Does it seem like no matter what you do you’re stuck in an uphill battle with fat? Before you can tackle the problem, you need to know what’s causing it.
Fat doesn’t accumulate for no reason. It comes down to a simple formula: Eat more calories than your body needs to make energy, and the unused calories, which tend to come more from sugary, fatty and processed foods, will get stored in your fat cells. Once the cells are packed to the brim with extra fat, they begin to stretch out. When that happens, your body experiences weight gain. Since we all hold weight differently due to our genetic makeup, the general rule of thumb is that the areas where we gain fat first are usually the areas where we lose it first, too.
You May Also Like: Does Liposuction Really Get Rid of Fat Forever?
But not all types of fat are equal, nor is fat always bad. In the body, there is white fat and brown fat, and each serves a different purpose. White fat is what we typically think of as fat and it’s where we store extra calories. This is the fat that becomes enlarged when you gain weight. Brown fat is the type that burns calories. There’s also visceral fat, aka belly fat, which is the most inflammatory type of fat and often the hardest to lose.
On the body, excess fat can cause bumps, lumps, rolls and bulges, but the body needs appropriate amounts of fat in order to function properly. With age, the face tends to lose fat and fat shifts downward, causing a hollow or sunken look (although it often increases in the neck with age). But luckily, it can be restored with the use of fat transfer (fat taken from elsewhere on the body) and fillers.