How Many Calories Equal One Pound of Fat?

It is common knowledge that losing and gaining fat would has something to do with the amount of calories that your body intakes. However, what most people tend to forget is how many calories really equals one pound. Dieters should understand that losing weight really takes time and is definitely a process.

So, How Much Is It?

In reality, 1 pound of fat is equivalent to 453.6 grams, while 1 gram of fat would contain 9 calories. Thus, one fat pound would contain 4082 calories. This would come from the equation: 9 x 453.6 = 4,082.4 . This is the approximate amount of calories that you gain every time your body consumes a pound of fat.

However, when talking about getting rid of 1 lb of body fat, you must get your body to burn 3500 calories. Obviously, 3500 calories is definitely not equal to 4,082 calories, right?!

What’s With The Difference?

So, what’s with this big difference? Actually, the reason is that fat cells in your body actually contain other materials, like water and protein. Hence, they’re not really made up of pure fat, unlike what you consume. In consequence, when you lose one pound of body fat, you really burn only about 3500 calories and not 4082calories.

Gaining Or Losing Weight

If you want to gain weight, you would have to add 3,500 calories to your diet so that you can gain one pound of fat. On the other hand, you would also have to take off 3,500 calories so that you can also get rid of one pound of your weight.

What’s The Implication?

As you can see, this simply answers the question as to why some diet programs are impossible to succeed. How come? Take note that the needed average calorie intake of a person in a day to supply vital functions and maintain their weight would usually fall into the 2000 calorie or 2500 calorie diet. Obviously, this is far from 3,500 calories. Hence if you want to lose one pound in a day, you would have to go to the extent of not getting any kind of calorie intake plus burning another 1,000 or 1,500 calories.

This basically means torture to your body. Also, it would be difficult to execute a plan like this since your body is wise enough to detect what is happening. Hence, there is no such thing as instant dieting or instant weight loss.

Do not be victimized by those countless advertisements of weight loss products that say you can get an instant one pound off your scale as soon as you use their product for just a few minutes or an hour. Promises like that are definitely impossible to achieve. It would take burning more than your daily calorie need just to get that pound off in a day!

Taking It Slow

Nevertheless, it is still possible for you to get rid of that pound. However, it will take you some time and you have to undergo a process. You should understand that there are no shortcuts with losing weight.

Sad but true, it takes a lot more time for you to drop pounds compared to what it takes to gain them. A majority of dieters tend to feel that they’re not getting any progress, especially when they come into the phase where slow rates of weight loss occurs, such as when they get stranded on the infamous weight loss plateau.

Achieving Your Way To Victory

If you are really determined to lose weight, you can still take advantage of this information. What you’ll have to do is set a realistic goal and create a diet plan that you think you have the guts to stick to until the end.

For example, you want to lose one pound in a week. This is something more achievable than losing a pound in a day. Hence, divide 3,500 calories by 7 (there are 7 days in a week) and you’ll get 500. Thus, you would have to cut 500 calories from your daily diet.  So, if you’re eating a 2,500 calorie diet, you would have to cut down to a 2,000 diet so that you can lose 1 lb in 7 days.

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History of Losing Fat

Watching what you eat, counting calories, exercising, diet programs, weight loss pills, liposuction, slimming creams and soaps - all of these seem to be a normal part of the present culture. However, did it ever occur to you that this obsession of losing fat must somehow have had a beginning?

Civilization With No Diets

The history of losing fat is actually a very interesting and colorful one. Although you may think that the human race has been dieting since the beginning of time, this presumption is actually wrong.

The truth is, losing fat didn’t seem to be an issue once upon a time. In fact, back then, people didn’t really think about their weight. This is probably due to some economic factors. For instance, back then only the rich people were the ones who got fat. The majority of people were actually busy trying to survive and have at least one meal a day.

Sin, Dieting And Vegetarianism

Ironically, the first diets came from the traditional war against sin. Since gluttony was considered to be one of the seven deadly sins, there were religious institutions that preached on eating healthy and the perils of sickness. The first known preacher of this principle was Sylvester Graham. He was ordained in 1826 and by 1830 he was preaching about the benefits of having a vegetarian diet.

The First Low-Carb Diet And Diet Book

During the 1850’s a physician named Doctor Harvey in England had to treat a patient named William Banting regarding obesity. Harvey advised him to cut down the sugars and starches. In fact, he told him not to eat more than the minimum daily amount that was required. This came to be the very first low-carb diet.

The plan worked so well, that William Banting was able to write a book about the diet. The book was published in 1862 and was called Letter on Corpulence Addressed to the Public. This book also came to be the very first diet book in history.

Chewing Food The Right Way

During the end of the 19th Century, Willam Gladstone, Britain’s 4 times Prime Minister, had advised that food must be chewed 32 times, before it is swallowed. The theory was based on the principle that it can lessen ones appetite, which would lead to weight loss.

This simple advice, was so influential that it led to the title of The Great Masticator named as Horace Fletcher. However, he took it a step higher as he advised that food should be chewed until it became liquid in the mouth. He also advised that all kinds of meat must be avoided along with tea, coffee and alcohol. It was also him who spread the principle that people shouldn’t eat until they felt hungry and that people should have a happy disposition during meal times.

Calories In The Making

Wilbur Atwater, a chemist, was the one to discover the calorific value of food. However, it was only 2 decades after his discovery, 1918, that the concept went mainstream and left the academic world.

A doctor from California, Lulu Hunt Peters, was the first to introduce the calorie counting diet. Since it was a scientific method of losing fat, people were enthusiastic about it and it sold like pancakes.

Food Combinations

Then came the concept that how much you eat doesn’t really matter at all, what mattered is your food choices and their combinations. It was William Hay who first introduced this concept. He also held on to the theory that sugars, proteins and starches must be eaten separately in order to avoid adding extra pounds.

More Food, More Diets And More Claims

As time passed, people were exposed to more kinds of food. Fast foods were also introduced along with the comforts of living with high technology. Losing fat became more of a problem and still more kinds of diets came into being. However, most of them are still based on the above diets, which are considered to be the first in the history of losing fat.

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What You Need to Know About Weight Loss

Everybody wants to lose weight. This is one fact that is supported by the countless weight loss programs on the market along with the numerous weight loss products, ranging from snack bars, powdered juices, shakes and even slimming soaps and lotions!

It really gets confusing nowadays to know which ones are for real and which ones are junk, especially when presented with all the information.

You Don’t Have To Practice Everything

It’s not really essential that you know about all the available diets on the market. In fact, many of them have conflicting principles. For instance, one might say that you need to eat several small meals throughout the day.  Another suggests that you should only eat one big meal for the day and starve yourself until you start another day. Confusing isn’t it?

This proves that just because advertisements say so, doesn’t mean they’re right. You should get to know which information is the real deal and which ones are not.

So, here are the essential things you need to know about weight loss before you decide to undergo any kind of diet program.

Losing Weight Is Not Instant

Although it would really be superb if you could lose weight instantly just by using a product, you have to face the reality that losing weight is not an instant process. Don’t be fooled by diet programs and products that make 5-minute promises. Losing weight is never instant, unless you’re undergoing liposuction.

You must understand that it is a process that takes time to be effective. There are no shortcuts here. Unless you impose real discipline in regard to eating healthy and living a healthy lifestyle, you won’t lose weight on a permanent basis.

Weight Loss Involves Activity

There are so many diet programs to enter and each varies with their underlying principles. Watching what you eat is good. There is nothing wrong with that. However, you should keep in mind that food is not the only factor that you should consider when trying to lose weight. Another important factor is your body’s activity.

If you really want to shed some fat and make your diet effective, you should couple monitoring your food with the right exercise. Dieting will not work when you’re living the life of a couch potato. Living a sedentary lifestyle does you no good at all.

Starvation Is Not The Answer

Going on a hunger strike will not answer fat problems. The popular belief that starving your body will make you lose weight is a common mistake. Although this principle may seem to make sense, it doesn’t work!

The human body has its own monitoring system, which sees that everything is in balance.

If it senses starvation, it automatically takes this as a signal for stress. When under stress, the body does automatic actions, such as production of hormones to counteract this stress. In this case, it produces more cortisol, which is an important hormone that stimulates fat production.

Additionally, your body retains more water. When it starts water retention, this adds to your body weight, since the human body is mainly composed of water.

Metabolism Varies

Metabolism is how fast or slow your body makes use of the food you eat and turns it into energy. You should understand that people do not have the same rate of metabolism. People have varied rates, and this can affect how susceptible a person is for gaining weight.

Generally, people with slow metabolism are prone to gain weight easily. Those with a fast metabolism are likely those that can eat a lot yet still do not get fat. This is one good reason why eating what your friend eats within the day wouldn’t necessarily lead you to having the slim body that she has.

You may have different metabolic rates, which make it okay for her to eat an entire pizza without worrying about getting fat, while you get to eat all veggies, yet still have a hard time trimming down.

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