How can a cellulite cream reduce cellulite?

How cellulite creams work

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  • How can a cream reduce cellulite fat that lies deep in the dermis and hypodermis?

  • What is a real cellulite cream?

  • How fat cells accumulate and release fat in reaction to different chemicals

  • How natural actives from a cellulite cream stimulate fat cells to release fat

  • Why a high-concentration, multi-ingredient cellulite cream is needed for effective cellulite fat release

  • No cellulite cream “burns” fat or melts(😂) fat

  • Combine your cellulite cream with strict diet and exercise, for best results

  • Spot cellulite reduction: when a cellulite cream works - and when it doesn’t

  • One last thing: can spot fat reduction be achieved with a cellulite cream?

  • Check our professional consultancy, for a masterclass in radiofrequency, ultrasound cavitation, cellulite and skin tightening

How can a cream reduce cellulite fat that lies deep in the dermis and hypodermis?

Most people believe that cellulite creams do not “work” and I do not blame them given the hype, exaggeration, misinformation and fake “before and after” pictures, regarding anything to do with cellulite out there - not just cellulite creams.

On the other hand, most people believe that cellulite creams do not get absorbed or it is massaging a cream onto the skin that works, not the cream per se.

These are ludicrous ideas propagated by ignorant “experts” that we have addressed in previous articles:

  • Well-designed creams do get absorbed, all the way not just into the dermis/hypodermis, where cellulite lives, but also into the more deeply lying subcutaneous fat, as research has shown.

  • And no, the one minute of massaging a cellulite cream onto the skin does absolutely nothing. What ignorant mind has ever thought of that? If a cellulite cream works, it is not massaging the cellulite cream that works, it is the cream.

But even knowing that a cream can get absorbed, one may ask how can a cream reduce cellulite fat that lies in the dermis and hypodermis?

And this is the question I am going to answer here.

What is a real cellulite cream?

Before we explain how cellulite fat can be released from fat cells due to the action of a good cellulite cream, let’s first define what a good cellulite cream is.

A quality cellulite cream is one that contains:

  • MULTIPLE natural active ingredients

  • in high CONCENTRATIONS

  • that are PROVEN by research papers to stimulate fat release from dermal and hypodermal fat cells and that also act on all other aspects of cellulite, i.e. microcirculation, fibrosis, collagen/elastin synthesis, glycation, free radical damage and inflammation

Why we need MULTIPLE actives and why we need them in HIGH CONCENTRATIONS will become apparent below.

In the meantime, let’s just make it clear that for profit maximisation purposes most cellulite creams are diluted and only contain a couple of cheap actives.

So very, very few real cellulite creams exist on the market.

How fat cells accumulate and release fat in reaction to different chemicals

Like all fat cells in the body, your cellulite fat cells (dermal and hypodermal adipocytes) constantly release or accumulate fat in reaction to contact with various chemicals that reach their surface receptors.

These chemicals include, among others, hormones, neurotransmitters, adipokines, triglycerides (fat molecules), glucose, vitamins, aminoacids, peptides and phytochemicals.

These molecules can be derived from food or from topical application products, such as cellulite creams.

  • If, for example, glucose is infused from the blood capillaries into the adipose tissue extracellular fluid (the fluid that surrounds a fat cell), the cell will react by absorbing this glucose and convert it into fat

  • If fat reaches the fat cell, it will also be absorbed

  • If insulin is infused at the same time, glucose/fat absorption increases

All the above lead to fat cell enlargement - certainly not a good thing for cellulite prevention/removal.

How natural actives from a cellulite cream stimulate fat cells to release fat

If, on the other hand, adrenaline/noradrenaline (the fight or flight hormones) are released locally/infused from the blood into the adipose tissue, as for example happens during exercise or intense dieting, the fat cell will release fat.

Then this fat will find its way via the blood circulation into the muscles and organs to be oxidised (burned) for energy.

  • If a natural chemical mimicking adrenaline, such as forskolin attaches to adipocyte cell surface receptors, it will also stimulate fat release (lipolysis)

  • If a natural chemical that maximises lipolysis, such as caffeine attaches to the fat cell receptor, lipolysis will increase further

Such actives can stimulate the fat cell to change its function towards fat release and can even make the to fat cell to die off early (this process is called adipocyte apoptosis).

All these things lead to fat cell shrinkage or even fat cell early death - certainly a good thing for cellulite prevention/removal.

Why a high-concentration, multi-ingredient cellulite cream is needed for effective cellulite fat release

Since one biochemical pathway usually is not enough to produce the results you are after, your fat-releasing cream should ideally contain multiple ingredients that act via several lipolytic pathways.

And of course, those ingredients should be in high enough concentrations to make an impact on your fat cells. Otherwise the message will be subdued and lost in the cacophony of messages received from hormones, triglycerides, glucose and other chemicals in the bloodstream.

In the same way lipolytic actives help reduce cellulite fat, multiple other active ingredients can help improve microcirculation, fibrosis, inflammation, oxidative damage, glycation and skin firmness/elasticity, i.e. all 7 aspects of cellulite

No cellulite cream “burns” fat or melts(😂) fat

As you can see, nowhere in this article there is any mention of “fat melting” or “fat burning”, because such things do not happen either with cellulite treatments or with cellulite creams.

Such claims are either marketing BS or simply misinformation given by ignorant practitioners/salespeople. If you bought a product or a service from anyone promising you that their treatment or product will “burn your fat” or “melt your fat”, you were lied to.

The facts are that:

  • Fat in your fat cells is already liquid. It does not need to melt down, thank you very much.

  • Fat cells do not melt down either. No scientist has ever seen a cell, any cell, “melting down”.

  • And no fat oxidation normally occurs at the fat cell level. Fat only gets “burned” (oxidised) in muscles and organs.

[In certain fat cells, but NOT human cells, and definitely not cellulite fat cells, a fat cell can oxidise its own fat (brown/beige/brite adipose tissue). This mainly happens in mice, it is extremely limited in humans and occurs only in tiny fat tissues near the base of the neck and shoulderblades.]

Combine your cellulite cream with strict diet and exercise, for best results

So you need:

  • A cream with several active ingredients in significant concentrations

  • Combined with a strict and healthy nutrition that does not encourage your fat cells to grow

  • And ideally you also need to combine your cream application with some exercise that will give a helping hand to your cream in its fight against the flab

Why is that? Because exercise makes you secrete adrenaline and noradrenaline, which in turn stimulate fat release, adding to the lipolytic messages sent by the cellulite cream’s active ingredients.

This means that you should ideally apply your cellulite cream right before and/or right after exercise, for maximum results.

Spot cellulite reduction: when a cellulite cream works - and when it doesn’t

If these four conditions are met (multiple actives, high concentrations, healthy nutrition and exercise), a cellulite cream CAN INDEED HELP YOU REDUCE CELLULITE. This is called spot cellulite reduction / topical cellulite reduction. Very few such creams exist on the market.

This is in contrast to whole body cellulite reduction, which occurs with diet and exercise only, whose effects are unequally distributed throughout the body, due to genetics and current state of health/metabolism.

On the other hand, a cream with only one or two active ingredients (or even a cream with multiple actives but in low concentrations) WILL SIMPLY NOT WORK. The vast majority of the so-called “cellulite creams” fall into this category.

Furthermore, applying EVEN THE BEST CELLULITE CREAM IN THE WORLD without a strict diet and exercise will achieve very little.

And as the terms ‘spot cellulite reduction’ / ‘topical cellulite reduction’ suggest, this reduction is localised, i.e. you cannot expect to lose pounds/kilos of fat - only superficial localised fat deposits (i.e. cellulite), where the cream is applied.

One last thing: can spot fat reduction be achieved with a cellulite cream?

Spot fat reduction refers to reduction of subcutaneous fat, which lies deeper to cellulite’s dermal/hypodermal fat.

If the subcutaneous fat deposits are small (i.e. when we are talking about a thin layer of subcutaneous fat), then yes, a good cellulite cream can in time reduce those fat deposits, perhaps not completely, but to a large extent.

But under no circumstances should you expect significant subcutaneous fat deposits to be reduced with a cellulite cream or even with a cellulite treatment.

Efficient non-surgical “liposuction” only exists in marketing brochures, ignorant Internet articles and misleading Instagram posts - not in actual real life.

The only really efficient non-surgical liposuction is only possible with diet and exercise.

(Of course there exists the inefficient cryolipolysis, which works 40-50% of the time and almost solely on the stomach and waist. On arms and thighs fat freezing only works 10-20% of the time.)

Check our professional consultancy, for a masterclass in radiofrequency, ultrasound cavitation, cellulite and skin tightening

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