What Happens to Your Heart as You Lose Weight?

So are you one of those that never thought (or knew) the overall impact losing weight can have on your heart? Here’s what losing 10 percent of your body weight would look like.

• Blood vessels. Losing weight reduces your heart’s workload. Blood vessels supply the heart with the blood it needs to keep pumping. As you shed pounds, there’s less fat lurking around and forming plaque that can build up and clog your coronary arteries, causing a heart attack. Reduce your weight, reduce your risk. There is a direct relationship between a healthy weight and blood pressure.

• Blood fats. The blood fats, or blood lipids, in your bloodstream change when you shed pounds. Weight loss can make your triglycerides go down, your LDL cholesterol go down, and your HDL cholesterol go up. That means there are more good cholesterol and less bad cholesterol and fat floating in your bloodstream.

• Blood clots.Sometimes blood slows down and can form clots. Healthy weight and lower blood pressure generally mean fewer blood clots, so slimming down slightly makes it less likely that a clot will break away and travel to your heart, lungs, or brain.

• Your belly. Fat around the belly and the heart are especially detrimental to heart health. A 2011 study published in the journal Cardiology found that even normal-weight people with a “beer belly” or “muffin top” and heart disease have an increased risk of death than those with differently distributed weight. And research shows that hidden fat around the heart may be an even bigger indicator of cardiac disease than the waistline.