5. Your Existing Activity Patterns
If you are reading this and are frustrated because you already exercise – or consider yourself to have a pretty active daily routine – and are still not losing weight, this may be a result of the following:
If you are reading this thinking it’s about time I became more active – then what are you waiting for?
Where Do We Store Our Body Fat?
Have you ever wondered why some of us seem to store all our body fat on our hips and thighs and some of us tend to have long lean arms and legs but store more of our body fat around our midriffs? This distribution of fat is associated directly to two main hormones in the body. These hormones, lipoprotein lipase LPL and hormone sensitive lipase HSL, directly affect whether we store fat or encourage it to be distributed in the blood and then burnt off LPL tends to encourage fat storage and HSL tends to encourage fat to be burnt off The amount of LPL and HSL we have tends to vary between men and women, individuals and areas of the body.
Men tend to have more LPL in the belly and less HSL in the lower hip area. This creates the more pronounced apple shape we see in overweight men, with more body fat distributed around the belly. Women tend to have more LPL in the hips and back of the arms and less HSL in the upper body. This classically creates more of our traditional pear shape. When women lose weight we generally still have more LPL in the hips so still have a pear shape.
So the challenge for us is to try and create more HSL and one of the best ways to do this is with exercise. Weight-bearing aerobic exercise such as brisk walking, jogging and aerobics is the best form of exercise to choose. Swimming, even though it is an aerobic activity, has shown to be less effective for weight loss as it is non-weight bearing so it is not so effective in burning off calories. In addition, swimming increases LPL, which has the effect of decreasing our core temperature, which in turn can stimulate us to eat more.
Carb Curfew will help you reduce your weight and body fat and boost your confidence to put you in control long-term. It is important to understand however that due to your own individual makeup your body will have an optimum shape it naturally wants to be.
Why Is Measuring Body Fat Important?
When we stand on weighing scales we are actually measuring our total body weight, which is made up of muscle tissue (also known as muscle mass or fat-free mass) and fat tissue (also known as fat mass). Muscle is denser than body fat, so if you took a pound of muscle and you took a pound of fat, the pound of fat would take up a lot more space. It is the amount of fat that we have in our bodies that actually affects our body shape and health. The reading we receive from traditional bathroom scales tells us what the total amount of our body weight is – body fat and muscle (and other tissue such as bone) – but it does not tell us how much fat we actually have. It is this excess body fat that is associated with heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes and certain types of cancer. By measuring our body fat not only are we monitoring how much of our weight is actually fat but it also gives us an indicator of our health status. Monitoring our percentage body fat actually allows us to impact our health by ensuring we lose body fat as opposed to muscle mass.
Studies have shown that with very low calorie diets, the body will actually lose muscle mass and keep hold of body fat. This means that with some ‘diets’ you may actually increase the amount of body fat you have!
How Can I Measure How Much Body Fat I Have?
Body fat can be measured in a number of ways. One method is with skin-fold calipers. The skin folds are generally taken at four sites around the body.
A more convenient and accurate method to measure in your own home however is with body fat monitors. Constructed as a set of bathroom weighing scales, by entering your height and sex and standing on the scales, a safe technique known as bioelectrical impedance analysis will determine your percentage body fat. Replacing bathroom scales with body fat monitors will give a true idea of what is happening inside you – this way you get to see a complete picture of your total body weight, muscle mass and fat mass. Body fat monitors are now available from a wide range of outlets.
How Much Body Fat Should We Have?
We all need to have body fat. Too little and we run the risk of decreased fertility and the onset of amenorrhea, a condition where the female periods stop. Too much body fat is associated with an increased risk of heart disease, hypertension, diabetes and some cancers. So what exactly are the healthy ranges? The figures shown below are broadly accepted as the ideal percentages for body fat.
| Males | |
| Age 18–39: | 8%-20% |
| Age 40–59: | 11%-22% |
| Age 60+: | 13%-25% |
| Females | |
| Age 18–39: | 21%–33% |
| Age 40–59: | 23%-34% |
| Age 60+: | 24%-36% |
| Source: European | Congress of Obesity, 1999 |
What Fat-Loss Target Should We Aim For?
Changing body fat does take time but the benefits you see will be long-term. A two to four per cent decrease in body fat over a ten-week period is a sensible and realistic target. Although this may not sound a lot, in real terms this will represent a two to four per cent decrease in the amount of fat your body is actually carrying with you day in and day out.
Recording Your Progress
It is good to keep a record of how much body fat you are losing each week so you can see how much progress you are making. Here is what you do:
Factors Determining Your Success
Your Willpower
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