When you are losing weight, some people will tell you that it is a simple matter of increasing your fitness and reducing your calories. Others will claim that your wellness and wellbeing will only truly be improved by paying attention not to the calorie content but to the amount of fat in your diet – but which is truly more important, calories or fat?
There are pros and cons about each method, of course, as with anything else in life.
A calorie is a small measure of energy that you burn as you go about your daily life. You need to burn off the calories in your food in order to maintain your weight – in other words, if you consume 2000 calories per day then you need to burn 2000 calories per day, in order to ensure that your weight stays the same. If you eat more calories than you burn off, then you will gradually gain weight, even if the food that you are eating is all healthy and low fat. That is because your body actually makes fat in order to store all the nutrients that it is not able to use up, so that they can be stored for another time. Some nutrients cannot be stored, of course, as they are not water soluble.
It sounds reasonable, then, that focusing on calorie content is the best way to go when you are trying to lose weight. The problem with this method, however, is that your body also needs a certain amount of fat every day. Fat that is made from sugar is the wrong type of fat, but ignoring the body’s need for fat altogether can also be equally damaging because it makes it harder for your body to burn calories. Too much fat can also cause serious health problems, such as intestinal disorders and certain associated types of cancer.