Is skinny fat so bad?
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justrollme wrote: »lemurcat12 wrote: »justrollme wrote: »3dogsrunning wrote: »
I missed that, thanks.marissafit06 wrote: »Need2Exerc1se wrote: »3dogsrunning wrote: »
It's defined differently by everyone. Anorexics who have any fat will deem themselves "skinny fat" and attempt to eliminate the excess.Need2Exerc1se wrote: »How are you defining "skinny fat"? Like so many other terms, that seems to have several different meanings on MFP. The most common is a BMI in the healthy range but a BF% outside the healthy range. You say your BMI is high so that would not describe you.
It is possible to be overweight and healthy and this may better describe you. Being overweight is a risk factor for some diseases, but it's not a guarantee of disease. If you get enough exercise and eat right you can be overweight and healthy. A gym or structured exercise plan is not required for getting exercise. All activity is exercise.
I said once that I quit lifting weight because it bored the crap out me and someone said, "So, you want to be skinny fat?" Several people agreed. To them, anyone who doesn't lift weights is skinny fat.
Since it's not a medical term with any real definition, everyone gets to make up their own meaning.
There just is no way to use the term nicely, whether you say it about yourself or others.
No, skinny fat has a definition, people just choose to use it their own way. It is Normal Weight Obesity.
To answer the OP - I would consider true "skinnyfat" bad. But the question is if that is what you will really end up as.
How do you define "Normal Weight Obesity"?
And who coined that term? Is it even possibly to be obese by BF and normal by BMI? Overweight, sure, but obese?
The article posted by MakePeas above discussed the term and what it means.
It doesn't give any details, though. It would seem that one would need to review tests and look at a person in order to determine whether they had weight-related health risks. It would not seem that there are numbers to define it.
Calling someone "skinny fat" would be difficult to do online, even for a doctor.
Who is calling anyone skinny fat here? OP was the one who believed she would be skinny fat, many questioned if she actually would be. And it was determined that the OP was applying a different meaning to the term.
I think you've misunderstood her post. She isn't saying that anyone called someone else "skinnyfat" in this thread, she is questioning the definition of the term to clarify the OP's context. There was no finger-pointing there at all.
She was saying it meant nothing real and is just an insult and that's not the case.
That was not my point, but that's okay.
I thought your point was (for some reason) to defend Kalikel's point.
Her claim was that it meant nothing real and was just an insult:Since it's not a medical term with any real definition, everyone gets to make up their own meaning.
There just is no way to use the term nicely, whether you say it about yourself or others.
As for:My opinion is that the term means several different things, none of which I associate with anything healthy. I really do not believe that if I used the term "skinny fat" to describe myself or someone else, that it could be in a good way. To me, it is referencing an underlying health issue that a weight number may not reflect.
Yes, I think most of us have been agreeing with this. It generally refers to normal weight obesity, which is a real thing and not healthy. (Although I don't think OP should worry about it, it's not just not being muscular.)0 -
I've been skinny fat before in the sense of having a high proportion of body fat for my weight.
This time around? Well, I started doing all of this for my health. Since that time I was last thin, which was many, many years ago, a loved one died from complications from a broken hip she got due to having osteoporosis. The idea of not doing some sort of resistance training once I made the choice to start exercising never occurred to me.
My joints are bad, I need good muscles to support them. I've become very active in order to achieve that goal.
Hopefully, when I reach my goal weight, my body fat % will reflect the efforts I've put in to protect my joints.0 -
if a doctor ever uses the term skinny fat please find another one...your words of wisdom for the day0
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This is true, but doesn't change the fact that it normally (not always) is used to refer to a real issue. Just like I'd expect a doctor to refer to overweight or obesity or BMI or some such, and not say "you are fat," but I'm perfectly comfortable saying I used to be fat (and when I was "fat" I'd use the term too).
Off topic, but Yoni Freedhoff has found that people react really negatively to the term "obesity" or "obese," so recommends some other way of talking about it -- I forget what. To me it's just medical/clinical. I wanted not to be obese, but because it was an unhealthy category to be in, not because I thought the term was hugely stigmatizing. It just was.0 -
People misuse the term skinny fat to define anyone who's normal weight but has no popping abs and defined biceps. Basically, if you're not ripped, you're deemed skinny fat. It's meaningless unless medically accurate. So if you're overweight, just want to be thinner and lose the fat and fit into skinny clothes, which is the vast majority, then do that. It's win-win. You'll get rid of excess body fat and improve your health and look good.0
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lemurcat12 wrote: »But you would likely only retain all of those 96 lbs w resistance training of some kind.
Even with resistance training you lose some. My point was that I was left with 96 lb of LBM despite not being particularly muscle-y ever before and having a relatively slight build -- I didn't put on muscle mass while at a deficit, but likely from being fat and having to lug around all that extra weight. I'm sure I had much more when I was at my heaviest, but I didn't do a DEXA back then.
I've only gained and lost twice, but this second time I fit into the same clothes at a higher weight. Speaks to the benefits of retaining LBM to the extent you can, to keep the benefit of the muscle you may have unintentionally built.
Yup, all makes sense.
I think some people who have a lot of scale weight to lose might resent hearing about what they may see as a petty concern. And it s very true that on this board, lots of ppl have vanity goals (nothing wrong w that imo, except when it imposes yet another unreachable standard). And "skinny fat" is used for both the actual medical risk category and the "want to get shredded" goal. And, sometimes ppl who are of normal weight obesity do complain about it for aesthetic vs health reasons (or both).
But normal weight obesity is a real thing. And wanting to lose fat or weight for any of those reasons is valid.0 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »But you would likely only retain all of those 96 lbs w resistance training of some kind.
Even with resistance training you lose some. My point was that I was left with 96 lb of LBM despite not being particularly muscle-y ever before and having a relatively slight build -- I didn't put on muscle mass while at a deficit, but likely from being fat and having to lug around all that extra weight. I'm sure I had much more when I was at my heaviest, but I didn't do a DEXA back then.
I've only gained and lost twice, but this second time I fit into the same clothes at a higher weight. Speaks to the benefits of retaining LBM to the extent you can, to keep the benefit of the muscle you may have unintentionally built.
Yup, all makes sense.
I think some people who have a lot of scale weight to lose might resent hearing about what they may see as a petty concern. And it s very true that on this board, lots of ppl have vanity goals (nothing wrong w that imo, except when it imposes yet another unreachable standard). And "skinny fat" is used for both the actual medical risk category and the "want to get shredded" goal. And, sometimes ppl who are of normal weight obesity do complain about it for aesthetic vs health reasons (or both).
But normal weight obesity is a real thing. And wanting to lose fat or weight for any of those reasons is valid.
Yeah, it irritates me when it's used incorrectly for just not being an aesthetic ideal (not aiming this at OP, who I think was concerned that there was something unhealthy about her situation when there's not, but the talk that gives rise to that concern). I don't think there's anything wrong with vanity goals (I suppose I am currently pursuing one, although not particularly hard, heh), but thinking you would look better with a bit less fat doesn't make you skinny fat (or "normal weight obese").0 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »lemurcat12 wrote: »But you would likely only retain all of those 96 lbs w resistance training of some kind.
Even with resistance training you lose some. My point was that I was left with 96 lb of LBM despite not being particularly muscle-y ever before and having a relatively slight build -- I didn't put on muscle mass while at a deficit, but likely from being fat and having to lug around all that extra weight. I'm sure I had much more when I was at my heaviest, but I didn't do a DEXA back then.
I've only gained and lost twice, but this second time I fit into the same clothes at a higher weight. Speaks to the benefits of retaining LBM to the extent you can, to keep the benefit of the muscle you may have unintentionally built.
Yup, all makes sense.
I think some people who have a lot of scale weight to lose might resent hearing about what they may see as a petty concern. And it s very true that on this board, lots of ppl have vanity goals (nothing wrong w that imo, except when it imposes yet another unreachable standard). And "skinny fat" is used for both the actual medical risk category and the "want to get shredded" goal. And, sometimes ppl who are of normal weight obesity do complain about it for aesthetic vs health reasons (or both).
But normal weight obesity is a real thing. And wanting to lose fat or weight for any of those reasons is valid.
Yeah, it irritates me when it's used incorrectly for just not being an aesthetic ideal (not aiming this at OP, who I think was concerned that there was something unhealthy about her situation when there's not, but the talk that gives rise to that concern). I don't think there's anything wrong with vanity goals (I suppose I am currently pursuing one, although not particularly hard, heh), but thinking you would look better with a bit less fat doesn't make you skinny fat (or "normal weight obese").
Agree again, 2/2
Really, it would be good if another phrase got picked up (or two new phrases, "skinny fat" is horrible imo) but I don't see it happening 0 -
A trainer at the gym told me that doing cardio only will make me skinny fat because I'll lose more muscle than fat. Based on my body fat%, I've retained lean mass and lost 24 lbs down to 128. I've been doing cardio 95% of the time. I told him I've lost 5 inches off my waist. That's all body fat. Do I have abs yet? No. Am I ripped? Far from it. But I'm not skinny fat either. I've gone from 32% to 20% body fat (per US Navy method). I didn't lose muscle. Proves trainers don't know *kitten* either. Just parroting the same stuff.0
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Doesn't "skinny fat" apply more to how the fat accumulates on the body as to actual body fat percentage? I'm a 56 year old woman who is 120 lbs. and 31% body fat. I've always had a curvier figure; even at a lower weight, I had a bust and hips. In fact, I've seen many women in better shape than I am, but much more body fat in what my spouse might call "aesthetic" areas -- hips and bust. But I have almost no visceral fat (fat in the midsection), and many of these women have pretty tiny waists. Are these women "skinny fat" or what we might call curvaceous (before that term became a synonym for moderately obese)? There's a lot of talk about being able to diet and strength train a body into a certain shape, but there are also women who can get that muscle definition and lean look much more easily while others still have some curves. Are these curves, which my spouse would say are what make the female form interesting to him, a natural part of being female or just unhealthy "skinny fat" that must be dieted and trained away. On the male side, some males will have love handles or even a pot belly at "normal weight," and that fat is definitely the fat around the internal organs that is so dangerous. I also have some female friends who are "apple shaped" and they and their family members do tend to get cardiovascular conditions earlier.0
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lemurcat12 wrote: »I thought your point was (for some reason) to defend Kalikel's point.
Nope. Was simply pointing out what appeared to be a misunderstanding, as I said in a few posts above.lemurcat12 wrote: »Her claim was that it meant nothing real and was just an insult:Since it's not a medical term with any real definition, everyone gets to make up their own meaning.
There just is no way to use the term nicely, whether you say it about yourself or others.
This wasn't the post that I quoted or was referencing, but out of curiosity, how would you use the term nicely?
/semi-offtopicness
Here is a somewhat recent Time article that explains the term in reference to poor health that is sometimes hidden by a healthy-range BMI. In this sense, I'm of the opinion that yes, it would matter a lot to worry about being skinny fat. This is one of many reasons that I care about nutrition and have been experimenting and tweaking to find something sustainable for me. My genes are not going to help me much, there is a lot of disease in my family. So, to food I go!0 -
justrollme wrote: »lemurcat12 wrote: »I thought your point was (for some reason) to defend Kalikel's point.
Nope. Was simply pointing out what appeared to be a misunderstanding, as I said in a few posts above.lemurcat12 wrote: »Her claim was that it meant nothing real and was just an insult:Since it's not a medical term with any real definition, everyone gets to make up their own meaning.
There just is no way to use the term nicely, whether you say it about yourself or others.
This wasn't the post that I quoted or was referencing, but out of curiosity, how would you use the term nicely?
/semi-offtopicness
Here is a somewhat recent Time article that explains the term in reference to poor health that is sometimes hidden by a healthy-range BMI. In this sense, I'm of the opinion that yes, it would matter a lot to worry about being skinny fat. This is one of many reasons that I care about nutrition and have been experimenting and tweaking to find something sustainable for me. My genes are not going to help me much, there is a lot of disease in my family. So, to food I go!
skinny gets used on this forum all the time. So does fat. So....' skinny fat' should be off the table?0 -
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justrollme wrote: »lemurcat12 wrote: »I thought your point was (for some reason) to defend Kalikel's point.
Nope. Was simply pointing out what appeared to be a misunderstanding, as I said in a few posts above.lemurcat12 wrote: »Her claim was that it meant nothing real and was just an insult:Since it's not a medical term with any real definition, everyone gets to make up their own meaning.
There just is no way to use the term nicely, whether you say it about yourself or others.
This wasn't the post that I quoted or was referencing, but out of curiosity, how would you use the term nicely?
About myself, as I used to use the term fat, if it applied. Not "nicely," but neutrally -- yeah, I'm a healthy BMI but skinny fat, so I still need to lose some weight to be healthy. (For the record, my BF% is actually in the healthy range.) Or perhaps to explain why I wouldn't want to lose weight in certain ways, like with an extreme deficit and no exercise, as I don't see the point in getting lighter if my BF% does not improve much -- if I end up "skinny fat." That would be contrary to the supposed health goals of losing weight.
The point is that it actually does mean something real as normally used. It's NOT just an insult or an excuse to lose an unhealthy amount of weight, as was claimed. In particular, BMI is not everything, BF% matters more.
I don't care for the term much, but can generally tell what someone means by it, and it's possible to challenge claims (as with a poster not long ago who was BMI 18 or so and claiming she was 35% BF or some such). People pointed out that it was simply not possible.0 -
According to the Mayo Clinic, which did the first research in this area, researchers are still working to define the exact parameters for who may be normal weight obese. In the Today's Dietician article referenc d above, it says in general women of "normal" weight but 33.3% body fat or greater, and men of 28% body fat.
If that's true, and the caliper measurements my trainer took are more or less accurate...I am normal weight obese. Which makes sense, as I am definitely unhappy with the many pockets of fat I have despite being 5'5" and 133.5 pounds. I have just started lifting...
I can see the 28% for men. I just hit it recently down from 35 and can start to find clothes that better fix vs just hang on me. The belly has more visceral fat that can go since I am still at 200 at 5'11".
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justrollme wrote: »lemurcat12 wrote: »I thought your point was (for some reason) to defend Kalikel's point.
Nope. Was simply pointing out what appeared to be a misunderstanding, as I said in a few posts above.lemurcat12 wrote: »Her claim was that it meant nothing real and was just an insult:Since it's not a medical term with any real definition, everyone gets to make up their own meaning.
There just is no way to use the term nicely, whether you say it about yourself or others.
This wasn't the post that I quoted or was referencing, but out of curiosity, how would you use the term nicely?
/semi-offtopicness
Here is a somewhat recent Time article that explains the term in reference to poor health that is sometimes hidden by a healthy-range BMI. In this sense, I'm of the opinion that yes, it would matter a lot to worry about being skinny fat. This is one of many reasons that I care about nutrition and have been experimenting and tweaking to find something sustainable for me. My genes are not going to help me much, there is a lot of disease in my family. So, to food I go!
skinny gets used on this forum all the time. So does fat. So....' skinny fat' should be off the table?
i don't like "skinny" either. or "fat", particularly, when not referring strictly to adipose tissue0 -
OP - kudos in getting back into the swing of things and looking after your health.
The only thing that I would like to add is that for your ongoing health's sake that you look at any activity you enjoy that retains as much muscle as possible. You are in the prime of your life and I speak from experience that it REALLY sucks to lose the fitness and muscle mass that we women have to work SO hard at building.
Due to health reasons my favoured form of exercise was no longer possible...very quickly - within about 6 months pretty much all the muscle strength I had spent such a long time building was dissipated. I became weaker and more sickly and eventually suffered a back fracture that was caused by me developing osteoporosis.....it all happened so quickly.
The last 18 months have been utter Hell.....trying to get back mobility, regain muscle to protect my now brittle bones....I would hate to think just how bad it could have been had I not been active and focused on muscle strength in the years before.0 -
Kez,
I have read the whole thing and I think you will be quite pleased with the result of losing the 2 st (28lb) you say you want to lose.
I would guess 'functional fitness' is your goal, as you do a lot of everyday stuff that is keeping your bones and muscles well supported. You would have to stop doing all the stuff, day in day out, and spend a lot more time on the couch to be 'skinny fat'. JMHO
I am 62, and a little jiggly, but at 5'1 100-105 lb, low BMI, and bf% between 22-25% ( depending on online calculator).
I really like myself.
It is great that your health is a priority over your looks, that is how I started out. Now, as I said, I really like myself, and you could say I have become a little vain. I like wearing slinky dresses and bikinis, and that the dress I wore on my 40th birthday fits me better now (62) at the same weight, but with a better lbm.
I know in the summer I maintain well doing everyday things, lots of gardening, and a bit of nerdfitness.com ( body weight exercises). But in the winter I do sign up for a variety of different classes, or do drop-in classes, go to the gym etc for an hour a day, because I know I go into hibernation mode.
Skinny- fat is a term that can upset some people, not me. I don't think that is where you will be.
Cheers, h.
Makepeas, thank you for the link on normal weight obesity, I feared that. I am going to have to back track to bookmark it.
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amyrebeccah wrote: »
Both of these. Strength training isn't solely for the purposes of aesthetics. It helps with a long-term healthy body. There's a lot of different ways to do it, and in many cases you can find something you enjoy. But justifying not doing something that's hard/boring/tedious is rationalizing, pure and simple.kshama2001 wrote: »daniwilford wrote: »At 53, I don't care about my looks as much, hence the natural premature grey hair color. I do care a ton about my health. Even though I find strength training boring, I am doing it because of the health benefits. I also read how those on the national weight loss registry, those who lost AND maintained weight, by a large measure used a balance of calorie restriction and exercise. My grandmother had osteoporosis, and my aunt in her 80's had to use both arms to lift anything over 10 pounds. I want to be able to stand up straight and carry my own groceries, even if strength training is boring.
Ya, flossing is boring too, but after just having to go through dental scaling, I am motivated to do it. Unfortunately, the effects of not strength training don't show up until it's rather late to do anything about it.
Oh please. A lot of people in every country live long and healthy lives without doing any strength training.
Most medical professional will recommend resistance training for the typically sedentary individual
http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/fitness/in-depth/strength-training/art-200466700 -
Doesn't "skinny fat" apply more to how the fat accumulates on the body as to actual body fat percentage? I'm a 56 year old woman who is 120 lbs. and 31% body fat. I've always had a curvier figure; even at a lower weight, I had a bust and hips. In fact, I've seen many women in better shape than I am, but much more body fat in what my spouse might call "aesthetic" areas -- hips and bust. But I have almost no visceral fat (fat in the midsection), and many of these women have pretty tiny waists. Are these women "skinny fat" or what we might call curvaceous (before that term became a synonym for moderately obese)? There's a lot of talk about being able to diet and strength train a body into a certain shape, but there are also women who can get that muscle definition and lean look much more easily while others still have some curves. Are these curves, which my spouse would say are what make the female form interesting to him, a natural part of being female or just unhealthy "skinny fat" that must be dieted and trained away. On the male side, some males will have love handles or even a pot belly at "normal weight," and that fat is definitely the fat around the internal organs that is so dangerous. I also have some female friends who are "apple shaped" and they and their family members do tend to get cardiovascular conditions earlier.
Visceral fat is not fat on your midsection or belly that you can see. Visceral fat is internal fat around the organs. It can't be seen by the naked eye.0
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