The Fat Fad
PROVOKE Lifestyle|May 2024
YOUR LIFE DEPENDS ON FAT
Dr. Ashmita Boopathy Moturi
The Fat Fad

0mg FAT! We hate it...we hide it... we suck it in...and even try to suck it out...So shameful...so reviled... indicating lack self-control...the flabs...magnifying the unforgivable sin of gluttony... Fat is so unloved, that a billion-dollar industry has been thriving, with diets, gyms, drugs and surgeries, whose cornerstone has been to annihilate this offensive FAT!

But...but...but...perhaps you didn't know...FAT is as vital an 'ORGAN' in your body as your liver or heart. That's right...I did call it 'an organ'

It's your fat that enables puberty and ensures your reproductive organs function. Research shows that women with insufficient fat (including the so assumed 'fittest' of the lot...like dancers, athletes, sports stars and even models, who deliberately lose fat), have irregular menstrual cycles and even struggle to conceive.

Women use subcutaneous fat (fat that you find right under your skin), to convert the male hormone androgen to estrogen...too much biochemistry? Simply put - estrogen is a female hormone...vital to prepare the uterus for pregnancy... Women who are extremely lean with low subcutaneous fat even struggle with lactation post-delivery. Subcutaneous fat is in fact the only source of estrogen for women post menopause. Your muscles or your bones or your immunity...fat is actively involved in building them. Fat is actively involved in wound healing and can even prolong your life.

FAT is so vital that a baby in the womb at 2 weeks (still an embryo) begins to make fat before any other systems begin to develop and function.

Every single cell in your body is surrounded by a membrane of fat.... this is what ensures you capitalise on all your Vit A, D, E and K you consume. When I say every cell...it also includes your brain...guess what your brain cells are sheathed with?...good guess...FAT! The fat around the brain cells protects the brain from losing signals. Basically you need fat to even think! 

This story is from the May 2024 edition of PROVOKE Lifestyle.

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This story is from the May 2024 edition of PROVOKE Lifestyle.

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