Topic: Diet on school days--need help

[WQ F]

At the moment, everyday for "lunch," I bring 2 pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables, 2 hardboiled eggs, a meat sandwich weighing around 0.7 pounds, and a large piece of cake (same dimensions as the sandwich). I drink 2 cups of whole milk and 2 pills of Vitamin D for "breakfast" before I leave the house.
My school day is homeroom+8 periods and about 1-2 hours after school.
The fruits/vegetables usually consist of apples, grapes, baby carrots, and celery. I just take a few bite every period and generally finish around 7th period.
The meat in the sandwich is whatever sliced ham that's on sale. I start this 4th period and try to finish 4th period, but sometimes finish 8th period. The sandwich is extremely thick (2-3 inches) and a pain to eat.
My mom makes the cake out of the cheap box of cake mix at grocery stores with lots of eggs, walnuts, and milk. I try to finish this 2nd period along with the 2 eggs.

The problem is that I usually don't get enough to eat before 3rd period. I try to eat the most calorie dense foods first, but it's still hard to eat fast while doing classwork. The 3rd period teacher does not allow any eating in the classroom at all. 4th period is lunch, and by the time I finish lunch, I feel sleepy during 5th period. That's Calculus, the class I need to concentrate in the most. Then by the time it's after school, I'm hungry again. I try to eat as much as the school allows me to, but I'm still not gaining any weight. I'm seriously thinking about just bringing a gallon of milk to school everyday, but my parents think it's ridiculous (and it really is).
So far, I see 2 solutions, try to eat more 2nd period, or drink something nutritious 3rd period. Any suggestions?

Thanks!

[Bryan Augstein]

I don't understand why you feel the need to be constantly eating for 8-10 hours. What are you trying to accomplish by this?

[WQ F]

Not trying to constantly eat. The problem is that I have no time to eat enough. I have no opportunity to have breakfast at home. I have maybe a 3-minute opportunity to eat per class period other than 4th (I have 45 min per class period, but end up using most of 4th period to study anyway. I often end up skipping lunch entirely on really busy days). I'm pretty sure I'm expending more than I'm intaking per day. Gaining a bit of weight would be nice.
I've always hated eating; it's such a waste of time and money. I guess I'm asking what's something fairly healthy and calorie dense that can be consumed as fast as possible?

[Dan Elric]

Hate... Eating?  What...

[Bryan Augstein]

Trying to gain weight by munching on grapes and celery all day isn't going to work unless you literally consume your entire body weight. Not having enough time to eat isn't so much a diet issue as it is a planning issue. It might help to make your meals ahead of time and bring them with you. If you're really strapped for calories, a well made shake is a quick fix, but not ideal.

There is no magic answer to any diet problems. If you want to gain weight eat more, if you want to lose weight eat less, among other things. It comes down to if you have the will power to change.

I'm sorry if this doesn't answer your question, but honestly I still have no idea what you are trying to ask.

[WQ F]

Thanks, I already knew that much. My situation is quite strange. I’m probably consuming twice as much as I did 2 years ago. When I first started eating this much earlier this year, I was quite full everyday. My exercise did increase a bit, but not that much. I suspect I’m mainly losing energy through intense brain activity. Nowadays I work past midnight everyday on homework, research projects, college applications, etc. Then I wake up at 6:30 to 7:00 AM. After that I immediately go to school. Squeezing in time for breakfast here would not be worth it; I can’t afford having any less sleep. After school, I work on my research paper or some other school activity for another hour or 2 before going home to do homework. Sometime near midnight, I compromise my parkour training with maybe 20 min of pushups, pull-ups, and single leg squats. So unfortunately, I’m overly stressed and there is no opportunity to save time but through cutting down time for eating. That results in either cutting calories or quality of food. Nutrition is way too complex. Drinking oil and taking multivitamins would get me all the calories and vitamins, but that’s not a good solution.
Perhaps the problem is that my weekends are very different from school. I wake up at 10AM, have breakfast at 11AM, study, lunch at 4PM, 1-2 hours of parkour training, study some more, and sleep at 10PM. I know that’s bad.
Basically, I need to just survive with minimum damage to my body until I have more time. Living on borrowed time isn’t the right idiom; I’m just doing more than I have the time and effort for, but I now often borrow eating time from class time, borrow reading time from eating time, and borrow college application time from sleep time.
No magic? But I wanted to break the laws of thermodynamics!
Thanks again. I'll figure out something...

[Patrick Yang]

I'll leave the nutritional component of your problem to more knowledgeable folks, but it sounds like you've got some time management or overcommitment problems.  Would you be able to cut out a few things and really focus on doing fewer things really, really well?  Because it sounds like you're overstressed, which can adversely affect your health and happiness.  It doesn't matter how awesome a college you get into if you're miserable all the time.

You might try looking at this article, especially the bit about doing less.

[Schuman]

It comes down to this: if you eat more, you gain weight.
If you want to gain muscle mass, try going to a gym and lifting if you can fit it into your schedule.
For time management, try this: Make 30 PB&J sandwiches all at once, put them in individual sealed ziploc bags, and toss them in the freezer. Now, if you need a sandwich or snack, you've got a sandwich ready to go. They won't go bad so you can take them to school for lunch, and they're pretty good frozen.
If you're a protein drinker, Get a pack of 40 water bottles, pour the water into an empty pitcher for drinking, then put the power in the empty bottles. Then, if you want a shake, it's already half-made. (I put protein power and gatorade power together. Then just add water)

[Chris Salvato]

Im not really all about that PB&J Idea.  There is no significant amount of protein in a PB&J sandwich at all.

[Shae Perkins]

No time for breakfast? Uh, wake up 15 minutes earlier?

EDIT- I'm not trying to provide a rude, hasty comment here. I hope you don't take it that way:)

[Dan Frank]

How much do you weigh, how tall are you, why do you want to gain weight, and how much do you want to gain? You definitely have a time management problem that you need to work out, but your diet sounds pretty far off what it should be, too.

[meluvmath]

if you want to gain weight fast, you shud try eating alot of peanut butter.(just plain peanut butter with nothing else)