When you lose fat, where does the fat go?

When you lose fat, it sneaks out of your body when you sleep. 

This may sound really stupid or you may think I’m joking or trolling you, but TRUST me, most of your fat loss happens during sleep. When you workout regularly, eat well and sleep well, your body’s levels of Cortisol, which is the stress hormone, are lowered which helps the body to burn fat for energy more efficiently. 

Now a practical answer to where the fat REALLY goes :

Fat burning depends MAINLY on two hormones - Insulin and Adrenaline.

Let’s have a quick glance at what Insulin does in the body. Insulin is a hormone which lowers blood sugar levels and helps in the storage of nutrients like protein, carbohydrates and fats that you eat in your daily diet. All nutrients spike insulin and all nutrients need insulin to reach their storages. When you eat carbohydrates, or carbs, your blood sugar spikes up and insulin’s main function is to lower your blood glucose (sugar) levels.

When you consume high amounts of carbs, especially from refined and fast-absorbing sources like white bread, white pasta, sugary stuff, etc., then your blood sugar spikes a lot, thus demanding more insulin. On the contrary, when you consume controlled quantities and good quality carbs (low-moderate glycemic), your blood sugar will be lower which in turn results in lowered insulin levels. 

Fat loss happens only when insulin is blunted, or dormant, i.e. mostly in the fasted state or during the gaps in between meals. During this blunted insulin state, stored body fat is converted into ketone bodies - namely Acetone, Aceto-acetate and β-Hydroxybutyrate (BHB). BHB is released into the bloodstream to be used for energy. It’s similar to water evaporation; you can’t see the water being evaporated every second, every minute, but a few days/months later, an entire lake can get dried up.

I’m sure you’ve seen or heard of “Adrenaline Rush” in movies and/or TV shows, which refers to the surge of energy in people when facing an extremely difficult or uneasy situation. Adrenaline, also known as Epinephrine, triggers the body’s “fight or flight” mechanism. Whenever you face a situation which is dangerous, highly uncomfortable and/or threatening, you have only two options - either to fight and face the situation; or to flee. 

Let me give you an example. Imagine you’re in a jungle and you see a lion running towards you. What do you think you’ll do? You’ll obviously run as fast as you can, and that explosive energy you will get will be provided by adrenaline to flee from the threat. 

Let’s take another great example that we see in your daily lives. You’re driving your car and a motorbiker bumps into your car. You get out to see the damage and ask the biker to pay for the damages because of his recklessness, but he arrogantly refuses to pay, so you’re agitated, your heartbeat’s super high and in that moment, you give him a hard beating. That’s your “fight” mode activated due to the adrenaline rush.

Similarly, when you workout, your body produces high amounts of adrenaline which in turn give you more energy to workout harder. This energy helps you burn a lot of fat. 

So a sustainable and balanced diet which includes a good amount of protein, moderate or controlled amount of carbohydrates and healthy fats helps you achieve fat loss.