No Stupid Questions

When you gain weight your fat cells grow, and when you lose weight they shrink. You don't actually gain and lose fat cells the way people think.

But as my doctor explained to me, if they get big enough, they divide. Then even if you lose weight, you have fat cells hanging around who think they should be holding onto more fat than they are. So your body will want to be fat, and will enforce that with cravings.

It’s why it’s extremely hard to lose a large amount of weight and leave it off. I’m on my third major attempt now.

That opens the door to new insults such as "You so fat your fat cells are the size of grapes"

the stuff in those cells could very well be old.

So, losing weight, is like taking a long needed shower for your cells.

Edit: That link is awesome. Your gut lining turns over every few days and your skin is weeks? That brings up so many more questions about the biome then.

yo momma so fat

So then I’m curious what happens with liposuction as the fat cells are literally removed. Does your body create more, or no longer store fat, or does it get stored somewhere else?

It kind of says something different though. It says the amount remains stable, but they're dying and replacing themselves. It's quick in fat people and takes longer in lean people.

It has been generally believed that adult humans cannot create new fat cells. We have thought, until now, that fat cells only and simply increase their fat mass by adding more lipids into fat cells that already exist in order to settle their body weight – this is true, but that is not the end of the story. Research lead by Kirsty Spalding, Jonas Frisén and Peter Arner has recently shown that adult humans constantly produce new fat cells regardless of their body weight status, sex or age.

Peter Arner, Professor, Department of Medicine, Huddinge, said “The total number of fat cells in the body is stable overtime, because the making of new fat cells is counterbalanced by an equally rapid break down of the already existing fat cells due to cell death.”

Edit: I can't wrap my head around this. Why would anyone keep gaining weight then? If the cells are replaced really quickly, why does it get replaced with the exact same amount of weight? It must be from evolution or something, but it's weird. That means biome, skin, fat, etc, the stuff that replaces itself quickly, keeps the healthy and unhealthy.

Wow, this is something that hasn't been said. I wonder if this is still current.

An average human adult has 30 billion fat cells with a weight of 30 lbs or 13.5 kg. If a child or adolescent gains sufficient excess weight, fat cells may increase in absolute number until age twenty-four.[3] If an adult (who never was obese as a child or adolescent) gains excess weight, fat cells generally increase in size, not number, though there is some inconclusive evidence suggesting that the number of fat cells might also increase if the existing fat cells become large enough (as in particularly severe levels of obesity).

Edit: Also, this explains why some people have it easier and harder

People who have been fat since childhood generally have an inflated number of fat cells. People who become fat as adults may have no more fat cells than their lean peers, but their fat cells are larger. In general, people with an excess of fat cells find it harder to lose weight and keep it off than the obese who simply have enlarged fat cells.[3]