The Science of Losing a Pound

So maybe you set a weight loss goal, ate healthy, exercised regularly and have lost some weight. [...]

toned and tan woman measuring her body fat

So maybe you set a weight loss goal, ate healthy, exercised regularly and have lost some weight. While that feeling is an incredible one, do you ever wonder where all that weight you used to have went? The answer is simple: Your fat cells from before have shrunk. You still have all the same fat cells you had before, but all the energy you burned while eating healthy and working out used up the fat stored in those fat cells.

We are very familiar with calories. We count them, we crave them, we loathe them. We know they are essential to our bodies, yet we have a love-hate relationship with them. Calories control our diets. They measure the potential energy in foods we eat in forms of fats, proteins and carbohydrates. Our body then uses some of those calories we ingested to digest food. Once it's broken down into fats, proteins or carbs, our bodies either use the remaining energy from the leftover calories or convert it into fat for storage in fat cells.

>> Read more: 12 Fat-Burning Foods

To lose weight, we have to burn more calories than we consume so we can start using up the fuel reserve our body has stored up. Our bodies won't be ingesting enough calories to fuel additional exercises, so it will have to pull from fat reserves! So the fat that was stored in your fat cells was burned into energy, but the fat cells themselves still remain in your body, which is why it's important to continue a healthy lifestyle of working out and healthy eating.

Need some direction? Check out our Weight Loss Soup recipe!

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