Stop eating watery foods to lose weight! In fact, eating oil will not make you fat, but sugar is the key to losing weight

The source of body fat accumulation is "sugar"

The theme of this book is to lose belly fat (lose visceral fat). Why do we need to lose visceral fat? This goes back to the reason why visceral fat is formed. Understanding this will help you stick to weight loss and improve your health.

The key to losing weight by reducing sugar intake is to inhibit the functioning of the "obesity hormone" insulin. Insulin is a hormone secreted by the pancreas when the body takes in sugars, which is used to lower blood sugar.

Once you eat sugary foods such as rice, bread, noodles, cakes, biscuits, cold drinks, etc., the body needs to break down and absorb the sugar, which causes blood sugar to rise (sugar enters the blood and becomes blood sugar, and the blood sugar level reflects the amount of sugar in the blood).

Normally, insulin is not secreted in large quantities, but if you eat foods high in sugar, it will be secreted in large quantities, which is the starting point for the accumulation of visceral fat. After the body ingests sugar, blood sugar levels rise sharply, and the pancreas will secrete a large amount of insulin to lower blood sugar. As a result, muscle and fat cells absorb blood sugar, causing blood sugar levels to drop. In muscle cells, any glucose left over after being used for energy is stored as glycogen . Insulin also affects the liver, which stores glucose as glycogen.

Although it varies from person to person, generally speaking, the amount of glycogen stored in the liver is 70 to 80 g, and in the muscles it is 200 to 300 g. If you always eat three meals a day, eat rice or bread in the morning as a matter of course, and do very little physical activity, the glycogen storage tanks in your liver or muscles will always be full. If you consume sugar again at this time, your blood sugar will rise and the remaining blood sugar will be stored somewhere in the body, preventing your blood sugar from falling and damaging your health.

Once the storage tanks of the liver and muscles are full, they can no longer accommodate glycogen, and can only be stored in fat cells as neutral fat . This is the truth behind why visceral fat accumulation causes increased body fat . In other words, consuming large amounts of sugar will cause the body fat to continue to accumulate (the neutral fat accumulated in the body is collectively called "body fat"). Many people mistakenly believe that the raw material of body fat is fat, so they avoid eating fatty foods, but the main cause of body fat is sugar!

Consuming "fat" does not mean increasing body fat

The true nature of body fat is neutral fat, which is composed of three fatty acids and one glycerol . Among them, the enzyme that metabolizes glycerol does not exist in fat cells. It sounds a bit complicated, but in plain words, even if you consume fat, it will not directly form body fat. Glycerol does not enter fat cells, but is transported to the liver to become the raw material for glucose regeneration of gluconeogenesis. This is the function of insulin, which not only allows cells to absorb blood sugar and inhibit the decomposition of body fat, but also promotes body fat synthesis, so it is also called obesity hormone.

I have said many times that the accumulation of body fat is not due to fat, but due to excessive intake of sugars. Especially since 60% of Japanese people's normal diet is sugar (calorie ratio), they must reduce sugar. Reducing sugar intake can inhibit high blood sugar after meals and avoid excessive secretion of insulin. By preventing the obesity hormone insulin from doing bad things, you can avoid the accumulation of visceral fat. Not only that, reducing sugar intake can also promote the decomposition of visceral fat (including while eating!) and continue to do so, solving early problems of obesity and metabolic syndrome.

The first priority is to lose "visceral fat"!

I mentioned in the introduction that body fat is divided into subcutaneous fat and visceral fat depending on where it is stored.

● Subcutaneous fat = fat stored under the skin

● Visceral fat = fat that accumulates on the outer membrane of the digestive tract, such as the intestines

Subcutaneous fat tends to accumulate in the abdomen, buttocks and waist. Excessive accumulation will lead to obesity in the lower body. The external features are very similar to those of a pear, and it is also called "pear-type obesity."

On the other hand, if visceral fat accumulates too much, the abdomen will bulge, and the appearance will resemble an apple, so it is called "apple-shaped obesity." Once you gain weight, subcutaneous fat and visceral fat will also accumulate, so the first thing you should do to lose is visceral fat.

A moderate amount of subcutaneous fat is necessary for the body.

Eliminating visceral fat is not about eating less fat, but about reducing sugar

After being diagnosed with metabolic syndrome, I immediately received dietary guidance to reduce visceral fat and lose weight. The diet adopted at that time was "diet" and "eat less fat". However, after actual implementation, it was found that visceral fat was not reduced as expected and the method was difficult to sustain.

I believe that everyone who has read this knows that the reason for the increase of visceral fat is not fat, but too much sugar. Therefore, this diet policy is naturally unable to eliminate visceral fat. Even if you lose weight, it will be difficult to sustain because of the strong feeling of hunger. If you want to lose fat, it’s best to reduce sugar.

For many years, people have believed that the main cause of obesity is excessive fat intake. The basis to support this idea comes from the conversion calories of the three major nutrients (protein, fat, and carbohydrates) . Each gram of protein and carbohydrates can be converted into four calories, but each gram of fat is 9 calories , which is more than twice the calories of protein and carbohydrates. This "seemingly reasonable argument" supports the idea that "consuming fat will make you fat."

However, this argument has been completely turned on its head. The United States, the "obese superpower" that has surpassed Japan, is far ahead of other advanced countries in the risk of death due to obesity. It is completely restricted by the past "eating fat is bad" and "losing weight depends on dieting" and continues to follow a fat-reducing diet. This large-scale program across the United States lasted for 30 years from 1971 to 2000 and reduced the proportion of fat in total daily calorie intake from 36.9% to 32.8%, a reduction of more than 4%. Unfortunately, the results were contrary to everyone's expectations. People thought that reducing fat would lead to weight loss, but unexpectedly the obesity rate doubled from 14.5% to 30.9% (all subjects were men, source: "National Health Survey").

I lost fat but still gained weight because I ate too much sugar. The total calorie intake remains unchanged, and to make up for the reduced fat, people will increase their protein and carbohydrate intake. Foods high in sugar, such as fast food, are cheaper than protein-rich foods, such as meat or fish. As a result, many Americans eat less fat and more cheap sugar. Living a diet high in sugars not only did not reduce visceral fat, but made me fatter. In 1971, American men's sugar intake accounted for 42.4% of their total daily calories, but in 2000 it was 49%, an increase of more than 6%. No wonder they doubled in weight.

This article is excerpted from Sancai Culture's "Lose Belly Quickly! The Complete Book of Intermittent Fasting to Reduce Sugar: Evidence from Authoritative Physicians on Sugar Reduction, Lose 3 kg in a Week, Quickly Reduce Visceral Fat, and Fight Diabetes! 》