Natural HealthWhy Obese Eat More Calories?
A friend recently asked me, "Since an obese carries more fat, she'll have lots of energy reserve in her body, so she should eat less calories as she'll get most of her energy from her fat stores. Am I right?". Well, to answer his question, we need to find out if an obese uses more calories or not in the first place.
Does Obese Use More Calories?
An obese seems to have a lower metabolism than that of the lean, so she should burn less calories, isn't it?
Wrong. On the contrary, studies show that obese tends to expend more energy than lean people of comparable height, sex and bone structure.
This actually makes sense because when a lean grows fat, her lean body mass also increases. She puts on muscles, connective tissues and fat. And these will generally increase her total metabolism.
As a result of her larger size, she now has to use more energy to move herself around, flow her blood round the body and keep the heart pumping.
Having said that, the metabolic rate of an obese also plays a part on how much calories she'll burn.
Two obese persons weighing the same 200 pounds can have different metabolic rates. If you feed them 2,500 calories daily, one can burn all 2,500 calories while the other may burn only 2,300 calories.
Obviously, the difference lies in the energy expenditure levels between them.
Does Obese Eat Less Calories?
Now that we know an obese may use more energy than the lean, and since she stores more fat in the fat cells inside her body than a lean, she can easily burn those fats for energy use. In this way, she's likely to eat fewer calories, isn't it?
Again, the answer is a no-no. That's because fat cells do not release energy as easily as carbohydrate or protein.
"To turn what is eaten into fat, to move it and to burn it requires dozens of enzymes and the processes are strongly influenced by a variety of hormones", said Dr Edwin Astwood of Tufts University in 1962.
Nevertheless, to release fat requires an important trigger - oxygen. And for the body to burn just fat continuously for most of its energy needs, you need a constant supply of adequate oxygen in the bloodstream for such fat-burning purpose.
This is not easy, as many people, even the lean ones, have only enough oxygen in their bloodstream to keep them alive rather than keep them healthy.
When your blood oxygen becomes inadequate, your body will turn to carb and protein (that require little oxygen for burning) for energy source.
The only way to increase oxygen in your bloodstream is via exercising, especially anaerobic exercise like interval strength training.
Regrettably, obese tends to have low fitness level and pay little attention to proper deep breathing to train her lungs. Thus her lungs can't process oxygen effectively from the air she breathes in.
Since her body can't supply enough blood oxygen to billions of working cells to continue burning fat for energy, it turns to carb instead. As a result, she must eat more than the lean does in order to satisfy her minimal energy required.
A 2008 research done by London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine proves that obese with BMI of 29 consumes 18% more food energy than their leaner counterparts at 24.5 BMI.
Problem arises when obese loses control over her caloric intake. In other words, she overeats the wrong kind of food that adds on excess calories.
If she doesn't increase her activity level to burn off the excess calories, they get stocked up as fat faster for her, compared to those of the lean. At this point, the fat cells will continue to swell and multiply, sometimes at alarming rate, resulting in more weight gain.
If you got a friend who's gaining weight and does nothing about it, try observing her for 6 months. You'll realize her size increases dramatically within this period.
Is there a way to reverse obesity? Yes, start changing the kind of food you eat - pick up a vegetarian diet plan for weight loss.