Fat loss and weight loss aren't the same thing?

Phill2488

I've heard this so many times. People say that losing weight and losing body fat are two different things, but that never made any sense to me. When you lose weight the weight as gotta come off somewhere

lemonsnowdrop

Yeah, it can also come out as water or muscle. Fat isn't the only substance in your body.

srslybritt

Posting for my FL.

Hornsby

Right. When you lose weight, you could be losing fat, as well as muscle/lean body mass, water...

You need resistance training and adequate protein to try and make that percentage as high on the fat side and as low on the LBM side as possible.

srslybritt

From my (admittedly limited) understanding of it, when you lose weight in general, you are losing both lean muscle mass and fat. Once you are near a healthy weight, you can eat maintenance and still lose fat but not lose weight.

So I believe what you're looking to say is, weight loss =/= body comp/recomp

ETA: Yikes, I didn't explain that well at all. Basically what I was trying to say is you can reduce your body fat percentage without losing weight. In fact, a lot of people GAIN weight when they focus on lowering BF%.

uconnwinsnc1

I've heard this so many times. People say that losing weight and losing body fat are two different things, but that never made any sense to me. When you lose weight the weight as gotta come off somewhere

Muscle loss can happen if you under eat and don't exercise. That is why most of us suggest lifting weights while trying to lose fat. You want to maintain as much muscle as you want. Body fat percentage is what you want to lower.

funchords

Some people jump into a weight-lifting routine that causes fat loss but weight to either be stable or gain slightly. Muscle mass weighs a bit more than fat mass of the same size -- so if you're losing fat but gaining just as much muscle, your weight will go up and not down.

Another kind of weight is water weight. We tend to lose that fast at the beginning of weight loss. We tend to hang onto it after a salty meal or if we're going through an illness or injury.

And then there's the weight that is just unevacuated waste. We can hold a few pounds of liquid and solid matter until our next bathroom trip.

So, long story short, not every pound you see on the scale is fat. Not every fluctuation you see on the scale is fat gained or lost.

CharlieBeansmomTracey

muscle doesnt weigh more than fat it just takes up less space and is less dense.a lb is a lb. so a lb of fat will look 3x bigger than the lb of muscle.The reason why a lot of time your weight goes up when weight lifting is because your body will retain water to help repair the muscles.

lemonyradiomen

A good percentage of the energy your body uses to make up a caloric deficit comes from breaking down muscle mass. Strength training minimizes the amount of muscle you break down for energy, while cardio and excess protein intake haven't been shown to have much of a protective effect. Not eating adequate levels of protein or following medically-unsupervised extremely-low calorie diets will increase muscle loss as well as make you sick.

Other sources of lean weight loss include water weight lost when carbohydrate stores are depleted (remember, for every gram of carbs your body doesn't burn off immediately, a few grams of water are bonded to it while in storage), and, when losing significant amounts of weight, small amounts of extra skin/connective tissue can be reabsorbed by the body because you are smaller and no longer need it.

TeaBea

Right. When you lose weight, you could be losing fat, as well as muscle/lean body mass, water...

You need resistance training and adequate protein to try and make that percentage as high on the fat side and as low on the LBM side as possible.

This!^

lemonsnowdrop

I've always heard that the human body loves holding on to fat and couldn't care less about muscle. Think about why it's so easy to gain fat but hard to gain muscle.

onefortyone

Weight loss is just what the scale says. You could step on the scale before and after pooping and 'lose weight'. But that isn't the same as fat loss.

_Terrapin_

Right. When you lose weight, you could be losing fat, as well as muscle/lean body mass, water...

You need resistance training and adequate protein to try and make that percentage as high on the fat side and as low on the LBM side as possible.

This, and I'd add the resistance training doesn't need to be extensive. I dropped 22 pounds last year, and about 20 was fat, and 2 of LBM. My 'lifting time' was about 2 hours a week, hardly living in a gym. I did do more cardio then lifting or resistance; about 2-3 hours a week of cardio. YMMV and the 22 was over Feb thru Sept of '13. . . .good luck.

Kalikel

They're either arguing that weight is an abstract concept or they're arguing that you lose more than fat.

Either way, they sound a little nit-picky, contrary and boring. Just agree or say something noncommittal like, "I hear ya!" and they'll drop it.