amman, Jordan, where she studied Fiqh, Arabic, and other sciences. She recently moved back to Mississauga, Canada, where she lives with her family.
