How Can I Lose Fat? A Primer On Fat Loss.

This is an article to set the scene for people looking to lose body fat.

It is a big picture view of the things which matter, or are commonly talked about, when it comes to pursuing that goal.

If you’re interested in help to lose fat, you may be interested in Nutrition Coaching with Extension Fitness. Read about our approach to weight loss here. And get in touch here.

Fat Loss: Not Inherently Vain

Sometimes, when someone expresses a desire to lose weight, there's a quick comeback from friends and family:

 "What do you mean?! You're fine. You're healthy! Chill out!"

 Or, more pointedly, "Don't be vain."

And, of course, vanity is a thing. It's not good to be obsessed with your appearance. We're rightly repulsed when someone is all about the outside, to the neglect of their character and convictions.

But some degree of vanity is inside all of us, and it exists on a spectrum. If extreme vanity lives on one end of that spectrum, a healthy concern for your physical appearance is on the other. Plus, it can be hard to know what’s vain and what’s healthy concern for how you look.

Predictably, cultural ideals about attractiveness map fairly substantially onto certain aspects of health. Stated differently, the social and cultural celebration of lean-ness reflects a truth about HEALTH: it is not good for your health to carry excessive body fat, especially around your abdomen.

Those criticising a friend's desire to lose fat may be comparing their friend to the a typical Australian - the generic "man in the street". The problem in making this comparison is that the man in the street is probably overweight or obese. An illuminating exercise is to look at photographs of average people from the first half of the 20th century, prior to the onset of the obesity epidemic. People looked very, very different.

 The obesity epidemic has advanced to the extent that people who are at a healthy weight may appear a little gaunt or skinny to our modern eyes.

 In summary:

• Yes, vanity is not great.

• Yes, there IS a danger that you become obsessed with your appearance to the extent you have an eating disorder.

• But, it's normal to have some (balanced) concern for your appearance (this is not contrary to good character).

• And, there’s a chance you could overplay the risk of psychological damage/unhappiness and underplay the risk associated with excess body fat

• Furthermore, excess body fat CAN be addressed (it is very hard, but still possible for many people)

Diet Is Absolutely Paramount

When it comes to losing body fat, your diet is totally fundamental. "You can't out-train a bad diet", as they say. Exercise plays an important role in shedding fat, but it's a minor player in comparison to diet.

As time goes on, and I accumulate more and more experience helping people to lose fat, this becomes clearer and clearer to me.

So, if you're seeking to lose fat, you need to focus in on your diet as the first order of business. It is the most critical variable.

My observation is that in order to make the necessary dietary changes to facilitate fat loss, you need to;

•  Invest time, energy and money (listening to podcasts, buying books, doing courses, or spending time with professionals) in becoming more educated and informed about nutrition

• Develop awareness about your energy needs and the energy content in the foods you eat most commonly

• Identify the chief villains in terms of energy density: alcohol, sugar sweetened beverages, and other high-calorie, highly processed and highly palatable (i.e. insanely delicious) foods

• Spend some time experimenting with different weight loss strategies (e.g. calorie counting, macro-tracking, keto, low carb etc etc) to find a strategy that you can comfortably adhere to.  Because, in the long term, the extent to which you can comfortably adhere to a healthy diet will dictate whether you can lose fat and keep it off.

Remember That Food Is So Much More Than Simply Fuel And Nutrients

It's not enough to simply understand the physical facts about food, as though the overweight and obesity issue many of us face is simply about physics and chemistry.

No, you need to allow for the fact that food is deeply connected to our culture, beliefs, psychology, and spirituality.

What am I getting at here?

Food is one of the best things about life. Almost everyone (me included!) loves to eat. It is one of the major things we gather around as people. It brings us together.

You exist in a web of food-related customs and traditions, and this needs to be factored into your strategies to adjust your diet.

Here's some examples:

• Your Italian (or Macedonian, or Greek etc) grandmother will be trying to force feed you when you visit her. You'll need a strategy to politely refuse her overtures without  causing too much offense (if such a thing is even possible…)

• Your mates may bond over binge drinking, and you may feel out-of-place if you don't join in. They make take the piss if you don't … get on the piss (or choose a low/no alcohol beer).

• If you join a social setting with a food culture that is all about health, such as in a cross-fit gym, you may need to exert LESS willpower to eat a healthy diet, as the social pressure could pull you in that direction. This can help you generate momentum in a good direction and reduce the amount of willpower you need to exert. (BUT, unhealthy attitudes to physical appearance in such settings can also cause an overly restrictive, obsessive and inflexible food culture so it's not all beer and skittles - or kombucha and raw balls).

• You may be knowingly or unknowingly using food to manage stress, or deal with negative emotions. To lose fat, and keep it off, you'll need to work on other ways to deal with these things besides eating your feelings.

If you're embarking on a fat loss program, it's worth considering these social factors.

Here's an exercise that can help you do that.

Step 1: Set aside 60-minutes in a quiet place with a pen, paper, and no distractions. (Note: if you resent setting aside an hour like this, I've got bad news for you. Changing your diet for the long term is really, really difficult. And just like other difficult things, it requires an investment of time, energy, attention and resources to achieve meaningful change).

Step 2: Ask yourself these questions, and write down the answers.

Q1: What foods feature in my social connections with other people? (e.g. get togethers with friends, family celebrations, sporting events) Can I participate in, and enjoy, these events, without overconsuming foods which are at odds with my goal of losing fat?

• Can I sub out high calorie and high alcohol drinks for low calorie and low alcohol drinks?

• Can I select high fibre, high protein, foods in these settings?

• Do I need to prepare myself with answers to people who object to my goals to lose fat?

Q2: Do I use food to combat boredom? Or to cope with troublesome emotions? How can I address these things differently?

• Can I go and have a sauna or a massage to relax instead of having an excess of dessert foods?

• Can I choose lower energy drinks instead of alcohol? (Personally, my wife and I like to have a Rooibos tea every evening)

• Are there broken relationships which really stress me out? How can I advance the ball in this area to reduce the stress? Counselling? Raising difficult issues with spouse, parents, friends, housemates?

Q3: How are foods involved in my rituals of relaxation or entertainment?

• Do I have really moorish foods in the house? Like extreme cheese Doritos? (You need to bear in mind that these foods are specifically engineered by trained and experienced food scientists to have you overconsume them. It is very very hard to enjoy these things in moderation).

Fat Loss: A Satiety Problem

Ok, we've set the scene. Desiring fat loss is not inherently vain. Diet is THE major factor to be addressed. Food is inherently linked to social and psychological factors which warrant attention.

Now to get more into the nuts and bolts of how it's done.

Overweight and obesity are heavily influenced by satiety - the extent to which you feel satisfied (or full) after eating.

When you're trying to lose fat, you ought to expect that you're going to need to tolerate periods of hunger. Your brain won't put up too much resistance against gaining fat, but it WILL fight against fat loss.

But the degree and duration of the hunger will heavily influence your prospects for success in fat loss. That's why food selection matters when you're trying to drop body fat - even if you compare foods that have the same amount of energy (calories).

Food selection matters because some foods are better than others when it comes to promoting satiety. And the more you can foster a sense of satiety, the less hunger you need to tolerate and the higher the likelihood of long term, sustained fat loss.

Foods that are high in fibre and protein are more satiating - because they take longer to leave the stomach. This is why you can "hack" your physiology to some degree when trying to lose fat by consuming more high protein and high fibre foods.

Another hack is to avoid highly processed foods. The issue with processed foods is partly that they are often already somewhat pre-digested.

Compare, for example, fresh fruit with fruit juice.

When you drink the processed fruit juice (and all juice is processed - it is just a matter of degrees) your body doesn't necessarily perceive very well that you've just taken on board quite a lot of energy. The juice will go through your stomach quite quickly, and you may feel hungry - or at least empty - again quite soon even though you don't need to eat.

Contrast this with fresh fruit, which takes longer to go through your stomach because of the fibre content. Your body will register the energy content more accurately because the fruit stays in your stomach longer, meaning it takes longer until you're hungry again.

Processed food = lots of energy & goes through your stomach quickly

Unprocessed foods = less energy (generally) & they take longer to digest, meaning you feel satiated for longer

At the start of this article, I mentioned how exercise alone is not an effective fat loss tool. If you've ever tried that strategy, you may recall how easy it is to simply replace the energy you've burned off.

But exercise is far from useless when it comes to fat loss. You see, exercise can help your brain register that you've had enough to eat. People who exercise habitually are more sensitive to the body's satiety signals, which means it takes less willpower or conscious effort for them to stop eating when they've had enough. This is important because a high amount of hunger is a big reason for failure in reducing body fat. Exercise can reduce the mental effort involved by indirectly making you feel more satisfied with your food.

In summary:

• Protein and fibre deliver a high amount of satiety

• Exercise helps you to avoid hunger by increasing your sensitivity to your body's satiety signalling

Multiple Viable Strategies, But Your Long Term Habits Dictate Success

There are numerous different strategies available to lose fat. People have lost fat successfully with all manner of approaches. Fasting, Calorie Counting, Shakes, Low-Carb, Keto, Paleo, CSIRO. All of these can work, and they are all valid tools you can use to achieve your goal.

Having said that, it seems to me that there's a lot going for a low carbohydrate approach. There seems to be unresolved questions about WHY it works so well (many point to the high levels of insulin associated with high carb diets as being crucial in causing obesity) but the fact that is DOES work really well has been well established.

(Note: If long distance endurance events are your thing, I believe you should probably avoid a low carb diet. Not that it can't be done, it's more that the logistics could be extremely tiresome)

Here's a large study showing a superior result from low carb diets: Weight Loss with a Low-Carbohydrate, Mediterranean, or Low-Fat Diet | New England Journal of Medicine (nejm.org)

Check out the CSIRO total wellbeing diet for a high protein, moderate carbohydrate and low fat approach. Note: the CSIRO diet chooses a low fat approach to achieve the necessary total energy (calories) reduction.

Importantly, you'll need to select a style of eating which you can sustain long term. While it's true that lots of different diets are successful in the short term, very few diets are successful in the long term.

This is because the amount of body fat you carry is reflective of your habitual diet and eating behaviours over months, years and decades. It's your routine, day-in day-out behaviours that are so critical when it comes to achieving and maintaining a healthy weight. Fat loss is hard to maintain long-term because it's quite difficult to change your behaviours and habits around food over the long haul. (Note: don't despair though, many many people ARE able to do this successfully).

It's fine to try attack your fat loss goal, getting some quick wins on the board with a strict, unusual diet (like using meal replacement shakes or pre-packaged portion controlled meals), but you need to understand the hard work in these areas will need to be done sooner or later:

• Saying no to excess alcohol

• Developing knowledge about energy content of different foods

• Developing healthy cooking skills

• Figuring out ways to eat healthy food while staying within your budget

• Coming up with a system for lunch preparation (so you don't need to rely on buying a healthy lunch)

• Organising your own meal plan across the week

• Resisting all manner of high sugar, high fat, high alcohol, highly processed foods which are available almost everywhere you go!

(As you can see, it’s quite hard - best to conceptualise this as a long-term ongoing project).

Energy Deficit

Having established the importance of food selection, I'll also say that you do need to achieve an energy deficit to lose fat.

Yes, high protein and high fibre foods will make it easier, but you can't be stuffing your face with rump steak, gobbling down cheddar cheese and chomping on cherry tomatoes 24/7.

You'll be less hungry with these foods, but you'll probably still need to get hungry occasionally to drop body fat.

This is important to come to terms with: you're going to be hungry and it's going to suck. Maybe a little bit, maybe a lot. It seems to vary widely for a given calorie deficit.

Just remember: you'll be OK, you won't starve, and once you lose the fat you want/need to, then it's done and dusted. You don't need to do it again unless you regain the weight. (Which is sadly easy to do in our setting, but therein lies the dilemma folks).

The pendulum has swung so far away from self-denial to self-compassion in our culture, that people have become allergic to the idea of exerting self-discipline and mastery over bodily and psychological issues and shortcomings. Yes, I understand, authenticity to your emotions can be a good thing. It can be a good thing to not be too hard on yourself.

But self-improvement is also a good thing. Striving hard to get what you want is a good thing. Pushing through the pain to gain the prize can be great! We can have these things and self-compassion.

Bear In Mind There's More To It Than Diet And Exercise (Sleep, Stress, Medical Issues)

The last thing to say in this primer on fat loss, is that there's many other factors which can affect your body's preferred level of fatness.

Aside from the obvious influence of genetics on your body shape, we need to factor in such things as medications and medical conditions. These can have profound effects on energy metabolism.

Your occupation, with its inherent stress levels, affects your ability to achieve a healthy weight. Especially if you do shift work or FIFO. The disturbances to your sleeping pattern and the organisation of your life can be a big obstacle.

If I had easy answers to these things, I'd be a rich man. But I don't, and when it comes to these sorts of barriers, we need to chart our own course, enlisting the help of friends and family plus caring and committed professionals to help us find our way.

Post Script: Fat Loss Tips For Busy Fathers And Middle-Aged Men

We're living in the golden age of low (or no) alcohol beer. You have the option of enjoying a brew with friends without the calories now.

While variety in your diet is important, it's a good idea to standardise your diet and introduce routines to help you. For example, it could be good to have three (and only three) weekday breakfast options. That way, you know what portion size you need. You have some idea of energy content of that meal. You can refine these meals over time to serve your goals. If you’re always improvising with food, you introduce a greater possibility for sub-optimal selections.

Learn to be content with doing something that's not ideal, as opposed to waiting for the ideal to come along (and doing very little). Particularly with exercise, it can feel silly to do a ten minute home-based workout. It is hard to be bothered. But these little things make a big difference, especially when you bear in mind that exercise helps promote satiety.

 Pad out your meals with lots of non-starchy veggies to help you feel full:

• Grated carrot and zucchini

• “The Three C's! Carrot, Cucumber, Capsicum” - have these available to help you feel full at dinner

• Having a big leafy green salad every day can help you feel satiated

Don't be enslaved to the never-sip-breakfast dogma we were raised with.

If fasting from breakfast (and not overcompensating during the rest of the day) works for you, then go for it!