Perception or Reality: Fat or Body Fat

Many people perceive overall weight as a general determining factor of just how “in shape” you are. Even things like BMI “body mass index” going off height and weight can really kill a person’s motivation (trust me, my WII fit character looks like a square with a head because of that). Sure being scale heavy sucks but more importantly, a high body fat REALLY SUCKS.

If the scale said you were 400lb but your body looked like Halle Berry's, woudl you care that your 400lbs? See a lot of people, women especially get so caught up in their weight that they ignore the big factor is body fat %. The average body fat percentages for American Males are around 25%. For females this number is 35%-40%. To give you an idea how high of a number this is, the ideal body fat percentage for a male is around 12% and for a female is around 20%. So as you can see, there is obviously a significant problem, particularly in America. Take myself for example, I’m 6’3 and I’m 237 lbs. As stated before, if you went off BMI alone, I’d be considered overweight. But if you add the fact my body fat is 9%, I look more 215. That’s a 22lb difference for those of you bad at math. Now don’t get all excited skinny people, you’re not off the hook. There’s such a thing as “skinny fat people.” I know it sounds like an oxymoron but not all skinny people are in shape. Some skinny people have high body fat but due to their body type just naturally look to be in shape. And hate to break it to you but cardio alone won’t keep you that way.

So now that we know how important knowing your body fat is, how to we check it? Well the easiest way is the electronic testers most gyms and trainers use. While fast, they are not 100% accurate and things like how recent you ate and drank water can throw them off. The more precise way is body fat calipers but they take time to learn and most people don’t just have a pair lying around. The cheapest way is using tailor tape. You can find out your body fat with this or even easier, just go by your circumference measurements. Use the tape to measure around your chest (across the nipple), mid section (right below your belly button), Hips (around where your pockets are), Upper Arm (mid line between your shoulder and elbow), and your this (mid line between hip and knee). When you start working out, you will notice differences here before you’ll notice differences on the scale. Also it’s easy to indentify your “problem areas”, the areas where you personally store most of your fat. Keep track of your circumference measurements and they go down you can almost be assured that your body fat is even if you stay at your current weight. Once you get the hang of this, then you can go into dissecting your body fat.

In summary here are a few things, it's usually more important to be losing inches than to be losing pounds. The number doesn't really matter if your clothes fit better (or become too big).Weighing in the morning is an accurate measurement because your body is "empty." It's just you. If you weigh later in the day, after you have eaten and done other things, it's not just you on the scale. Also try to not weigh or measure yourself everyday because it can get discouraging. More so try to take measurements every two weeks. You just have to remember that water, salt, and other things can really affect each daily weight. Sometimes you'll see nothing move and then a drop in weight. Remember, that you probably want to lose 1-2 pounds a week, so you shouldn't necessarily be seeing results every day. And for measurements, if you think you’re doing them wrong, don’t stress and just keep doing it “wrong.” Sounds silly but even if you’re doing it wrong, if you do it wrong all the time you can still notice if the “wrong” number goes up and down till you get the hang of it or someone does it for you. It will happen! Good luck!

"You don't drown by falling in the water. You drown by staying there." Same goes for your health.