Eating For A Flatter Belly
To lose the lower belly pouch, your focus should be on clean, unprocessed foods. Eliminate all sugar, especially the type you drink in the form of soda, energy drinks and fancy coffees. Treats, including ice cream, candy and cookies also need to go. Skip the highly refined grains such as most breakfast cereals, white pasta, hamburger buns and pizza. Instead, opt for small servings of whole grains such as brown rice or quinoa.
The majority of your meals should be made up of lean proteins — think flank steak, tofu, white fish or skinless poultry. Fresh vegetables, especially green, watery vegetables, provide you with enough fiber to help you stay full, while also providing valuable phytonutrients. To replace processed snack foods, have fresh fruit, 1/2 to 1 ounce of nuts and plain yogurt.
Start With A Detox Diet To Lose Belly Fat
The best way to lose belly fat is to begin with a detox diet. Its great way to reduce belly fat and jumpstart weight loss in the first week or 3 days and then keep up journey to flat stomach.
Next are some reasons you should try a detox diet and how to lose stomach fat.
How to lose belly fat on a detox diet:
- A detox diet will help reset your cravings, so you crave the good stuff and not the junk food
- Detox diets focus on water intake, so after your detox week you will already be used to drinking more water, and inturn burn stomach fat.
- Healthy Detox diets help raise metabolism
- You dont eat processed foods on a detox diet
- As you will see later in this article, planning your meals is often considered the best way to lose belly fat
- A detox week can help you lose up to 10 pounds in a single week
Sometimes a jumpstart is just what you need to burn that belly fat! Try one of these healthy detox diet plans to jumpstart your weight loss or overcome a plateau.
Detox Diet Week a one week plan that relies on smoothies and salads
3 Day Detox Diet a simple 3 day guide to fast weight loss
A detox diet is the key to how to lose belly fat fast, it will also reset your cravings and help you build healthy habits to help you continue burning stomach fat after your detox diet is over.
Find the best belly fat burning foods and tips above and more information on how to lose belly fat with diets below.
Stop Drinking Your Calories
Regularly sipping stuff other than water, black coffee, or unsweetened tea? Calorie-containing drinks can slow or straight-up stall your weight loss progress, making it almost impossible to get rid of lower belly fat.
Case in point? That 16-ounce latte you get with breakfast can pack about 250 calories. Grab a sugary cocktail after work and youre looking at 300, 400, or even 500 more.
If you have those kinds of drinks on the reg, just cutting them out could be enough to start melting fat all over your body including around your lower belly.
Thats especially true when it comes to booze, since research shows that drinking a lot of alcohol seems to cause fat to be stored around your belly. Dorn JM, et al. . Alcohol drinking patterns differentially affect central adiposity as measured by abdominal height in women and men,
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How Much Body Fat Should You Have
The way in which women could and should lose belly fat is different to that of men. Women need somebelly fat to function fat cells store oestrogen, so having too little can cause your whole hormonal function to go out of whack, causing serious health issues such as irregular periods and even infertility.
To that end, striving to lose fat from your stomach with the aim of getting a six-pack, for most females, wouldn’t be healthy. Instead, aim to sit within the 21-30% body fat category. This is what’s considered a healthy body fat percentage range for women.
What Is Belly Fat
First things first. Before we talk about how to get rid of belly fat or how to lose belly fat, its important to know exactly what belly fat is.
‘Belly fat or abdominal fat is the subcutaneous fat that sits around the waist and provides a store of energy, and also protection and heat, for the organs,’ says Tarik Belalij, personal trainer and nutritionist at Everyone Active Becontree Leisure Centre.
‘Small amounts of fat below the skin is normal and healthy, it is the visceral fat, which surrounds the organs that can be the most dangerous type of fat leading to heart attacks and diabetes.’
How do you know if youve got this type of fat situation going on? ‘Excessive visceral fat is what causes the “beer gut” , pushing the stomach out from the inside,’ Belalij says. So, to reiterate, were not talking bloating, which comes and goes, we’re talking about actual belly fat tissue.
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How To Lose Inches Off Your Waist In A Week
Excess belly fat is dangerous as it has been linked to a risk of heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, etc. Dont worry, it is possible to lose inches off your waist in just a few weeks so you dont have to throw that dress away! Here are a few essential tips that anyone looking to lose weight should follow.
Before we get started on how to lose inches off your waist, here is a fat-burning drink recipe to help you burn belly fat very fast at home. Make sure to refrain from using this drink if you have any health conditions such as high blood pressure, diabetes, etc.
Effective Tips To Lose Belly Fat
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Belly fat is more than a nuisance that makes your clothes feel tight.
Its seriously harmful.
One type of belly fat referred to as visceral fat is a major risk factor for type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and other conditions .
Many health organizations use body mass index to classify weight and predict the risk of metabolic disease.
However, this is misleading, as people with excess belly fat are at an increased risk even if they look thin .
Though losing fat from this area can be difficult, there are several things you can do to reduce excess abdominal fat.
Here are 20 effective tips to lose belly fat, backed by scientific studies.
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Stop Adding Sweeteners To Your Food And Drinks
While many people turn to artificial sweeteners in a misguided attempt to whittle their waistlines, those fake sugars are likely to have the opposite effect. According to Yale researchers, artificial sweeteners are actually linked with an increased risk of abdominal obesity and weight gain, possibly because they can trigger cravings for the real stuff and spike insulin levels in a similar fashion to real sugar.
RELATED: No-sugar-added recipes you’ll actually look forward to eating.
Don’t Let Diets Take Over
If you find every spare second is given over to thinking about calories, plans and cutting, then maybe the best thing you can do is to take a break from dieting. Research by the University of Tasmania revealed that people who broke from their diet every two weeks and aimed to just keep their weight stable during that period lost more weight and gained less back when their diets had finished.
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Eat More Thermogenic Foods
“Different foods generate different thermogenic responses. Whenever you eat anything, it takes energy to transform that food into something you can metabolize. There are certain foods that take a lot more energy to metabolize, making your body work harder for the energy it takes in, and helping cut back on your overall calorie gain,” Gentile says. “Some popular thermogenic ingredients are turmeric, garlic, coconut oil, green tea, cinnamon, apple cider vinegar, chili peppers , and salmon. Combining resistance training with eating more thermogenic foods we are more likely to be putting ourselves in a position to change our body composition from less fat to more muscle!”
Reduce Stress And Breathe
As we get older we tend to gain weight in our midsection due to spikes in cortisols. Stress is one of the primary culprits for high levels of cortisol secretion. When this happens cortisol breaks down lean musclethe type of tissue that burns calories most efficientlyand also holds on to fat storage in the abdominal region. As we age, we generally take on more life stress and the effects of that stress can be compounded by bad dieting habits we’ve learned. Studies actually show that the stress caused by dieting can increase cortisol levels, making no change in belly fat even with calorie restriction. Most people under emotional strain either alternate holding their breath with short breaths, or take rapid shallow breaths. After you become aware of your own breathing, consciously relax your belly and slow down the breathing and tell yourself ‘slow down.’ This works best if you focus on slowing down the exhalation rather than your inhalation. It sounds like a simple tool but can really make a big difference.” And to get through this pandemic at your healthiest, don’t miss these35 Places You’re Most Likely to Catch COVID.
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Be Mindful Of Your Sugar Intake
If you are looking for a way to get rid of stubborn belly fat without the help of exercise, reducing the amount of sugar you consume is essential. High amounts of sugar will keep you up at night and can put an extra load of work on your liver. Generally, higher sugar intake will trigger your body to start storing fat, mainly around your tummy region.
Reducing the number of complex carbs and breads you put into your body can help with this sugar intake issues. While this may take some getting used to, it is well worth the struggle due to the health problems you can avoid.
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Meal Planning Works In Losing Belly Fat For Two Reasons:
- Your time is valuable you wont want to waste it later by scrapping all your meal planning work.
- When you know you have a nice dinner planned, youll be less likely to go through a drive through on the way home!
Try the Lose Weight By Eating meal planner here. Use it to lose belly fat faster!
Planning your meals in advance will help you stick to plan. Its one of the great burn belly fat exercises to burn that belly fat.
Find the best diet to lose belly fat below
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Youre Expecting A Quick Fix
Dr Luke explains that it’s easy to become impatient and frustrated when youre trying to lose weight and havent seen the results yet. “But be realistic,” he encourages. “You wont see results overnight. Your brains wiring plays a huge part in resisting changes in lifestyle, and it takes time to establish new habits up to 12 weeks. Stick with it for at least eight weeks and you should notice a change.”
Emily agrees, further emphasising that progress takes time. Disappointed that your progress looks a little different to someone elses? Remember, one of the biggest misconceptions when trying to lose lower stomach fat is that a flat stomach, or ab definition of any kind, looks the same on everyone.
“Major spoiler – they dont! Id try to avoid chasing the perfect set of abs and instead focus on striving towards a strong core – whatever that looks and feels like for you. Remember, even if we all trained the same, we wouldnt all look the same!,” she points out.
Remember Consistency Is Key
One thing you do want to keep in mind when you’re laser-focused slimming down: you want to be consistent when it comes to pursuing your goals, even if that means trying to lose hip fat.
“Just like everything else in life, consistency is key. If you don’t exercise your glutes, you’ll lose them. If you don’t eat healthy foods, it’ll catch up to you. If you don’t keep up your lymphatic massage, the cellulite has a higher chance of coming back,” Gentile says.
Bad weight takes time to put onand it takes time to drop off, too. So you’re going to want to be patient and push yourself. But it’s much easier than you may think to make healthy changes that will get you the results you want.
“I highly recommend finding an exercise program you enjoy doing. This will actually keep you excited to keep going back,” Bowmar says, “Finally, I recommend finding meals that you genuinely enjoy eating and eat those for a week, reducing the number of meals you have to come up with makes sticking to a diet that much easier.”
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How To Lose Belly Fat By Eating More:
In my Lose Weight By Eating weight loss plans I show you how to lose stomach fat by eating more.
Here are the three weight loss plans that will show you how to lose stomach fat and keep it off for good.
Lose Weight By Eating an easy diet that leans on comfort food made healthy
Detox Diet Week a one week plan that relies on smoothies and salads
3 Day Detox Diet a simple 3 day guide to fast weight loss
Skipping meals can actually harm your weight loss efforts, so dont skip if youre trying to lose belly fat.
Keep scrolling for more tips on how to lose belly fat fast
Spot Reduction Doesnt Work
Spot reduction is the theory that exercising a certain spot on your body will lead to fat loss in that area. Most studies have debunked this idea and if you ask the internet theyll tell you the same. Doing more sit-ups isnt going to make your stubborn abdominal fat go away . You might build more muscle there but the fat itself isnt necessarily going to burn off.
Instead, the trick to losing this stubborn fat is to lower your body fat. If youre carrying too much excess body fat then its going to be hard to lose the stubborn fat. Many people whove had great weight loss through dieting end up having trouble losing those last stubborn pounds because of this. As you have more weight loss your body fat doesnt decrease and can crazy enough even increase. But as long as your body fat remains high youre not going to lose stubborn fat.
With weight loss youre not just losing fat. Muscle loss also occurs in the weight loss process especially if youre not strength training too . This can cause a lot of people to become skinny fat. This is when you appear to be thin but have a high body fat percentage. This leaves your body looking and feeling mushy, saggy, and dimply. Instead, the goal should be to lower your body fat to tone and shape your body. This is whats going to get rid of the last of your stubborn fat.
The trick is to force your body to use your fat stores for fuel!
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Eat Plenty Of Soluble Fiber
Soluble fiber absorbs water and forms a gel that helps slow down food as it passes through your digestive system.
Studies show that this type of fiber promotes weight loss by helping you feel full, so you naturally eat less. It may also decrease the number of calories your body absorbs from food .
Whats more, soluble fiber may help fight belly fat.
An observational study in over 1,100 adults found that for every 10-gram increase in soluble fiber intake, belly fat gain decreased by 3.7% over a 5-year period (
Make an effort to consume high fiber foods every day. Excellent include:
- flax seeds
- blackberries
SUMMARY
Soluble fiber may help you to lose weight by increasing fullness and reducing calorie absorption. Try to include plenty of high fiber foods in your weight loss diet.
Will My Hormones Influence How Much Belly Fat I Have
During our reproductive life women have less visceral fat than men, but this changes as oestrogen levels fall during midlife and at the menopause. At this stage, testosterone starts to play a more significant role in where women lay down fat, favouring the upper body rather than the hips and thighs, with our proportion of fat to body weight also increasing.
Menopause is not the only time when hormones play an influential role in fat storage. Women diagnosed with the condition PCOS may also be prone to increased intra-abdominal fat storage.
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Train Multiple Exercise Groups
“It’s best to do moves that incorporate multiple muscle groups since you can’t really spot train one specific problem area,” says Physique 57 co-founder Tanya Becker. “Barre exercises are highly effective since your body becomes the machinery and your muscles have to work together to support your balance at the barre.” Becker also notes that it’s important to combine sprints that incorporate cardio, as well as strength training. “This combination yields quick results when you’re trying to trim and tone all of your muscles.”