Kind: captions
Language: en
first let's start off by talking about
how fat cells actually
grow right well look um fat is an actual
term that elicits some pretty negative
responses right I mean if you think
about it uh when you hear the word fat
it's in your mind it automatically turns
into something that's not so positive
even if you walk in a grocery store and
you walk by the butcher cabinet and you
see the the fat on the Rind around the
steak like it's kind of like oh that's
kind of gross right um and the other
experience that we all have associated
with fat and this is I think common to
everyone all of us uh take a shower in
the morning step out naked and out of
the corner of our eye we see an a mirror
a little lump or a bump that wasn't
there before or we don't think belongs
there and you automatically think man I
got to I got to do something about that
I got to eat better I got to work out or
whatever it is then you step on the
scale that number doesn't deliver what
you expect it's a disappointment so all
around this whole idea of fat body fat
is kind of a in our society become quite
a negative thing but I'm actually here
to tell you that there's a completely
different way a more I think liberating
way more powerful way to look at fat it
has to do with Biology because I'm a
scientist what scientists do is we are
interested in looking at the origins of
things so where does fat come from right
like fat doesn't just automatically come
up when we're adult and we want to
actually lose some weight turns out
what's amazing is that fat forms when
we're in the womb so when your mom's egg
met your dad's sperm ball of cells
emerged first tissue that got laid down
were blood vessels because every future
organ needs a circulation second nerves
started forming because every organ
needs a channel to receive signals on
what the organs should do the third
tissue is little bubbles of fat they're
called ATP adipocytes little fat cells
and they form like bubble wrap around
every blood vessel now the reason is fat
cells are not actually bad they're good
they're actually fuel tanks just like
the tank in your car and they wrap
themselves around blood vessels because
when you eat food and you get energy the
energy comes through the blood and it
gets stored into the fuel tank right so
it makes a lot of sense now that means
means that we had body fat before we had
a face we could stuff with food very
important to think about I mean
mind-blowing to think about really now
when you're born think about it a cute
baby how do you know there's a cute
healthy baby it's pudgy it's chubby it's
fat round right big chubby cheeks round
tummy arms and legs are like balloons
you know like that circus balloon twist
into a Poodle right
so fat babies are considered healthy
babies so Fat's actually good at the
moment we're born and in fact if you saw
a baby that had chisel cheekbones thin
arms long thin thighs like a fashion
model you you go like well there's
something seriously wrong with this baby
and you'd be right and that's the key
thing fat is important in our Origins it
starts before we were born and so the
real new science about fat and the new
science about your metabolism tracks
back into this origin so the question is
what does fat do why do we even have it
and why is it important yeah oh man so
fascinating I love this because we have
to reframe something that has been so
vilified in our culture and in some
aspects rightfully so but if we don't
often times we we're fighting against
something we don't understand and also
trying to hate our way into fitness and
so creating a new relationship and and
value and understand standing with fat
has been a big mission of mine as well
and yeah and I know again having someone
like you as an ally in this because it
really starts with education and now we
get into a place so we know the the
beginning the origins of fat and why
it's so valuable it's helped us to
evolve as a species and not need to have
like a funnel of food going in all the
time because fat is there to do its job
now let's talk about what happens when
we become quote overfat or fat cells
begin to grow grow abnormally how does
that process work how are fat cells
growing in the first place does this
have something to do with that first
thing that develops blood vessels yeah
so let me kind of put a little story
together first to talk about how good
fat how fat helps us and that's really
the best way to start I think this
conversation is what is fat doing why do
we need it why does it form so early and
it actually has completely to do with
our metabolism which is what my book new
book is really about it's not a diet
book it's really a metabolism book and
it's really the new signs of the
metabolism so to break it down into to
understand why excess fat is so damaging
to our health and compromises our
fitness let's let's reel it back just a
little bit to say okay how does uh
normal fat F first of all what does
normal fat do normal fat first I
mentioned to you is a fuel tank it
literally is a canister a Jerry can to
be able to store fuel uh that we eat
just like if you had a car and you're
driving around you need your engine uh
to run smoothly on gasoline what do you
do you look at the fuel gauge when your
fuel gauge runs low runs towards empty
you pull over to The Filling Station
pull out the nozzle put plug it into the
car and press the handle and you
actually fill up the tank when the tank
is filled there's a click and that's it
and you put it back and you drive off
with the full tank right so our car our
body is kind of like a car car engine
that's how our metabolism Works how it
actually gets energy and so the engine
of our body needs fuel the same way as a
car now when our uh fuel gauge which we
sense in our brain runs low all right
what do we do we don't go to The Filling
Station we pull over to the dinner table
to the restaurant to the refrigerator
the pantry right that's how we actually
pull over and we put the no we we load
up on fuel our fuel is food all right
that's our energy some people call it
calories I don't want people to get
distracted on the whole topic of
calories because it's becomes so uh such
a fixation but we just call it calories
um but let's call it Fuel and so what
happens is that we when we eat the fuel
goes into our body and our uh our body
produces a hormone called insulin
insulin is a hormone that basically says
oh you got some fuel you're eating let's
pull that energy to to into our function
so we have enough fuel just like you
would when you're F filling up a car and
then anything extra that you don't need
at that moment to keep running your body
your engine it gets stored away and it's
it's smart that we're storing it away
because when we're not eating we need to
draw down from it right it's our it's
our storage so where does it store it it
stores it in body fat so what does it do
it takes those uh food that we eat goes
into our stomach absorbed in the
bloodstream that energy the fuel
actually is stored with insulin's help
into little fat cells those little fat
cells were the bubble wrap that form
when we were in our mom's womb okay and
it just stores up it's loaded up okay
it's our fuel tanks now when we actually
uh are not
eating when our insulin goes down our
body normally can draw down from that
extra Fuel and it reaches for the fuel
tanks it just empties it out normal fat
cells are not big they're tiny and when
you load them up they get a little bit
bigger it's like a water balloon that
you fill up halfway and then you stop
you can just squirt that water you can
draw it out from that water but what
happens when you
overeat it's like going to The Filling
Station and imagine if you were pumping
gas and that clicker didn't stop uh the
gas from flowing when your tank is full
imagine what would happen right gas
keeps on pumping up gas tank fills up
but now it continues to overflow gas
comes out of the side runs out of the
side around the tires around your shoes
and now you are standing in this
dangerous flammable mess now in our
bodies when we're fueling up we don't
have the clicker to stop us from eating
so we can keep on eating all right and
we can overload and overfill our tanks
uh in our body it doesn't run down
around our shoes what happens our body
has to pack it away in fat so those
little fat cells get bigger and bigger
and bigger they get stretched to their
Max all right and if you keep on eating
and you still got more fuel guess what
the body's got to make more fuel tanks
now you take stem cells and you make
another fuel tank let a fat cell and
that gets filled up and you still got
more fat got to make another one keep on
cloning it and that's why
overeating overloading your our bodies
with fuel that habit that too many
people practice I mean it's a kind of a
Hallmark of modern society and lots of
other complexities right it's a there's
a psychological component there's all
kinds of marketing forces that can
actually make us do this um uh overloads
our body and so then the fat actually
gets bigger and bigger and bigger now
what's the connection to blood vessels
well fat is an actual organ in the body
and it means it needs a blood supply so
um and I'll tell you why it's an organ
in a second but it needs a blood supply
and so when fat starts to clone itself
because you need more fuel tanks because
you got too much fuel and it keeps on
getting bigger and bigger and fat you
know and it starts to fill up more and
more the faster it grows the more blood
supply it needs but if it can't grow its
own blood supply quickly enough what
happens is that in this giant expanding
Mass the center of that mass is starred
of oxygen it starts to die it's called
hypoxia not enough oxygen all right and
when that happens the fat becomes
inflamed inflammatory cells infiltrate
that fat and we see this even in cancers
that are trying to expand span they
can't grow a blood enough of a blood
supply starts to die in the middle once
you have inflammation and not in hypoxia
inside a mass of fat you completely
derail your metabolism and you derail
many other hormonal system as well and
it sets you up for harm so the answer to
your question what happens and why does
it happen and what's the connection to
blood vessels that's a simple way to
think about the fact that when we eat
we're loading up our fuel when we
overeat we have to keep on loading it up
and it's going to create more fat when
that fat grows too big it's going to
start to die in the middle of the mass
can't grow enough blood supply it starts
to kind of go bad hypoxic and that
starts the trigger to all kinds of
problems
Downstream this is fascinating so again
this is something we see experientially
on the surface but to understand what's
happening with our fat cells so number
one they're getting filled up with cont
ENT right and so they're expanding their
volume and our fat cells can actually
expand their volume hundreds of times
their size but at a point they're going
to start to replicate as well so that's
talking about the stem cells which we'll
get more into in this episode for sure
and so now we're making copies but all
of these blood vessels so we've got the
filling up of
content but with the blood vessels they
also need to create more blood vessels
angiogenesis that's right so they can
get an A fuel supply an oxygen supply
nutrient Supply so that they can keep
growing in the first place exactly