When you lose weight, your body fat diminishes and you are able to slim down. But have you ever wondered where the fat really goes when it goes away? What happens to body fat when you lose weight? This is a question that is surprisingly rather common, with a lot of people wondering the same thing. That's why we decided to dive into this inquiry in order to find the answers that you want.
To see what we discovered, check out the information below on what happens to body fat when you lose weight, whether you stick with merely dieting and exercising or if you decide to incorporate the use of a fitness supplements like APEX-TX5 to make your weight loss journey a successful one.
The Old Beliefs About What Happens to Body Fat
Before Covering What Happens to Body Fat: What Is Fat, Anyway?
In order to comprehend what happens to body fat when you end up losing weight, you need to know what fat is in the first place. Put simply, fat is actually considered energy that is stored in your body.
When your body needs extra energy, what happens to body fat?
1. The body fat is converted into energy so that you can power through your day or your workout routine.
2. After the conversion has taken place, the many tissues and the muscles throughout your body are able to use the energy that your body fat provided for a wide range of functions.
3. By utilizing various metabolic processes that are complex in nature, your body can convert fat to energy and continue functioning at its best.
4. Metabolic activities that use fat for energy are able to produce heat. That heat then helps with things like the maintenance of your body temperature, and with the production and removal of waste products that are excreted through sweat, urine, and exhaled breath.
5. The fat cells throughout your body shrink after the fat that they were holding is converted into energy and that energy is used up.
New Research, New Conclusions on What Happens to Body Fat
Prior to more recent discoveries about what happens to body fat, which are discussed below, most doctors and dieticians, as well as other experts in the weight loss and fitness fields, weren't entirely sure what the answer was. The majority of them seemed to believe that the body fat was merely converted by the body into energy or heat when it needs to be broken down, as described above.
If you ask the average person about what they think happens to body fat when they lose it, they might tell you that they think it is removed when you have a bowel movement. Or, they might tell you that the fat is transformed into muscle. Unfortunately, as newer research has pointed out, those ideas are misconceptions about what happens to body fat when you lose weight.
A Question of Conservation of Mass
Questions arose when people began discussing the Law of Conservation of Mass, which states that, when you are dealing with a closed system, the overall mass has to remain the same over time.
For example:
1. You gain weight when you consume an excessive amount of proteins and carbohydrates.
2. Those compounds are then converted by your body into triglycerides, which consist of oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon.
3. The triglycerides are stored within your body's fat cells.
4. When you are exercising to lose weight, your body works on breaking down the stored triglycerides, and your body is able to access the carbon inside of them in the process.
But the question still remains: what happens to body fat after these processes occur?
New Research Suggests That You Actually Breathe Out Your Body Fat
According to recent research on what happens to body fat when you lose weight, the majority of it goes away when you exhale. In other words, the answer to what happens to body fat when you are on a weight loss plan might just be that you breathe it out. Strange, but true!
Here is what the researchers found, according to a study that was published in the British Medical Journal:
• 22 pounds of body fat in converted into 18.5 pounds of carbon dioxide.
• The carbon dioxide is exhaled, so when it comes to what happens to body fat when you lose body fat, you are basically breathing the majority of it out.
• The remaining 3.5 pounds of body fat is converted into water that is then removed from the body through sweat, tears, urine, and the production of other bodily fluids.
• Through this study, researchers also concluded that, in order for your body to totally break down a total of 22 pounds of fat, you have to inhale a whopping 64 pounds of oxygen. On top of that, 94,000 calories would need to be burned off as well. When all of that happens, 62 pounds of carbon dioxide are produced, along with 24 pounds of water.
What Happens to Body Fat? It Goes into the Air!
The experts concluded that, what happens to body fat is that it simply goes out into the air. It is breathed out of your body and then it vanishes. Thus, when you lose body mass, the majority of it will be exhaled in the form of carbon dioxide.
This is a really interesting conclusion because a lot of experts didn't really have an answer for what happens to body fat before this research was conducted. Now, they have a much clearer understanding of what occurs in the body when you lose weight, and they have a better comprehension of where the body fat really ends up in the process.
Conclusion: Your Lungs Help You Get Rid of Body Fat
Researchers might still have more to learn about what happens to body fat when it goes away, but they are currently confident in stating that their calculations prove that your lungs play a primary role in removing fat from the body. Who knew?!
But, before you get ahead of yourself, don't just assume that breathing quickly or deeply will help you lose any additional weight. The key to losing weight is still a combination of a healthy diet and a rigorous exercise routine. That's because exercising helps to unlock carbon that then allows for the breakdown of the body fat.
Now that you have a clearer understanding of what happens to body fat when you work on losing weight and getting in shape, you might be surprised to discover that what you once thought about body fat wasn't really true. But what's most important is that you keep in mind that exercising is an integral component of any weight loss program.