Sunday, May 17th, 2009
Welcome back!
What is Your Body Shape?
By Dr David Heber, M.D., Ph D., Director, UCLA Centre of Human Nutrition
When you look in the mirror, you may think you may know what your body shape is. Or you may cover up the unshapely areas and not really see yourself as you are. Do you know how much fat you’re carrying, compared to how much muscle? Do you know the answers to these questions? Are you ready to make your personal plan for losing weight and keeping it off? Understanding your body is the first step to reaching your personal shape.
As someone who teaches both doctors and the public about obesity. I believe weight loss has been overemphasized and body shape underemphasized. You have probably read about the Body-Mass Index (BMI), which is a weight to height ratio. If your BMI is greater than 25, you are considered overweight, and if it is over 30, you are considered obese. This ratio has been a powerful way for scientists to document the obesity epidemic and its effect on health and disease.
However, when it comes to you as an individual, it can be misleading. A football player can be considered overweight on the BMI scale, but if the extra weight being carried is muscle, he is not really fat. A thin woman can have a normal BMI, yet still be over-fat. So shape counts. 
Shape also helps determine goals. Women are very conscious of their shape and dress sizes, and for many women changing their shape is more important than just losing weight.
Men are often unaware of the excess weight around the middle, and simply buy larger pants or tighten the belt below their stomach. Men may care less about shapely appearance. But shape has many health consequences and improved health is a goal for many men. Losing weight around the middle can help reduce cholesterol levels. Blood pressure and blood-sugar levels.
Three body types
Shapes are personal and go beyond the usual pear and apple. Women can have three typical body shapes – upper body fat, lower body fat and both upper and lower body fat. Men usually only get upper body fat. The upper body stores fat in time of stress and some people can lose and gain weight rapidly in the upper body. The lower body fat in women responds to hormones such as estrogen and proesterone and stores fat for breastfeeding a newborn baby.
Women who have both upper and lower body fat will lose their upper body fat first. Women with lower body fat tend to have more muscle than women with lower body fat and will need more protein in their diet to help control hunger.
Losing weight is harder if you have lower body fat rather than upper body fat, but the medical benefits of losing your upper body fat are greater. The upper body fat around the intestines, which is seen on the outside as an increase in waist size and on the inside with special x-rays called CT scans, is very specialized in function.
This fat tissue sends fatty acids to the liver and causes changes in your insulin level that affect how much fat you store versus how much fat you burn. When you have too much of this fat in the body, it can also cause too much inflammation in the tissues, including the heart. Losing weight around your neck, face, chest, and waist usually goes along with losing fat on the inside as well. So as you look better, you are also improving your health tremendously.
Discovering your shape
Finally, there are two more body shapes to consider: The shape you can change and the shape you can’t change. It is important to know the difference and work on the shape you can change, while adjusting your wardrobe and attitudes to the shape you cannot change.
People come in all different shapes and sizes. Due to lower metabolism, many women with lower body fat can’t lose weight by just cutting calories. These lower body-fat cells are resistant to both diet and exercise. Only a personalized program can help make sure enough protein to control cravings and build or maintain lean muscle.
Popularity: 1% [?]
![[Valid RSS]](valid-rss.png "Validate my RSS feed")