Body fat percentage and weight loss.

Our percentage body fat can often be an indicator towards possible health problems later in life. If we have a very high body fat percentage we are more prone to heart problems, diabetes, high cholesterol, some cancers and things like gallstones and arthritis. On the other hand if our body fat percentage is too low this can also cause related health problems especially in women. We need a certain amount of body fat to maintain a healthy hormone balance and to keep our immune system working efficiently.

There are a few ways to measure your body fat percentage but they are all just estimations.

• US Navy formula

The US Navy developed a formula to estimate a persons lean mass and body fat and you can find the calculator here. There are other calculators at this link too and they are fun to have a go and see what they tell you.

• Scales/Monitors

You can also use the hand held body fat monitors or scales. This method sends a low voltage current around your body, the current can pass through fat-free substance far quicker than trough fat so the resistance is measured. The reading it gets is your body density which then has a formula applied to it and this gives you your body fat percentage. Again it is just an estimation not an exact reading.

• Skin fold calipers

These are a set of calipers that you use to measure your body fat but it is very easy to make mistakes in measuring so it's best to have someone who knows what they are doing take the measurement.

• Hydrostatic weighing

This method uses water displacement, if you would like a full explanation of this system click here. This method is the most accurate but is still only an estimation.

Below is basically what the charts say are the healthy body fat percentages, there are so many of them but they are not hugely different.

It seems that I was not alone in my confusion over what my body fat percentage means. There is so much information online, charts to follow and then there are the pictures. I have 27.5% body fat. I wondered if this was normal so I went onto Google and had a look at quite a few websites detailing what the normal ranges are, and showing many pictures of people with differing percentages of body fat. It seems that from what I have read and the charts I have looked at I am in the middle of the normal healthy range. But my body looks nothing like the pictures of other women with a similar percentage body fat to me. After more reading I found out that lean muscle mass is often not taken into account, so if you were to put two people side by side who had the same body fat percentage but one had a high percentage of lean muscle they would look very different.

Your body fat percentage does not necessarily correlate to your size either. You could be a slim person with a high body fat percentage and this often happens with anorexics. They starve themselves to lose weight and what they lose first is lean muscle so they may be losing 'weight' but they are not losing 'fat'. This tends to happen a lot with people who diet a lot too, they reduce their calorie intake but then do not take on enough nutrients or protein and again they loose 'weight' but not 'fat'.

The most effective way to lose weight and keep it off is to increase your lean muscle mass, this way your metabolism will be higher and you will be burning calories more efficiently. When trying to lose weight most people concentrate on what they weigh. This can be very misleading because generally what people really want is to lose size. If you increased your lean muscle mass and lost fat you may weigh the same but you could be inches smaller!! Muscle takes up much less room than fat pound for pound. If you are interested in getting healthier and losing fat please contact me at happyhealthiness@gmail.com or visit my website. I am a wellness coach and independent herbalife distributor and I would be happy to help you.