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0:02Fat is your most dangerous organ.
0:07While it is often falsely described as a
mere expression of laziness or gluttony,
0:12fat is essential for health, controlling
and guiding crucial processes in your body.
0:18But if you have too much fat, it starts
to disrupt your metabolism becoming
0:22one of the most deadly things
that can happen to your body.
0:26Today more people are obese than
starving, which is a huge victory.
0:31There are all sorts of ideas about the cause
0:33of the obesity epidemic but it
really comes down to one thing:
0:36For millions of years, humans had to expend a
lot of effort to get food and often faced hunger.
0:42Our bodies evolved to hold
on to every bit of energy.
0:46And then suddenly we had an overabundance
of food we didn't need to move much for.
0:51We made food hyperpalatable and ultra processed,
with loads of unhealthy fats, salt and sugar.
0:58Our brains love this, so our food is extremely
hard to resist, to the point of being addictive.
1:05It is also extremely convenient,
1:07cheap and you get a lot of energy per
volume – so it’s not very satiating.
1:12This leads to most of us regularly
overeating without realising it.
1:16And food is aggressively
marketed, especially to children.
1:21Fat comes with a lot of shame
and blame which is pretty unfair,
1:24in a world full of things that make you
feel nice and are available within minutes.
1:29Body fat is also often unfairly villainized –
but it is crucially important for your health
1:34and if you don't have enough, you can
suffer problems from infertility to a
1:38weak immune system, fatigue, mental
health issues and osteoporosis.
1:43Still none of this changes
how bad excess fat is for us.
1:48So how does our fat organ become so
destructive and can we help ourselves?
1:56If you consume more energy than you
burn you store it as triglycerides,
2:00an organic battery bustling with energy.
2:02Collected in a large drop of
fat inside a white fat cell.
2:06Gain weight and white fat cells expand
with fat, lose weight and they shrink.
2:12Only in the last few decades have
we learned fats' most important job:
2:16Fat is an endocrine organ, part of the system
that makes and regulates your hormones:
2:22chemical signals for your brain, liver, muscles,
2:25digestive tract and immune system,
making them work correctly together.
2:30Unfortunately if you become overweight and obese,
2:33your fat organ and the many
hormones it releases turn insane.
2:38In adults fat comes in two types of white fat
depots – most of it is subcutaneous fat, the
2:44gooey soft stuff under your skin that insulates
against the cold and serves as energy storage.
2:49The other one is visceral fat nestled between your
2:52organs providing a soft cushion
for your sensitive insides.
2:56But it also happens to be more dangerous.
2:59These fat cells are super sensitive to
stress hormones like cortisol or adrenaline.
3:04When they pick up a surge of stress,
they release fatty acids directly into
3:08your blood and are picked up by your
liver, as a rapid source of energy.
3:12On top of that your visceral fat
is very metabolically active,
3:16in a constant hormonal dialog
with the rest of your body.
3:20This is also why the health
of two people with the same
3:22weight and amount of fat can be totally different.
3:25If you are pear shaped and your fat
is mostly in your hips or limbs you
3:29are much less at risk than someone apple
shaped with a lot of fat in their torso.
3:37As you gain unhealthy weight,
3:38excess visceral fat triggers a cascade
of negative changes all at once.
3:43Fat cells bloat up to their limit until they
3:45outgrow their blood supply
and get starved of oxygen.
3:49They become critically stressed or even die.
3:52This is bad. If you are overweight or
obese your fat is basically a wounded
3:56organ leaking stress and poison into your system.
3:59Especially your visceral fat,
4:01even more triggered by the extra stress
hormones, makes your blood more fatty.
4:06This overfeeds your organs like
your liver or your muscles,
4:09who can’t keep up anymore
and begin to take damage.
4:12The cellular stress and dead fat cells
4:14are emergency signals that call
your immune system to a fight.
4:18Armies of macrophages invade your fat tissue,
4:21creating clusters, trying to eliminate
the cause of the stress but can’t.
4:25So they stay and call for more help.
4:28In a lean person’s fat, immune cells make up about
5% of cells – in an obese person's fat, up to 40%!
4:36Active immune cells cause inflammation,
4:38bloating up your tissue and
releasing even more alarm signals.
4:41Which is good for a short amount
of time when you are sick.
4:44But if it becomes chronic, it’s like
your entire body is under friendly fire.
4:49The inflammation molecules and fatty
acids rip countless tiny wounds into
4:53the insides of your blood vessels, which leads
to plaques that desperately try to close them.
4:57This narrows your blood vessels and
reduces the flow of oxygen-rich blood.
5:02Inflammation also causes your blood
pressure to rise, so your heart has
5:06to work harder and your risk of heart
attacks or strokes increases massively.
5:11To make things worse your fat organ’s
hormone production gets out of whack.
5:15Like leptin, the satiety hormone.
5:18With a healthy amount of fat,
leptin tells your brain when you
5:21have enough energy storage, can
eat less and spend more energy.
5:24But if you have too much fat,
instead of becoming less hungry,
5:27your brain becomes resistant against
the constant flood of leptin.
5:31This breaks your internal food thermostat.
5:34Which is one of the reasons why many people
who are overweight feel intense hunger.
5:39Their fat is screaming at their
brain that they have enough but
5:42the brain is not hearing the message anymore.
5:45Your sex hormones also get out of whack,
5:47testosterone is lowered while
estrogen is over produced.
5:51In women this increases the risk
of breast cancer significantly.
5:55Most people are not aware how much the
risk of cancer rises with excess fat.
5:59In the US almost 10% of all cancers are
directly related to being overweight or obese.
6:05And to top this off, obese cancer
patients have much worse outcomes,
6:09succumbing to the disease more often and sooner.
6:12None of this is great but
even worse is what happens
6:15to one of your most important hormones: Insulin.
6:19When the Hormone World Explodes
6:22Insulin is a hormone produced
by your pancreas that tells
6:25your cells to open their tiny mouths
and eat up glucose from your blood.
6:29It is your body’s way of screaming “dinner time”.
6:32Disastrously bombarded by the
stress from your excess fat,
6:35cells all over your body become insulin resistant
– worse at eating glucose and taking up energy.
6:42Your body tries to compensate by pumping
out more insulin, screaming louder.
6:47This can go on silently for many years
and progress to prediabetes – with no
6:52or only subtle symptoms like fatigue or hunger.
6:55But as the damage accumulates, eventually
your body just can’t keep up anymore.
6:59Something breaks and you get Type 2 diabetes.
7:03The cells responsible for insulin
production are so overworked that they
7:07stop functioning properly and eventually give in.
7:10Your insulin crashes drastically and your
body can’t compensate, while the blood is
7:16now saturated with glucose – yet you are
starving and feel exhausted and unwell.
7:21Imagine this as trillions of tiny,
sharp shards floating through you,
7:25damaging your blood vessels, nerves and organs,
causing slow but constant damage everywhere.
7:31At this point your body is so chronically inflamed
that almost all organ systems are affected.
7:37The kidneys are overwhelmed, making you
pee way more, your vision gets blurry, your
7:41immune system is severely weakened, wounds heal
slower, dying nerves lead to numbness and pain.
7:48You may experience shortness of breath,
chest discomfort, erectile dysfunction and
7:52high blood pressure, problems with your
memory, focus, mood and even depression.
7:58Your risk of developing just about every
possible deadly disease goes through the roof.
8:03On average Type 2 diabetes shaves
10 years off your life and reduces
8:08your health span massively –
arguably as much as smoking.
8:12If current obesity trends continue up to 1
in 3 Americans will have diabetes by 2050.
8:18There is no nice way to put this:
8:20Excessive fat strains nearly
every organ system in your body,
8:24ages you much quicker and often leads
to multisystem damage and dysfunction.
8:28And yet, fat is still mostly discussed through
the lens of aesthetics first and health second.
8:35Which is kind of baffling considering that
most if not all of the toxic effects of your
8:39excess fat basically go away as soon as you
lose it and start eating a healthy-ish diet.
8:44Once your fat cells contract again they stop
being stressed and your immune system calms down.
8:50The excess blood fat and sugar drops to
normal levels and your body recovers.
8:55Even if you already have full blown
diabetes type 2, by losing weight you
8:59can reverse many of the negative effects and
drastically improve your health and lifespan.
9:05So if you’ve been waiting for a push
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