Weight Loss Vs Fat Loss: What People Don’t Know

“For the hundredth time, the scales are lying to you!” cried Rahul.

Ambika didn’t believe him. She didn’t know what was going on with her body.

Ambika had been trying hard to shed a few kilos for a while now. After a couple of appointments with a nutritionist and hitting the gym with a vengeance, her clothes started to fit better, and her friends started complimenting her on how amazing she looked lately.

But the scales kept telling her another story. She’d dropped a few kilos initially, but after that, she stopped losing weight altogether! Even when she ramped up her fitness routine, her hard work didn’t show up on the weighing scale. What was going on?

Poor Ambika! There’s still so much that she doesn’t know about weight loss. And I suspect that the same is true for a lot of us too.

A lot of people believe that the number they see on their weighing scale is an indicator of their fat loss progress. They get discouraged when they don’t see the kilos coming off the scale every week, even when their body looks significantly more toned than before. This discontentment rises because most people don’t understand the difference between weight loss and fat loss. And yes, they are not the same thing!

There’s a Difference Between Weight Loss and Fat Loss? What Is It?

Weight Loss Vs Fat Loss:

To explain it better, we need to go over something called body composition because it will help you understand what a ‘balanced body weight’ is.

So, what is body composition? It is the amount of fat, water, muscle, and bone mass our body has. Depending on your age, sex, and other factors, the ideal body composition should be 30-55% muscle, 10-30% fat, 15% bone mass, 10-25% water, and 10-15% tissue and organs.

Both fat loss and weight loss affect body composition but in different ways. When we lose weight, we might lose muscle, fat, water, and bone mass. In plain speak, weight loss is reflected in the numbers on our weighing scale, the one that Ambika was measuring so desperately!

However, fat loss is when you only reduce the excess fat stored in your body, toning up the body, tightening sagging muscles, and giving you a more sculpted appearance.

The Bottom Line

It’s very easy to manipulate the numbers on your weighing scale. You just stop eating or drinking as much. Some extremely unhealthy weight loss practices include crash dieting, intermittent fasting, and taking the recommended amount of protein.

So if not the weighing scale, how do I keep track of my fat loss progress?

Keeping track of body weight with a scale is only useful when you know exactly how your weight is affected by water retention and muscle gain. A better way of assessing the progress of your fat loss diet plan and/or fitness program is by evaluating changes in body composition.

You can track changes in your body composition by taking progress pictures each month, tracking body measurements, and measuring body fat percentage.