Are You Losing The Stubborn Fat or Your Precious Lean Muscle?

As you begin your program for weight loss and fitness, it is critical that you look at your body composition and ensure that the weight you lose is from fat, not muscle. Body composition refers to what your body is made of - how much of your body is fat (essential and non-essential) and how much is lean body mass (muscle, bone, organs)?

To determine body composition, you need to look at more than just a person’s height and weight. Stepping on a scale doesn’t tell you anything more than the amount of mass you have in the earth’s gravitational pull. You could travel to the moon today and cut your weight in half (less gravitational pull), but you still won’t be able to zip up those jeans that are too small. The important question is this: what is your ratio of lean body mass (muscle, bone, organs) to fat (essential and non-essential). This ratio refers to your body composition and is usually referred to as percent fat.

There are several different methods to measure body fat including: skin fold calipers, hydrostatic weighing, the Bod Pod, bioelectrical impedance, or a DEXA scan. Talk to your doctor, nutritionist, personal trainer or other health professional about having your body composition measured. A healthy range of body fat for women is 18 to 25 percent fat. A healthy range for men it is 10 to 16 percent.

To help you understand the concept of body composition, and not just weight, imagine for a moment two identical 16-ounce jars filled with liquid. Now imagine that one jar contains half water and half oil and the other jar contains three-quarters water and one-quarter oil. Are the jars the same? Well, yes and no. They are still identical 16-ounce jars, but what’s inside them is completely different. One is 50 percent fat and the other is 25 percent fat.

Let’s take another example. Imagine two 125-pound females who are both 5 feet 5 inches tall. Are they the same size? One might be 30 percent fat, the other 18 percent fat, but they are the same height and weight. The woman with 30 percent fat is at greater risk for many chronic diseases, but the woman with 18 percent fat has a healthy body composition and probably has more energy and vitality than the one with 30 percent fat. The woman with the 18 percent body fat will also fit in a smaller dress size and probably doesn’t have arms that jiggle when she waves.

The reason the woman with 18 percent fat can wear a smaller size even though they’re the same weight is that muscle weighs more than fat, but takes up less space than fat. If you’re having a hard time visualizing this, visit your butcher. Ask the butcher to weigh out one pound of fat and one pound of meat. You’ll see that you need a bigger bag for the pound of fat than the pound of meat.

Because the woman with the 18 percent fat has more lean mass, she will also have a higher metabolism. Lean muscle is what helps maintain metabolism at a high rate. It also gives your body the shape you want and allows you to move and enjoy life.

As you lose weight this year, be sure you are losing the stubborn fat and not your precious lean muscle mass. Pay attention to how your clothes are fitting and not just what the scale says. If you dropped a dress or pant size, but the scale says you’re weight is the same, it means you lost fat and increased your lean mass. Losing fat and gaining muscle is something to be excited about. You want to keep your lean mass because your lean muscle is what helps maintain your metabolism. When you lose your lean muscle you reduce your metabolism, have less energy, and routine activities become more difficult because you don’t have the strength to do the things you want. Increasing your lean mass means you increase your metabolism, energy, vitality, and strength.