So, Where does fat go when you lose weight
The Bob Pritchard Column
Scientists conducted a study to find out where fat goes when you lose weight and as part of their research they asked health professionals for their theories as to how the fat disappears.
Of the doctors, dietitians, and personal trainers surveyed, over 99% of them were wrong. This is extraordinary. In what other profession could over 99% of professionals not have a clue about such a fundamental question?
Most said it gets converted into energy or muscle, others believed fat was converted into muscle and some believed it leaves the body through the colon.
These are all incorrect.
With the rise of the wellness movement, countless people are focused on burning calories and getting lean, some thru exercise and some thru fad diets. But have you ever thought about exactly how all those pounds of fat disappears from your body? We hear about people who lose 60, 100, even 200 pounds of fat.
What the hell happens to it?
As part of a study on the topic, scientists posed a simple question to health professionals: When somebody loses weight, where does the fat go? Only three respondents answered the question correctly.
In The Conversation,scientist Ruben Meerman and Andrew Brown, professor and head of biotechnology and biomolecular sciences at UNSW, explained the results of the research — and, like the health professionals questioned, you might be surprised at what the scientists found. “The most common misconception by far was that fat is converted to energy,” the scientists wrote. “The problem with this theory is that it violates the law of conservation of matter, which all chemical reactions obey.”
The law of conversion of matter states that the mass of an object never changes, no matter how the particles rearrange themselves.
Other respondents believed fat was converted into muscle, which, they explained is impossible. Another theory was that it leaves the body through the colon, which is also incorrect.
So where does all this fat go?
Fat is converted to carbon dioxide and water. You exhale the carbon dioxide and the water mixes into your circulation until it’s lost as urine or sweat. If you lose 10kg of fat, precisely 8.4kg comes out through your lungs and the remaining 1.6kg turns into water. In other words, nearly all the weight we lose is exhaled.
Almost everything we eat comes back out via the lungs. Every carbohydrate you digest and nearly all the fats are converted to carbon dioxide and water. The same goes for alcohol and protein, apart from a small amount from the latter that is turned into urea and other solids, and excreted as urine.
The only food that arrives at your colon undigested is dietary fiber. The rest is absorbed into the bloodstream and organs. After that, it’s not going anywhere until you’ve vaporised it.
If we’re not meant to have midnight snacks, why is there a light in the fridge?
So, a good Diet and Excercise probably works (more energy out than in)
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