Understanding Body Fat

Body fat is completely related to calories, and the amount that we have is directly influenced by the number of calories consumed versus calories expended. Calories consumed obviously come from the foods we eat. It is important to recognize that when we consume any type of food in excess, whether it is carbohydrates, protein or dietary fat, it will be converted to body fat.

The flip side of the equation is calories used or expended. This brings exercise to mind, however, your body also expends calories in other ways. We focus on exercise because it is the method that can be most easily manipulated. Any form of exercise, at any intensity—aerobic training, resistance training, going out for a walk or performing a spring workout—burns calories and is, therefore, better than doing nothing at all. With all of this in mind, let's look at an interesting statistic:

Our bodies store energy in some 30 billion fat cells, mostly beneath our skin and around our abdomen. If we are overweight, we have more of these cells and each is larger. The very obese may have 75 billion cells with about 50 percent more fat in each one. When an obese person loses weight, the fat cells shrink but their number is unchanged.

Based on this fact, it is important to understand that those thousands and thousands of individual fat cells that give us those nice love handles act as one unit and essentially have three options:

• to grow and possibly divide;

• to rest as is; or

• to shrink in size.

The option your fat cells will choose completely depends on the calories you consume versus the calories you burn in your daily activity.  Personally, I want to do everything in my power to make sure all my pesky fat cells SHRINK, don't you?!?