Everyone has that friend or knows an individual that can eat any and everything without putting on a single pound. You go to the restaurant and they always have the biggest plates filled with the fattiest, most unhealthy meal that one could eat!

The mighty shocker is that this same individual has never stepped foot in the gym yet they are skinny. How could this be? If you eat fatty foods you are supposed to gain weight and become fat. Well these people that are known by the popular term skinny fat (medical term is metabolically obese normal weight) are a little different.

Skinny fat individuals maintain a normal BMI (personally I am not a fan of that measurement) while having a high fat to low muscle content. The space normally occupied by muscle is over ridden by fat but not so much that it’s noticeable.

Also, with many skinny fat individuals they will have a significant amount of vascular fat which will add to the potential complication accompanied with this body type. The inside of these individuals are practically the same as someone with obesity which explains their high chance of getting type II diabetes.

Surprisingly, someone who is skinny fat will likely have a higher chance of obtaining type II diabetes. This is based on the theory that the lack of muscle makes it tougher for the regulation of insulin. Other interior effects in the body of someone who is skinny fat would be a significant amount of intramuscular fat with fat surrounding and invading the heart.

So how do you know if someone is skinny fat? Well there are some metabolic tests that can be taken to determine if you’re skinny fat. Some of the basic tests for someone who could be skinny fat would be; LDL, triglyceride, blood pressure, HDL, and fasting blood glucose.

These are just a couple of metabolic tests that can be used to find out if a person is skinny fat. Even though a person is skinny fat that does not mean they can’t turn their health around. Without even exercising yet lowering the intake of sugar and fat, a skinny fat individual will be on a much healthier course. So the question is, are you skinny fat?

-Phil