Can eating more fat help you lose weight? An age old question haunting dieters all over the world indeed. In order to lose weight, you stop eating food that contains fat. You begin to read the label of every food you buy, checking to see how many grams of fat is in it. Hence, you decide to take a shortcut and ban yourself from eating any foods that contain fat. But is that a wise choice? What do the experts have to about this?
The bodybuilding hunks and beauties, who have made a career out of teaching people how to get bulk and lean, will tell you to eat everything, even fats! Even though you will be a little skeptical about believing this, but it is true! You do not have to distance yourself from all types of fat, but you do have to gain knowledge about which type of fat is good for you and which is bad for you.
Good and Bad Fats
A diet comprising of bad fats will ruin your body. Saturated and trans fat are two types of fats which you should not make a habit of eating daily. On the other hand, you have polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats, which both are good fats. Here is a list of foods from both categories:
The Good Fats
Good fats help you reduce cholesterol level, decrease the risk of heart disease, and more. They include:
- Polyunsaturated Fats: You can find this fat in a variety of different food such as soybean oil, salmon, walnuts, pumpkin seeds, soymilk, sardines, mackerel, and more.
- Monounsaturated Fats: You can find this fat in olive oil, all types of nuts such as cashews and almonds, sesame oil, sunflower oil, peanut oil, avocados, and more.
The Bad Fats
Bad fats are the worst of the kind. They include:
- Trans Fats: Do not even go near food that contains trans fat. Eating too much of trans fat will increase your risk of sustaining diseases and illnesses. You should avoid hamburgers, cookies, candies, pizzas, French fries, and any other type of fast food.
- Saturated Fats: Do you want the doctor to tell you that you are at risk for heart disease or your cholesterol levels are high? Of course not, but if you keep on eating cheese, lard, whole-fat dairy products, ice cream, and meat that is high in fat, the probability of the doctor not telling you the bad news is low.
If you want to lose weight, gain muscle, and look lean, you have to minimize your intake of bad fats, as they are not good for your body and especially, for a person who is trying to get buff. If you want to lose weight and gain muscle, but keep your fat intake high, you need to eat foods that contain good fats.
Read More:
- The Smart Method to Begin a Fat-loss Diet
- Eat Clean and Maintain a Lean Lifestyle with These 10 Fool proof Ways
What is So Amazing About Good Fats?
Your body needs three essential macronutrients, carbohydrates, fats, and proteins. One will not work without the other. If you restrict all types of fat from your diet, even the good ones, you will be plagued with health issues down the line. By eating foods with good fats, you will reduce your body’s insulin levels and curb your cravings.
The Effect on Your Body’s Insulin Levels
Following a low-fat diet requires you to eat foods high in carbs and as a result, your body begins to depend on carbs for energy. If you only eat carbs, your insulin level will increase, forcing your cells to stop the process of burning fat and turning it into energy. Conversely, following a high-fat diet will stabilize your insulin levels and you will end up losing weight.
How Good Fats Make You Feel Full
Since it takes a person longer to digest fats than carbs, eating fats will make you feel fuller. When you feel full, you will be less likely to overeat. If you only eat carbs to gain muscle, you will feel hungrier sooner. This will no doubt make you gain weight.
Are There Any Other Benefits You Need to Know You?
In fact, you do! Some other benefits you will get from eating foods with good fats include:
- In order to transport Vitamins such as D, E, A, and K into your body, you need fats!
- Since your brain is made up of cholesterol and fat, you need to eat good fats to ensure your brain keeps functioning optimally.
- If you want your cells to function normally, you need fat, as your cell membrane is made from it.
The Good Fats Diet You Should Follow to Lose Weight
By now, you already know that one macronutrient will not work without the other. If you want to shed the extra weight, you need the help from all three macronutrients, carbs, protein, and fat. Each day, you should eat adequate quantities of each macronutrient.
Even if the diet you follow requires you to eat large quantities of one type of macronutrients, still try to include small amounts of each macronutrient into your diet. However, remember, effective and well thought out diets will not tell you to leave out one macronutrient entirely. If you want to speed up the weight loss results, you can include supplements into your diet.
If you truly want to be successful, get plenty of sleep, drink plenty of water during the day, and visit the gym on a regular basis. Oh, and do not cheat. If you are really compelled to eat the cake in front of you, one small bite will do, but nothing more than that, as you do not want a cluster of bad fats forming a union inside your body to thwart your efforts at losing weight and building muscle. Say hi to good fats, and bye to bad fats!
Sohail has been searching diets and belly fat solutions for over a decade, and manage a pool of trained authors to write articles, which have helped thousands of readers to this date. He has CPD accredited Certificate in Nutrition for Weight Loss besides his MBA degree. He also owns this website, which he founded in 2013 to share his ideas and knowledge. Not to mention he has tried numerous supplements over the years and has an extensive and thorough knowledge on supplements. Besides spending time on his study, research and literature, Sohail loves swimming, gardening and travelling.
