Over the last several blog posts, we have looked at the cost of my recent weight loss. Thus far, we have examined how weight loss affects blood markers, how weight loss can slow down your metabolism, and how you can approach weight loss to minimize the negative impact on your blood markers and metabolism.
In this final blog post in the series, we will explore the changes in my body composition after losing the weight and discuss what I plan to do to reverse the impacts that weight loss has had on me.
First, let’s take a look at my body composition results.
In early November, I went to have a DEXA scan done. DEXA scans are kind of like an X-RAY, but instead of just looking at bone, they can distinguish bone from everything else in your body, allowing them to compute an approximation of how much muscle, fat, and bone you have.
While DEXA scans are considered the “gold standard” in body composition analysis, that shouldn’t be interpreted as meaning they are 100% accurate. Just like any other body composition tool, except dissection, there can be errors in measuring body composition. The reason why DEXA is considered the gold standard is because it has the smallest margin of error. In order to minimize any error in my own DEXA scans and allow for a better comparison from one scan to the next I go to the same facility using the same DEXA machine and have the test done under similar conditions (fasted, same hydration, 24 hours of rest from exercise, at roughly the same time of day).
During my scan in November 2023, my body fat percentage was 8.8% at a body weight of 149 pounds.
That body fat percentage puts me in the 5th percentile for other men in my age group and ethnicity. Below is the distribution of fat and lean mass on my body.
My body fat was down from 12.7% when I had my last DEXA scan in March of 2023.
However, perhaps the most important thing from this most recent scan is the amount of visceral fat I have. It is normal and healthy to have fat right below the skin; this is what is referred to as subcutaneous fat. Visceral fat is fat stored around your organs. When your body is storing fat around your organs, it’s a sign that your body has no more room to store fat subcutaneously and is storing it around your organs as a last resort. When you see a large amount of visceral fat, it is almost always associated with poor metabolic health. I only had 0.07lbs of visceral fat, which is very low, and that aligns with my blood sugar markers from my blood work as well.
From a body composition perspective, this all sounds pretty good. I am down about 3% body fat, so clearly that’s good, right?
In reality, it sounds good, but I think there are more negatives being at this body fat percentage than there are positives. The reason being is that being at this body fat percentage makes some of my blood markers worse than I would like them to be.
In addition, when my body fat was higher (back in January – March when I had my blood work and DEXA scan done), many of my blood markers looked better. Given the chart above, even at 12.7% body fat, that would still put me in the top 5% of males for my age and ethnicity, so there is clearly nothing bad with being 127% body fat.
Ultimately, I made the choice to drop the weight over the Spring and Summer purely for the purpose of competing athletically. Was that a smart thing to do from a health point of view?
I am not sure.
Considering the fact that competing in these competitions is nothing more than a hobby, you can make the argument that it might not be.
If the competitions weren’t somewhat dependent on weight, I wouldn’t have even really tried to lose any weight. Maybe I would have cut down a few pounds just to give myself a break from having to eat a massive amount of food to maintain a higher body weight, but I probably wouldn’t have dropped that much weight.
I also think that having some kind of periodization with your nutrition and body composition is a good thing. Our ancestors certainly had times where they had access to more food and could eat a lot, and then went through periods of time where there was less food around they were likely losing weight and body fat.
In fact, as I stated in the previous blog posts in this series, metabolic adaptation (the lowering of hormones, slowing of metabolism, etc.) is a survival mechanism for us humans that was meant to keep us alive in times when there was not a lot of food available historically… it’s part of the reason why we are here today and not extinct.
So, could artificially enacting these physiological processes occasionally be beneficial?
Maybe.
That said, this is not the approach that many people take today. Many people today are either perpetually overfed or perpetually trying to live on a diet… and neither are good long-term.
Remember, we likely went through these phases of being fed or being underfed throughout the year… we did not spend years, or in many cases, decades in these states.
Given this discussion about periodization of nutrition and body fat, what should you do then?
First, let me say that there is no one right answer here. If you are fine with your health and body composition and you just want to maintain that, then don’t change a thing! If what you are doing works for you, you don’t have to periodize anything.
With that out of the way, you might recall that we have already talked about a form of periodization as it relates to diet in the post on how to mitigate the effects of metabolic adaptation when we discussed the topic of diet breaks. That is one form of periodization for sure.
But we can also look at diet from a longer-term point of view. I spent the last 7 months dieting to go from 12.7% to 8.8% body fat. For me, based on my life and my next set of goals, it makes sense to come out of that dieting phase and to bring my body fat percentage up.
Why?
Well, I have no athletic competitions planned until at the earliest the Spring of 2024, and I would like to add more muscle mass and try to correct some of the blood markers in my labs. So, for myself, I am going to intentionally put on weight by eating more food. My hope is that most of that weight comes in the form of muscle; however, I know that there will also be some body fat gain.
In addition to hopefully gaining additional muscle and making my blood markers look a bit better, by going into a caloric surplus I am also alleviating the stress my body has been under being at this body fat percentage.
This is all very important because it is chronic dieting or chronic overfeeding that is the problem. If I spend the next 7 months or so feeding my body, I will put it in a much better state to lose any kind of excess body fat I put on during that time because my metabolism will be higher, my hormones will be optimized, and my body would have been under less stress. In addition, if I successfully put on muscle during this time, I won’t have to lose as much weight to be at the same body fat percentage!
If I however remain in a caloric surplus for a long period of time, eventually I will get to the point where the caloric surplus will turn from beneficial to negative and I might see health concerns of a different type. Unfortunately this is the state that far too many people find themselves in today.
To wrap up this blog post series, I want people to take away that being lean can come at a cost. It might seem like every male is 10% body fat and every female is at 17% on the internet and is doing great.
Some might be, but I am guessing many more are not doing so well.
I also think that many more people on the internet get down to a very lean body fat percentage, take a bunch of pictures while they are there, and then use those pictures throughout the year while they put on more weight. It gives the illusion that they are “shredded” year-round, but what they are actually doing is periodizing their nutrition and body composition. I am not saying everyone on the internet is “fake” or telling a lie, but let’s face it, everyone’s social media feed tends to be a “highlight reel”.
In reality, I think that what we need to think about is periodizing our nutrition and body composition to align with our goals and constraints. There will be times of the year where being on a diet and losing weight makes sense and other times of the year where it does not.
Maybe for you, you want to be leaner during the summer because you tend to wear less clothing, but during the winter when you are all bundled up because it’s cold and there are lots of holidays with yummy food, you put on a few pounds.
For someone like me, I am periodizing my nutrition and body composition around my athletic goals, so I plan things out based on a competition season.
For someone else, they might do it based on their mental performance. Maybe there are times of the year that are particularly cognitively demanding, and they find that being on a diet allows them to perform better cognitively. Then there are times of the year where things are more relaxed, and they can loosen the reins a little bit on their diet.
Like I said above there is no right answer here. We just need to make sure that we are not in a state of chronically dieting or overeating. I think monitoring your health with things like blood work and some type of body composition assessment is a good way to keep yourself honest. If you start to see these markers go in the wrong direction then you know it is time to switch directions in order to bring things back in line.
No matter where you are in your journey, whether you are trying to add muscle, lose body fat, or just figure out how to maintain the progress you have already made, my newsletter can help you navigate the minefield that is body composition to help you get to where you want to be safely and in the best health possible. Each week I put out free, actionable content that you can put to work right away and best of all by signing up for my newsletter I will deliver it right to your inbox. To sign up, enter your email address using the form below.