{"id":29346,"date":"2017-07-22T02:42:42","date_gmt":"2017-07-22T07:42:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/?p=29346\/"},"modified":"2023-04-27T19:46:37","modified_gmt":"2023-04-27T23:46:37","slug":"ideal-weight-how-and-why-to-calculate-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/ideal-weight-how-and-why-to-calculate-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Ideal Weight : How and Why to Calculate It"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Ideal Weight : How and Why to Calculate It<\/span><\/h3>\n

How do you know your ideal weight? People\u2019s morphology is different, muscle and fat mass are different depending on whether you\u2019re a man or a woman, and there are also differences based on our age. So how do we get an idea? There are two indices that can help us with this by verifying if our weight is located within a normal (healthy) range compared to undernutrition or excess weight.<\/span>They\u2019re the body mass index and the fat mass index, and they\u2019re relatively easy to calculate. While the interpretation of the results is done using intervals, they give a good indication of where you stand with respect to your weight, height, gender, and age.<\/span><\/p>\n

Calculating and interpreting your body mass index (BMI)<\/span><\/h3>\n

The BMI (Body Mass Index) indicator lets you check if your weight is appropriate for your height. It\u2019s been validated by the World Health Organization (WHO) for people between 18 and 65 years of age. For children, there\u2019s a growth curve that gives a better indication, and serious athletes, who have developed muscle mass, and pregnant women can\u2019t use this indicator to establish their ideal weight.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how to calculate your BMI:<\/span><\/h2>\n

Simply divide your current weight by the square of your height:<\/span><\/p>\n

BMI = Weight\/(height x height)<\/b><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an example: weight = 69 kg; height = 1.77 m<\/span><\/p>\n

BMI = 69\/(1.77 x 1.77)<\/b><\/p>\n

BMI = 22.02<\/span><\/p>\n

Once you\u2019ve calculated your BMI, you can interpret your result using this list:<\/span><\/p>\n

< 16.5 = starvation<\/span><\/p>\n

16.5 to 18.5 = underweight<\/span><\/p>\n

18.5 to 25 = normal weight (our example)<\/span><\/p>\n

25 to 30 = overweight<\/span><\/p>\n

30 to 35 = moderate obesity<\/span><\/p>\n

35 to 40 = severe obesity<\/span><\/p>\n

> 40 = morbid obesity<\/span><\/p>\n

Calculating and interpreting your fat mass index (FMI)<\/span><\/h3>\n

While BMI gives a certain indication regarding your ideal weight with respect to your height, it\u2019s not accurate enough if we know that men and women have very different morphologies and that there\u2019s also a certain number of differences according to age. For a bit more accuracy, after calculating your BMI, you can calculate your fat mass index, or FMI. This index is expressed as a percentage and shows the difference between the fat mass and the muscle mass of the body.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how to calculate your FMI:<\/span><\/h2>\n

The formula for calculating your FMI takes into account your BMI, your age (in years), and your gender (0= woman and 1= man), and the figures are constant values:<\/span><\/p>\n

FMI = (1.2 x BMI) + (0.23 x age) \u2013 (10.83 x gender) \u2013 5.4<\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an example: the BMI from the previous example = 22.02; for a woman (=0); 34 years of age.<\/span><\/p>\n

= (1.2 x 22.02) + (0.23 x 34) – (10.83 x 0) – 5.4<\/span><\/p>\n

= 26.424 + 7.82 – 0 – 5.4<\/span><\/p>\n

= 28.844<\/span><\/p>\n

Once you\u2019ve calculated your fat mass index, you can interpret your result using this list:<\/span><\/p>\n

For a woman:<\/span><\/p>\n

< 25% = too thin<\/span><\/p>\n

25 to 30% = normal (our example)<\/span><\/p>\n

> 30% = too much fat<\/span><\/p>\n

For a man:<\/span><\/p>\n

< 15% = too thin<\/span><\/p>\n

15 to 20% = normal<\/span><\/p>\n

> 20% = too much fat<\/span><\/p>\n

Why use these indices as references?<\/span><\/h3>\n

These two easy-to-calculate indices give an interesting indication of where you stand with respect to your weight, height, age, and gender.<\/span><\/p>\n

While they give a good indication, they don\u2019t reflect the different characteristics of each person\u2019s morphology and anatomy. That\u2019s why serious athletes can easily find themselves in the obesity category, since muscle weighs a lot and their muscle mass is significant. Likewise, certain people have bones that weigh more than others, or have more or less muscle. That\u2019s why, as we\u2019ve explained above, it\u2019s not recommended to use these indices for children, athletes, pregnant women, and the elderly, because they don\u2019t accurately reflect reality.<\/span><\/p>\n

If, for example, you find yourself in the normal weight range, which corresponds to a healthy weight, but you nevertheless want to lose a few pounds or else put on some weight, make sure you don\u2019t drastically change categories. For the vast majority of people, these indicators are effective.<\/span><\/p>\n

A little tip: you can use these indices in different ways \u2013 for example, by calculating your BMI and your FMI with the weight that you want to have in order to determine if your expectations are realistic in terms of health.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ideal Weight : How and Why to Calculate It How do you know your ideal weight? People\u2019s morphology is different, muscle and fat mass are different depending on whether you\u2019re a man or a woman, and there are also differences based on our age. So how do we get an [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":38195,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[126],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29346"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29346\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":93975,"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29346\/revisions\/93975"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.motivationminceur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}