The Biggest Loser and my DEXA

Based soley on a post by McNutt, I went out and bought Dr. Rob Huizenga's book "Where did all the fat go?" Dr. H is the doctor on The Biggest Loser, and in the book, gives his WOW! prescription to reach one's ideal weight.

Early on in the book Dr. H stresses the need to get an accurate measurement of one's "fat weight." Which is basically finding out how much muscle you have, how much bone weight, and how much fat.

There are lots of different ways Dr. H suggests to find this weight. The easiest and most accurate way I was able to do this was to get a DEXA (Dual Energy X-ray Absorptiometry) scan. I was able to do this at the local university. I found it by googling: DEXA Wichita.

The contestants on the Biggest Loser, amid all the tests, get to do an iDEXA, which is a newer version of the DEXA. Wichita State has only one of two DEXA's with the new programming made for conducting body scans for weight loss. And for $100, they were happy to have me lay on a table, perfectly still, for 6 minutes while the table moved me underneath the x-ray so it could shoot billions of electrons through my body and calculate my density.

Here's a pic of the DEXA:

After getting dressed, I received my printout. On the tv show they get a cool color picture. Mine is low-res black and white. It is hard to tell all of my fat because it isn't in color but you can see a difference on my inner thighs.

You can see the light gray is the muscle and the dark gray is the fat. It's all over my body, but you can really see it there on my "loins." (I just wanted to say "loins.")

The coolest thing about the DEXA is that you get a realistic analysis of your weight. Knowing that, you can calculate how many calories your body burns normally (your resting metabolic rate), and the amount of calories you need to lose .5% of fat each week. But that's not all.

The best part for me is that it gives me a realistic goal. Here are my results:

According to the DEXA, I have 175 lbs of muscle and bone. I thought 175 lbs was close to my goal weight! Even if I had zero fat, I would still weigh 175 lbs! dang! According to Dr. H, men are supposed to have 12%-18% of fat. Which means that my goal weight is 199-213 lbs. That is only 40 lbs away!!!!

What a RELIEF!!!! So cool!

I do wish I would have gotten this done when I was at my heaviest. I weighed in at 309 (fully clothed). I now weigh 244. I got this done last week, with breakfast in my belly and some light clothes I weighed 246.

On the Biggest Loser they get to see before and after DEXA scans and it is so cool to see the difference! Nevertheless, I am so glad I through down the Franklin. It has given me so much good information and has really helped me focus on my goal which seems so very close now!