When you’ve got a few extra pounds or you’re carrying some extra fat, what’s the best way to get rid of it? The approach you should take depends on a few factors. One of those factors is whether you’re trying for fat loss or whether your goal is weight loss.
Hold on, you might be thinking: aren’t they the same thing? Not quite. Although there are some similarities between fat loss and weight loss, the end result (and the process) is often different.
What is Weight Loss?
When people talk about weight loss, they’re usually talking about a reduction in a person’s overall body mass and size. If you weigh 175 pounds and lose 25 pounds, that weight will come from all over your body. Depending on the weight loss method you use, you’re likely to lose some combination of fat, water weight, and muscle when you drop the pounds.
It’s important to understand that weight loss doesn’t remove cells from your body. When you drop 10 or 25 pounds, your fat cells shrink, but they don’t go away. If you gain weight later on, the fat cells will increase in size once again.
What is Fat Loss?
While weight loss is more holistic, fat loss is pretty simple. It refers to the permanent removal of fat cells from your body. Fat loss won’t cause you to drop a significant amount of weight — unless you somehow have a significant amount of fat removed all at once. This isn’t recommended, as it’s only considered safe to remove a small amount of fat at a time.
Do You Want to Lose Weight or Fat?
Whether you want to lose weight or fat depends on your overall goal. If you’re overweight, weight loss might be the best option for you. Usually, it’s a good idea to work with a doctor and come up with a target weight and a plan to help you drop the unwanted pounds. Weight loss tactics often include making dietary changes and exercising more. Depending on how much weight you have to lose, bariatric surgery might be an option as well.
It’s possible to be at what’s considered a healthy weight and still have some unwanted fat. When that’s the case, trying to lose weight can be a frustrating experience. You might not be able to drop pounds and still eat a healthy diet. Or, you might find that you lose some weight, but the extra fat persists. In that case, trying to get rid of the unwanted fat is usually the most appropriate course of action.
How Can You Get Rid of Unwanted Fat?
What can you do to trigger fat loss? You have a few options. For years, the gold standard fat loss technique was liposuction. Liposuction is a surgical procedure that physically removes unwanted, excess fat cells from the body. Since it is a type of surgery, there is usually a lengthy recovery period afterward. You might have to take anywhere from a week to two weeks off from work.
In recent years, non-surgical fat removal options have become widely available. One example is Coolsculpting. Like liposuction, Coolsculpting is a fat loss method. But, instead of surgically removing the fat from your body, it uses cold temperatures to damage and destroy fat cells.
Your body metabolizes the destroyed fat cells, flushing them out for good. The destroyed cells can’t return, so you end up with fewer fat cells in your body overall.
The amount of fat you lose after Coolsculpting is enough to make a difference in the way your clothing fits and in your overall appearance. But it’s not likely to lead to significant weight loss. At the most, you’re likely to drop a pound or two after Coolsculpting.
Do you want to lose weight or fat? If fat loss is your goal, call 281-810-9083 to schedule a consultation at Mirror Mirror Beauty Boutique in Houston today. We’ll let you know all about Coolsculpting and how it can help you achieve your goals.