Can Too Few Calories Cause Weight Gain
Eating too few calories can be the start of a vicious cycle that causes diet distress. When you cut your calories so low that your metabolism slows and you stop losing weight, you probably will become frustrated that your efforts are not paying off. This can lead you to overeat and ultimately gain weight.
Gas Acidity And Bloating
If you note your stomach is getting bigger and you are not gaining weight, it could be bloating due to acidity or gas. Some of the common causes of bloating include air swallowing, too much caffeine consumption, drinking beverages can lead to acid reflux in the stomach, thereby causing discomfort in the form of bloating. Acid is produced in stomach as a protective lining to kill bacteria. But, when this acid interferes with the digestion process or increases in quantity than required it could lead to reflux and bloating. Constipation or irritable bowel syndrome can be another major reason for bloated stomach leading your waistline to plunge without any significant gain of weight.
For most of gastric problems, you are sure to have gastric complaints along with your stomach getting bigger.
You’re Brewing The Wrong Tea
A steaming cup of tea is the perfect drink for soothing a sore throat, relaxing at night, or binge-watching your favorite TV show. But certain teas are also perfect for doing something elsehelping you lose extra weight. Pu-erh tea, for example, can literally shrink the size of your fat cells! To discover the brew’s fat-crusading powers, Chinese researchers divided rats into five groups and fed them varying diets over a two-month period. In addition to a control group, there was a group given a high-fat diet with no tea supplementation and three groups that were fed a high-fat diet with varying doses of pu-erh tea extract. The researchers found that the tea significantly lowered triglyceride concentrations and belly fat in the high-fat diet groups. It’s a natural fat blaster, along with barberry, rooibos, and white tea.
Eat This, Not That! Fix: We love pu-erh so much, we made it part of our weight-loss plan, The 7-Day Flat-Belly Tea Cleanse.
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You Haven’t Been Drinking Enough Water
Adequate water intake is essential for all your body’s functions, and the more you drink, the better your chances of staving off belly fat. In one Virginia Tech study, dieting participants who were instructed to drink two cups of water before each meal lost 30 percent more weight than their thirsty peers. And you can magnify the effect by adding ice. German researchers found that six cups of cold water a day could prompt a metabolic boost that incinerates 50 daily calories. That’s enough to shed five pounds a year!
Eat This, Not That! Fix: You read the study results! Drink at least a glass of water before you sit down to each meal to decrease your calorie consumption. Plus, you’ll avoid these 7 Side Effects of Not Drinking Enough Water.
Hormonal Disturbances In Women
It is during the post-menopausal phase, many women undergo hormonal changes that lead to decrease in the female hormone levels affecting fat placement in the body. While progesterone and estrogen levels go down, body fat tends to shift more towards the abdomen leading to expanding belly without much or any weight gain. So, if you are an aging women, hormonal changes could be an important reason why your stomach is getting bigger and you are not gaining weight.
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What Is Causing My Stomach To Get Bigger Without Weight Gain
Do you often feel that your stomach is getting bigger, while you are not gaining weight? If yes, then you need to know the possible causes.
Feeling full and bloated at times where you have had heavy meals is normal but when this tends to become a routine, even with small meals, it require attention! Abdominal bloating can not only expand your waistline but also make your clothes tight making you feel low on self-confidence. Not all, but some causes of abdominal bloating can become life threatening when not controlled over time.
Stomach Sticks Out: The Problem
Sometimes working out and dieting or being naturally thin doesnt mean that you wont ever have to deal with stomach fat. You may have noticed how your friends or even you, despite being skinny, have a visible belly. The fact that your stomach sticks out when you are fit creates a load of confusion. But it is not a one-in-a-million case and happens more often than you may think. You might grow a belly because draining a bottle of cold beer after work is your way to kick back and unwind, or it could be the result of a certain health issue youre battling with. In this article, you will find out why your stomach sticks out, and how to effectively solve this problem.
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/5tips To Deal With A Bloated Stomach
Stay hydrated: Dehydration is one of the common reasons why you feel bloated all the time. Lack of sufficient amount of water in the body leads to constipation, which makes you feel uncomfortable.
Consume less salt and carbs: Excess of salt intake causes water retention in the body. Even some carbs can make you feel stuffed.
Exercise regularly: You should not only eat correctly but exercise every day to stay healthy and fit. Staying physically active is important to lose weight and easy bowel movement.
You Prefer Potato Chips
If you’re a sucker for a packaged, salty kick, chances are that’s part of the reason for your widening belly. And it’s not all water weight, either. A study published in the Journal of Nutrition discovered that salt actually confuses the biological processes that tell you when you’re full.
“Our body has biological mechanisms to tell us when to stop eating, and fat activates those mechanisms in people who are sensitive to the taste of fat,” lead author Russell Keast said in a statement. “However, when salt is added to the food, those mechanisms are blunted and people end up eating more food. This can cause you to eat more fatty foods, and over time, your body adapts or becomes less sensitive to fat, leading you to eat more to get the same feelings of fullness.”
Eat This, Not That! Fix: Cooking at home? Use fresh herbs instead of salt. When dining out, scan the nutrition info at home before you head out and pick a low-calorie dish with about 1,000 milligrams of sodium or less. And make sure to avoid the worst orders at popular restaurants.
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Why Is My Stomach Getting Bigger And I Am Not Gaining Weight
There are many people who may be intrigued when they feel their stomach has grown bigger without gaining weight. This may be a cause of concern for them. Abdominal bloating can have influence on your waist circumference. You may experience your pants have become tighter.
There are many causes that may make your stomach to grow bigger. Some causes may not be serious but more discomforting. On the other hand there are reasons for stomach enlargement without weight gain that are serious and sometime life threatening.
Let us identify such problems in which stomach or the waistline increases without substantial over all weight gain of the body.
Why Do I Gain Weight In My Stomach
Excess weight in your stomach is not just a cosmetic issue, it can have severe implications for your health. Those who carry extra abdominal — or visceral — fat have an increased risk of experiencing metabolic disturbances and developing cardiovascular disease and Type 2 diabetes . If you tend to gain weight in your stomach, there are several controllable and uncontrollable factors involved.
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How Do I Know If Im Bloated Or Gaining Weight
Gently press your stomach specifically around the swollen area. If your abdomen feels hard and tight, it means you are bloated. Generally, our stomach is soft and spongy and it remains the same even after gaining weight. If you can easily gasp an inch of your stomach, it can be due to excess of fat.
Processed Foods Can Lead To Inflammation
We’re surrounded by heavily processed foods at the grocery store, our favorite restaurants, coffee shops, and staff lounges at work. Registered dietitian Rachel Fine, RD told INSIDER that a high intake of heavily processed foods, especially those high in high-fructose containing sweeteners like high fructose corn syrup, can cause weight gain in your stomach.
In addition to highly processed sugars like high fructose corn syrup, Fine said trans fats could also increase inflammation that may drive insulin resistance and the accumulation of belly fat.
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Where Do People Lose Weight First
“In terms of loss, it may be easier to shed fat in the trunk and ab area as opposed to the leg and gluteal area, which is why it appears that men lose weight/fat faster than women,” says Lisa Wheeler, who works with Apple Fitness+. Similarly, Wheeler says that women who tend to carry weight in the trunk and ab area seem to lose weight faster than women who carry weight in their glutes and legs. In other words, while weight loss and gain can differ by gender, it can also differ greatly from person to person.
Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth
The gut relies on good bacteria to function well , but theres also bad bacteria chilling in your digestive tract. When that balance of good to bad gets thrown off, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth can take place, triggering extra gas in your GI tract along with bloating, abdominal pain, diarrhea, andyou guessed itsudden weight gain.
Docs arent entirely sure how SIBO may trigger those extra pounds, says Dr. Jampolis, but treatment for SIBO typically includes antibiotics to treat the bacterial overgrowth, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine.
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Dietary Makeover For Stomach Weight Gain
You can’t lose weight just in the stomach, but the best path to losing weight overall is to ditch unhealthy foods and to eat a nutritious diet filled with fruits, vegetables, lean protein, whole grains, nuts, seeds and legumes. When you’re cleaning up your diet, sugary drinks like sodas and teas sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup should be the first to go, because they have a direct link to belly fat, according to a study published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation in 2009. Swap these beverages for water, either plain or sparkling, flavored with fresh lemon, lime or berries.
Lose the refined grains — “white” foods like bread, rolls and pasta — from your diet, too, to shed weight in the stomach. Substitute whole grains such as whole wheat bread and pasta, brown rice, millet and oatmeal, which are associated with reduced visceral abdominal fat, researchers reported in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in 2010.
Why Is My Stomach Big At The Top
Upper belly fat can be the result of your body storing water weight. Sodium consumption, dehydration, and a lack of electrolytes can cause your body to retain water. This can make your stomach and other areas of your body appear swollen. Stick to a diet low in salt while youre working to lose belly fat.
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Youve Recently Been Dieting
On a short-term basis, weight loss is possible and relatively easy for some people too. But long term, your body is unlikely to let you get away with this, says Katherine Kimber, RD. Within each of our brains lies an incredibly powerful mechanism to control our weight. Its a somatic body fat control center that works tirelessly to maintain our weight at a level that it decides, known as the set-point weight. Its governed mostly by your hypothalamus, which sends signals to manipulate your eating, activity, and metabolic efficiency. The setpoint weight can be a range of 10 to 15 pounds, and its usually the weight the body likes to go back to in between diets or weight loss attempts.
To manage this set point the body responds to an energy deficit by turning on physiological mechanisms, outside of our control to manage weight, says Kimber. It might increase hunger signals, make us feel obsessed with food or think about it a lot, make us go crazy around sugar, and crave carbohydrate-based foods. In addition, you may feel less resilient, less energetic than if you were well-nourished, which can affect activity levels and food choices.
The solution: Dont give in to crazy fad diets and promise to properly feed your body with nutritious foods.
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You Order The Meal As
Restaurant chefs tend to soak their meals in deep, treacherous puddles of oil, cream, butter, and sugarall of which are calorically dense and offer little to no nutritional benefits. By asking for your veggies and meat to be cooked dry and leaving sauces on the side, you could save loads of calories. Simple renditions like this on your order can lead to major weight loss success.
Eat This, Not That! Fix: If you’re not already making this request when you dine out and order in, it’s time to start. Ask for your chicken and broccoli dish steamed, leaving the sauce on the side. When you order, ask for a side of fruit with your veggie-filled omelet rather than going for the oil-drenched potatoes.
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Potential Problem: Thyroid Hormone Imbalances
The thyroid regulates our bodys metabolism and helps to determine your BMR among many other factors in the body. Thus, thyroid disorders such as hyperthyroidism and hypothyroidism can often have an affect on body weight. People with hyperthyroidism usually have no trouble losing weight, but people with hypothyroidism tend to have difficulty losing weight. That said, the weight gain often associated with hypothyroidism is rather small and usually consists mostly of water and salt31.
Tips to fix it: Check with your doctor about getting your thyroid hormones assessed if you suspect you have thyroid problems or you have a family history of thyroid disorders or if youve had radiation treatments32. Once hypothyroidism is treated, a small amount of weight may be lost, but its not typical to see huge amounts of weight loss due to treatment of hypothyroidism²³.
Since there are so many different ways our bodies work and respond to our world around us, figuring out what is causing abdominal fat can be tricky. But if you approach the simpler things first , and then address the more complicated issues later if the first set of changes dont work, then you should be able to make progress!
Disclaimer: this blog post is for informational purposes only and is not intended to diagnose or treat any disease, nor is it intended to replace the advice of your doctor or other healthcare providers.
Eat A Nutritious Balanced Diet
There are many nutritionally sound ways to lose weight, but it may take trial and error to figure out what works for you. There is no one-size-fits-all approach. A registered dietitian can help you determine the best healthy eating pattern to reach your desired weight loss goals.
For many people, focusing on consuming more complex carbohydrates and fewer refined carbohydrates can be a simple strategy to work towards a healthier diet.
Some may find success with swapping out animal proteins that are high in saturated fats for plant-based proteins such as soy , beans and lentils, quinoa, and nuts and seeds.
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You’re Not Seeking Medical Help For Your Depression
Constantly reprimanding yourself about your diet and ripping yourself apart over one indulgence is only going to make things worse. A study in the Journal of Health Psychology has shown that people who suffer from depression are actually more at risk for obesity than those who do not.
Eat This, Not That! Fix: Consider seeking medical treatment if you think you’re suffering from depression.
Factors That May Impact Weight Loss
Weight loss is largely a product of burning more calories than you ingest, and in general, a deficit of around 3500 calories will yield one pound of fat loss. With that said, various factors affect your metabolic rate and subsequent weight loss, including the following:
- Age
Belly fat-burning elixirs will not target stomach fat and melt it away as they claim. The same goes for the foods you eat. Zuckerbrot explains that while fiber has been shown to help decrease the amount of visceral fat in the abdominal area, subcutaneous fat will decrease only with overall weight loss. Creating a caloric deficit can help to decrease overall fat stores as well as eating whole, fresh foods instead of processed fat and sugar.
Ideally, the key to reducing fat is through exercise, but know this: You can’t reduce fat in different areas of your body through targeted workouts. Sure, you can tone these areas and may, in turn, burn more calories via muscle development, but there is no “fat-busting” exercise for your stomach or butt. Instead, you need to utilize an overall approach to fitness. “Doing total-body workouts will help to reduce total body fat, and strength training will tone up and build muscle that will then define parts of your body,” explains NASM-certified personal trainer, Amanda Butler. This can be achieved through high-intensity interval training and lifting weights to build lean muscle, which increases your metabolic rate and subsequently supports overall fat loss.
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