Ep.44 Why teenage girls have more body fat than boys

I hope every teen girl out there can listen to this episode and learn to love their body.

By exploring the science behind the hormonal shifts of puberty, we can empower our  teens with the power of knowledge and understanding. 

Let's foster a healthy mindset toward these expected changes of puberty and find inner peace by accepting the diversity of our bodies. 

I’m Dr. Jenny Gourgari—pediatric endocrinologist, certified in obesity medicine and a health coach.
After helping hundreds of teens struggling with their weight and hormones, I’ve created a whole new path by doing what most programs miss: balance puberty hormones naturally and create habits that actually last.

Here's what makes this different:
✅ No dieting. No calorie counting. No shame.
✅ No more food fights between parents and teens.
✅ No weight obsession—just healthy habits
✅ Real science behind how puberty hormones affect weight
✅ A safe, supportive approach that prevents eating disorders

Because when teens understand their hormones and get the right support, they don’t just lose weight—they gain strength, energy, confidence, and freedom!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
This is the Lifestyle and Weight Loss for Teens
podcast.
If you're a mom and want tohelp your child who is
struggling to lose weight, youare in the right place.
If you are looking for healthylifestyle tips, dr Gorgery is
here to help you understand thescience around safe weight loss
in teens and children, becausewhat works for adult weight loss
is not always the best forchildren.

(00:29):
This podcast is for educationalpurposes only.
Dr Gorgory does not providemedical, psychological or
nutrition therapy advice.
You should not use thisinformation to diagnose or treat
any health problems withoutconsulting your own medical
practitioner and now your host,dr Jenny Gorgory.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
Hello, hello, welcome to another episode of the
Lifestyle and Weight Loss forTeens podcast.
This is Jenny Gorgory, and ontoday's episode, I will be
discussing a little bit moreabout the differences in fat
distribution between teenagegirls and teenage boys.

(01:12):
Now, there are significantdifferences in the body
composition between teenagegirls and boys, which also
translate into fat distributiondifferences in adult women and
men.
But in this episode I'm goingto focus mainly on teenagers and
even though kids start at aboutthe same rate of body fat

(01:39):
before puberty, when they getinto puberty there are hormonal
changes that are different.
Mainly, there is more estrogenin teenage girls and there is
more testosterone in teenageboys.
Also, both teenager girls andteenager boys, when they go into

(02:00):
puberty, they have high spikesof growth hormone.
When they go into puberty, theyhave high spikes of growth
hormone.
Now, what are the effects of thegrowth hormone on the fat
distribution?
You want to have a guess?
Well, fat distribution isaffected by high growth hormone
because growth hormone breaksdown fat.

(02:22):
Growth hormone breaks down fat.
So what that means is higherlevels of growth hormone improve
bodybuilding of mass.
So if most of your body mass isexposed to growth hormone,
you're going to have more musclethan fat.
And this is really why, thereason why sometimes growth

(02:43):
hormone is abused and is usedfor the wrong reasons by people
that want to build more musclesso they can have more growth
hormone.
So the question is if growthhormone breaks down fat, so both
girls and boys have high growthhormone levels, then why is it

(03:03):
that there is different fatdistribution in girls than boys?
And what are those differenceswhere girls naturally have more
body fat than boys?
And there was a great manuscriptwhich described this phenomenon
.
The title of the manuscript isEndocrine Control of Body

(03:25):
Composition in Fancy Childhoodand Puberty.
It was published in EndocrineReviews in 2005.
And I'm going to cite themanuscript for those that want
to read upon it.
But basically, this was a greatpaper that showed that while
there's, as I mentioned, thesame kind of body fat in

(03:46):
pre-puberty boys, thatpercentage of body fat, kind of
like, stays the same in boys andas they build more muscle mass
as they go into puberty, thepercentage of body fat decreases
because they gain more musclemass.
As they go into puberty, thepercentage of body fat decreases
because they gain more musclemass.
Now, in girls, actually, thatdoesn't happen.

(04:08):
Their body fat increases duringpuberty.
And what is the main hormonethat is different between girls
and boys in puberty?
It is estrogen and testosterone.
So testosterone has not anegative effect on the acts of

(04:28):
growth hormone.
However, estrogen can decreasethe effects on the muscle mass
building of growth hormone ingirls.
So because girls have higherestrogen levels, they have more
fat and boys have higher levelsof testosterone, which does not

(04:51):
affect the breaking down of thefat.
That is not really caused bygrowth hormone, is not really
caused by growth hormone, andthe reason I decided to talk
about this today is because Iwant to normalize this
difference in fat distributionin girls and boys.
We tend to see way more eatingdisorders.

(05:15):
We tend to see way moreanorexia nervosa, bulimia, binge
eating in girls compared toboys Not that we don't see it in
boys, but it's way more commonin girls and, of course, there
are many reasons that thishappens that I'm not going to go
through all of that now, but myhope is that by educating more

(05:38):
teenagers and more familiesabout what happens normally with
our fat distribution when we gointo puberty, that potentially
could help some of the teenagersaccept their bodies because it
is normal.
It is normal to have more bodyfat as girls go through puberty

(06:03):
and it is normal for boys tohave more muscle mass as they go
into puberty because they havehigher levels of testosterone
and girls have higher levels ofestradiol and we need certain
amount of body fat to be able tohave reproductive function.

(06:25):
Essentially, girls that go intopuberty and menstruate, and
after many years, the role ofhaving regular periods is
eventually to lead to goodreproduction, right, and it's
also a reason why one of thereasons why girls that have
severe anorexia and they don'thave enough body fat, then they

(06:50):
lose their periods.
So we do need to have a certainamount of body fat.
So Don't get too stressed out,don't get too worried about the
body fat that is accumulatedduring the period of puberty,
and it is mainly accumulated inthe lower body, like it's more

(07:16):
on the thighs areas, as are thetypical female body distribution
fat of body distribution.
Boys it is mainly in theabdominal area and girls is
mainly in around the thighs, sothis is normal, okay, so take
that into consideration when youare trying to decide whether

(07:40):
you need to get to a healthierweight or whether you are
healthy as you are, and I wouldencourage you to talk with a
professional to help youdetermine whether you are in a
healthy weight or you're not ina healthy weight.
Traditionally, professionalshave been using a tool that is

(08:01):
called Body Mass Index tounderstand whether a certain
teenager is in a healthy weightor isn't in a healthy weight.
And if you don't know what BMIis, I encourage you to go back
and listen to episode one of theLifestyle and Weight Loss for
Teens podcast, and I will saythat BMI does not give

(08:21):
information about body fatdistribution.
It will not tell you how muchfat you have.
However, if your body massindex is on the lower end or
lower than normal, or if yourbody mass index is higher than
normal, meaning more than 95thpercentile in a particular

(08:42):
person's height and weightdependent BMI, then it is more
likely that the fat distributionmay also be abnormal.
But my take-home message is itis normal I repeat, it is normal
for girls to gain a certainamount of body fat during
puberty, and if you don't get acertain amount of body fat,

(09:04):
you're at risk of not havingperiods and you're at risk to
have reproductive issues.
You're at risk of affectingyour bones, because your bones
are becoming stronger andstronger.
You're still building strongbones during those early years
in life.
Even though you may not begetting taller anymore, you're

(09:28):
still accruing bone mass, sothat is important.
So that's all I have for youfor today.
I hope that was helpful and Ihope that you can look more into
the distribution of body fatand realize what is normal and

(09:49):
what is expected before youactually make any drastic
decisions on what to do about it.
Take care, I'll be with youagain next week.

Speaker 1 (10:02):
If you enjoyed listening to this podcast, I
invite you to come check out theLyft program.
It's Dr Gorgeri's 12-weekcoaching program for teens and
their moms, where we take allthis information, we apply it to
your daily life and we worktogether so your teenager learns
how to create a healthylifestyle so they can feel
happier, more confident, lessstressed and love their body

(10:22):
again.
Visit the website atlifestyleforteenscom and click
on the work with me and freeresources to learn more about
this program and get free helpto start this journey right away
.
Thanks for tuning in and we'llcatch you in the next episode of
Lifestyle and Weight Loss forTeens.