Question about Body Fat Content

lipotrimmer

Full Member
When I started CD 98days ago, I was 209lbs and my body fat content percentage was 44%. Yesterday I was 161lbs and still my BF content is 40% :(

The first one I measured in a pharmacy scale and the yesterday I measured at home with my scale. My question is, why is my fat content not reduced though I have lost more than 45lbs. Is it that I'm losing muscle and not fat. Is there any way you can find out whether you are losing Fat and muscle. Ketostix is one way but is it reliable to say its only the fat which I'm losing.

Can anyone help me?
 
About 14-20lbs of your lost weight is probably water, thats what we lose before the fat starts to melt. My scales at home measure fat weight and % and water %. My fat weight barely moved to start with but now every time i lose a lb its a lb of fat. I started with my fat weighing 10st 1lb and now it weighs 8st7lbs. so 22lbs of my loss is fat and the rest water.
 
You need to be careful with these machines that supposedly measure your body fat when you stand on them - they are not particularly accurate, and can be affected quite easily by something very simple.

They work by measuring your body's electrical conductivity or resistance. Fat and muscle have a different electrical resistance, and this is how they work out how much of each they "think" you have.

If you have more water on-board, then your body's conductivity is much better as water is a very good electrical conductor. If you have just eaten, just had alcohol, just exercised etc ... all these affect the readings quite significantly.

Apparently, the best time to get the best (though still not reliably accurate) reading from these machines is when:

    • You have been to the loo (bladder and bowel)
    • Have not had any alcohol for 12 hours
    • Have not had water for 4 hours
    • Have not had strenuous exercise for 6 hours
I was using these machines to measure my BF% and was getting readings around 20% - 25% depending on what time of day etc. I paid a few quid to my gym and got them to measure my body fat using calipers and some calculation that they have, and it came down to 15% ..... so wildly different.

I would say that as long as the figure is going down, and your weight is going down, don't worry about it.

Steve
 
Cracking advice Steve!!
 
im not to fussed about water and fat content as long as i see why weight going down that is enough to make me happy, im very easilly pleased ha ha
 
As you say YM, as long as your weight is going down, that is all you need to worry about. Different people get fixated on different things such as BMI, Body Fat% and so on. The important one is the weight - that is why we all started this diet, and so that is what we should concentrate on.

I don't think that any of the VLCD diets claim that what you lose is "pure body fat", there will always be some loss of muscle and other lean tissue. But, the doctor told me that this is nothing to worry about and is all within acceptable limits, and the %age losses of fat to muscle/tissue are at about the same %ages as they increased.

Apparently, as it was explained to me, a heavier body needs more muscle, bone etc to carry around the extra weight, so the bodies natural processes deal with this as the weight increases. As your body weight decreases, it no longer needs that extra material to help with carrying the weight, so it does not matter that some gets consumed in the process of losing the weight.

I had exactly these concerns when I was on LL as I went from having arms like oak trees to having arms like twiglets :) . I raised exactly this issue with my Doc at the time (that I did the regular check-ups with whilst doing LL), and he told me that with the packs you are okay. Apparently the bad problems come with the diets where you are not properly nourished and the body is not getting enough protein, carbohydrate and fat to operate properly. With the packs you are.

Steve.
 
I always take peoples BF & water % as well as their weights, however I tell them that it is a guide & can get effected by many things (including the weather & sweaty feet etc!). I think you need to use the same scales at approx the same time of day to get a good guide. Although it will not be an exact "fact" what you will see is your BF% going down as you lose the weight. Great for motivation - but as I said only a guide.

Nicky
CDC Swindon
 
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