The proven benefits of fat loss….

Today's Post: Tuesday, 7-14-2009

Real fat loss is excess fat someone used to have that they’ve managed to remove permanently.

(Any fat people get rid of that they then regain is just temporary fat removal not real fat loss.)

The good news is that the food and exercise lifestyle changes that help you remove excess fat and do so in ways that improve or protect your health work best to remove fat and to have any pounds you lose be only fat. And, once you get accustomed to doing them, it is often quite doable to simply continue. That results in real and permanent fat loss.

I was just reminded today that there is a National Registry for people who have lost 30 pounds or more and kept it off for more than 5 years. (The average person they have on their list has lost 66 pounds and kept it off for more than 5 years.)

(See: http://www.nwcr.ws/ .)

Then I found this in the abstract of a research paper by someone who had studied this group.:

“Nearly all registry members indicated that weight loss led to improvements in their level of energy, physical mobility, general mood, self-confidence, and physical health.”

More abundant energy. Move more easily and in more ways. Simply feel better all the time. Have more self-confidence. Become and stay healthier.

The pictures of some of these people also show that they look better!!

That’s an impressive list!

Some of these effects come directly from having less fat weight to carry around.

Some come from the things people did and continue to do that cause their fat to leave and not come back.

Some come from the resulting health improvements.

Some come from becoming more normal in appearance and therefore from more often more noticed as a person, NOT as a fat person --and from being better treated.

And yet others come from the experience of trying to do something and then succeeding at it.

The first two benefits, more energy and more mobility, come in part from what might be called the Hot Rod effect. Full sized cars used to weigh well over 4,000 pounds and often had 100 horse power engines. Then some young people got the idea to take smaller cars that weighed more like 2600 pounds and then installed much larger engines that they made more powerful and super charged to get over 300 horsepower. Then instead of each horsepower moving 40 pounds, in the resulting “Hot Rod”, each horsepower moved only a bit less than 9 pounds. That car would then accelerate more than twice as fast and was much more nimble.

Fat loss and the resulting increase in mobility are much the same. Your body has less weight to move. And, because to lose the fat weight you likely did enough exercise, quite possibly including strength training and interval cardio, your control of your muscles is better; your muscles are stronger; & your heart is stronger as well. Small wonder you have more energy and move better. You’ve literally made the same kinds of changes in yourself that the Hot Rodders made to their cars. So your power to weight ratio is MUCH better.

Part of the feeling better and more confident is because of this effect. You feel more capable because you actually are more capable at that point.

In addition, the foods that make you fat tend to have a boom and bust effect. Your energy and mood are OK for just a bit and then quickly get much worse. But by stopping or mostly stopping those foods and eating foods that provide a more steady flow of energy, you simply don’t run out of gas emotionally or in your energy level as much or as often. You feel better and have more energy in part by no longer having your mood and energy levels crash every day – & often more than once.

In addition, the health benefits of losing even the first 5 or 10 % of your bodyweight as fat, let alone losing all the excess combined with the health benefits of the regular exercise you likely began to do, are so many and so large it’s almost unbelievable.

Your protective HDL goes up while your LDL, triglycerides, and inflammation level all go down.

If you had insulin resistance, high blood sugar, or type 2 diabetes, it either went away completely or it got very much better.

If your blood pressure was too high, it’s either now much better and down to a level that likely is safe without needing to take drugs or it’s simply gone.

If you had acid reflux, it’s either much better or completely gone.

If you had painful ankle, knee or hip joints, they will hurt less or not at all.

You’ll get far less asthma and breathe better.

You’ll also live longer and in good enough health to enjoy the extra years.

Among other things, your sex life will improve and you’ll enjoy it for years longer.

Small wonder you’ll feel better and be more confident after experiencing these things!

Since so many people today are from definitely to massively too fat and the benefits of losing it are so large, that’s one of the reasons we cover losing fat and the lifestyle changes that can enable you to lose fat and keep it off in so many of our posts.