Steer Clear Of Endocrine Disruptors
“Avoid foods or products that have endocrine disruptors, such as parabens,” says Cabeca. “Skincare products, creams, shampoos, and lotions that have parabens will add an estrogen load in your body that can increase belly fat in women.” This is because extra estrogen leads to excess fat storage, which is especially pronounced in the belly and butt areas in women.
According to a 2020 German study, even pregnant women who use parabens could increase the risk of their children being overweight.
How Long Does It Take To Lose Belly Fat
As mentioned, anyone wondering how to lose belly fat fast isn’t alone, but this isn’t always realistic, and almost always not sustainable. It plays out differently for every single person. Our genetics, age, lifestyle, stress and sleep all play a role in how fast we lose belly fat the same goes for all body fat actually.
It’s not about trying to lose belly fat in a week or lose stomach fat fast it’s about sticking to a pace that keeps you trucking on. For most people, the best way to lose belly fat looks like an 80/20 split of healthy habits and ones that are, perhaps, more fun than functional.
Read our complete guide on how long it takes to lose weight.
Eat The Right Type Of Fats
Contrary to popular belief, fats do not make you overweight or fat. What makes you fat is consuming junk food and not working out regularly.
If you want to know how to get rid of a hanging belly, then you need to avoid any kind of trans fats which include fried foods, margarine, cookies, and baked foods. Also, limit your consumption of saturated fats such as lard, palm oil, shortening, and full-fat dairy.
The kind of fats that you need to consume is unsaturated fats such as nuts, fish, oils, nut oil, seed oil, and avocado. Especially for men who do lower belly fat workouts, fish oil is extremely helpful, because enough fish oil increases testosterone levels. This ultimately helps you lose weight and build more muscles.
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Drink Coffee Or Green Tea
Another belly fat loss strategy for women is to drink green tea or coffee regularly.
Research shows drinking at least 3 cups of coffee or tea daily is associated with lower body mass indexes and smaller waist circumferences compared with non-coffee and tea drinkers.
Drinking caffeinated beverages like coffee and tea increases daily energy expenditure, and gives you a boost of energy for fat-burning workouts.
Find out what the 6 healthy drinks to buy at the store are and incorporate some healthy nutrition ideas into your life!
Think Eating Plan Not Diet
Ultimately, you need to pick a healthy eating plan you can stick to,Stewart says. The benefit of a low-carb approach is that it simply involveslearning better food choicesno calorie-counting is necessary. In general,a low-carb way of eating shifts your intake away from problem foodsthosehigh in carbs and sugar and without much fiber, like bread, bagels andsodasand toward high-fiber or high-protein choices, like vegetables, beansand healthy meats.
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Find A Friend Or A Group To Exercise With
To attack belly fat and any other menopause weight gain, youll need to burn between 400 and 500 calories most days of the week from cardiovascular exercise, such as walking briskly, jogging, bicycling, dancing, or swimming, Peeke says. Need motivation? Find a friend who needs to exercise as much as you do, and set a date to work out together. Research published in April 2015 in the British Journal of Health Psychology found that actively looking for a new workout partner and exercising together is beneficial for both exercise and emotional support.
If you dont have a buddy to join you on your weight loss mission, it may be time to try a group fitness class at your local gym or community center. Data published in November 2017 in the Journal of Osteopathic Medicine found that participating in regular group fitness classes resulted in a significant decrease in stress and a rise in physical, mental, and emotional quality of life compared with exercising regularly on your own or not engaging in regular exercise at all.
Consume Dairy Foods Or Plant Milk
Dairy foods and plant milks are loaded with satiating protein and calcium.
These foods fill you up without the extra calories, strengthen your bones, and help you maintain lean muscle mass when dropping body fat is your goal.
Aim to eat the following foods at least 2-3 times daily to maximize fat-loss results: low-fat cottage cheese, non-fat Greek yogurt, plain kefir, low-fat milk, reduced-fat cheese, plant milk, and homemade protein powder shakes.
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Exercise At Any Age Reduces Belly Fat
An active, physical lifestyle is a critical step toward losing belly fat and maintaining a healthy weight — especially as you age. Engage in strength training for all your major muscle groups at least twice a week to help offset the natural loss of muscle mass. You can start strength training at any age to see this benefit. Increase your weight and intensity gradually, and consult a fitness professional for guidance.
Engaging in cardiovascular exercise more 250 minutes a week can lead to significant weight loss, reports the American College of Sports Medicine. In 2013, the journal Plos One published a review of research — which asserted that even without major dietary changes — engaging in moderate or high intensity aerobic training can reduce visceral fat in overweight men and women after 12 weeks. This doesn’t mean that you can get away with not changing your diet — this result demonstrates the power of physical activity.
Consider other ways you can be more active every day. Take the stairs, park farther out in the parking lot, pace while you’re on the phone, walk your dog twice a day and play actively with your grandchildren. These small changes enable you to burn a greater number of calories all day, promoting faster weight loss.
Drink Water In The Morning
When you wake up, youre probably dehydrated after a long nights rest.
Drink water first thing in the morning to energize you and help you eat fewer calories at breakfast.
Studies show that drinking water before meals is associated with eating less.
One reason for this is because water takes up space in your stomach, which boosts satiety without the extra calories.
To burn belly fat fast, drink 2-4 cups of water when you wake up each morning, 2 cups of water before meals, and at least 12 cups of water daily for women.
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Why Is Extra Belly Fat A Problem
Although we may affectionately refer to our extra inches as love-handles or describe ourselves as cuddly, carrying too much abdominal weight does have a dark side. Visceral fat although small in proportion to other body fat is active, which means it produces messengers that influence how the body functions. These messengers include pro-inflammatory cytokines and compounds which influence how hormones like insulin work.
What this means is that when visceral fat starts to accumulate it may become a risk to our health, increasing our chances of developing conditions such as:
- Type 2 diabetes
- Alzheimers disease and other forms of dementia
Cut Calories To Banish Belly Fat
Good news — upper belly fat caused by visceral fat deposits is relatively easy to lose, since it’s the first fat you’ll burn when you start to lose weight. If you’re also carrying some excess subcutaneous fat — the under-the-skin fat — that may take longer to go away, but diet and exercise can help you get there. You’ll lose subcutaneous fat from all over your body when you diet, so your legs, arms and hips will get slimmer along with your stomach.
Start your fat loss journey by planning a calorie intake that creates a 500- to 1,000-calorie deficit. That will allow you to lose 1 to 2 pounds each week, so you can lose your upper belly fat at a slow and steady, sustainable pace. Your energy needs — and therefore how much calories you’ll need to eat to get your calorie deficit — depend on your activity and body size.
For example, a 45-year-old woman who is 5-foot-8-inches tall, weighs 170 pounds, and lives an inactive lifestyle needs 2,000 to maintain her weight. She could aim for a weight loss of 1 pound per week and achieve it by eating 1,500 calories daily. Trying for a 1,000-calorie deficit through diet alone cuts her calorie intake to just 1,000 calories daily, which is too low and could trigger a semi-starvation state that makes it difficult to lose fat. Instead, she should cut her calorie intake to 1,500 calories and burn 500 calories through exercise this combination creates a 1,000-calorie deficit that allow for 2 pounds of weight loss weekly.
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What Foods Help Burn Belly Fat
Can we be honest? No foods can help to burn belly fat. That’s just not how it works.
There are, however, nutrient-dense foods that you can incorporate into your diet to help you load up on goodness whilst you’re aiming for a calorie deficit. They include, but aren’t limited to:
- Eggs
- Apples
- Bananas
It’s also important to remember that food is to be enjoyed, so the key to a sustainable diet is creating one that’s full of produce you look forward to eating and with meals that leave you feeling satisfied and not craving more due to restriction. While the number of calories in food affects satiety , its much more complex than that, explains Dr Barbara Rolls, professor of nutritional sciences at Penn State University. Satiety and how long that feeling is sustained depends on numerous factors, including portion size, how long it takes to eat a food, its texture and how filling you expect it to be.’
Cut Back On Carbs Especially Refined Carbs
Reducing your carb intake can be very beneficial for losing fat, including abdominal fat.
Diets with under 50 grams of carbs per day cause belly fat loss in people who are overweight, those at risk for type 2 diabetes, and women with polycystic ovary syndrome .
You dont have to follow a strict low carb diet. Some research suggests that simply replacing refined carbs with unprocessed starchy carbs may improve metabolic health and reduce belly fat .
In the famous Framingham Heart Study, people with the highest consumption of whole grains were 17% less likely to have excess abdominal fat than those who consumed diets high in refined grains .
SUMMARY
A high intake of refined carbs is associated with excessive belly fat. Consider reducing your carb intake or replacing refined carbs in your diet with healthy carb sources, such as whole grains, legumes, or vegetables.
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Take A Pass On Sodas And Juices
Sodas and juices can be sneaky sources of calories, Gans says, and they dont fill you up. If you cut back on your source of excess calories, wherever they may be coming from, that will help you lose weight, she says. While most people are aware that sodas are often liquid sugar, juices tend to have a health halo that isnt accurate, Cording says. When you drink juice, it doesnt have the same fiber as youd get by actually eating a piece of fruit that will slow down digestion, she explains. It hits the bloodstream really quickly and you can have a blood sugar crash afterward. Weeding out these drinks from your diet will help cut out these excess calorie sources and regulate your blood sugar, she says.
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Stress And Weight Loss
Stress is one of the top reasons for most 50 year old belly fat issues.
Continual stress as we transition into menopause can also increase your cortisol levels.
This powerful stress hormone works in tandem with your sleep hormone, melatonin. So too much cortisol will interfere with your sleep which then causes your insulin to remain high overnight when it is usually decreasing. The insulin will hold onto fat making it doubly difficult to lose the weight around your middle.
If you find you are often stressed it is a good idea to practice mindfulness.
Meditation or Yoga or both are great ways to calm the body from stress.
Yoga is also a fabulous way to increase strength, flexibility and balance which is important as we start to age.
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What Should I Do If Ive Got Excess Weight Round My Middle
Regardless of your height or BMI, you should aim to lose weight if:
- you are a man with a waist measurement of 94 cm or more
- youre a woman with a waist measuring 80 cm or more
And your risk of serious health problems will greatly increase if:
- you are a man with a waist measurement of 102 cm ,
- youre a woman with a waist measuring higher that 88cm .
If your tummy weight is in the higher risk category above I would advise you to contact your GP. You might also find it helpful to contact a dietitian, who will help you to develop an individualised plan for a healthier lifestyle.
Understand Why You Gain Belly Fat
As you age, you can’t avoid gaining some belly fat and you won’t be able to lose all of it, but you can minimize its appearance and its negative health effects with lifestyle and dietary interventions.
Starting at age 30, you begin to experience sarcopenia, which is the natural loss of muscle mass that naturally occurs with aging. The American Association of Retired Persons states that this loss is approximately a pound a year after 30 — if you don’t engage in strength training to preserve your muscle tissue. By 60 — with no exercise — you may have lost about 30 pounds of muscle mass, replacing the muscle mostly with fat. Fat is less efficient at burning calories than muscle is, which means that your body’s resting metabolism also declines. So, even if you eat the same amount of food as you did when you were younger, you will likely gain weight.
To prevent weight gain with your slowing metabolism, you need to reduce your daily caloric intake by about 100 calories every 10 years after age 40. So, at 60 or older, you should consume at least 200 fewer calories every day than when you were in your 30s.
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Add More Lean Protein In Your Diet To Lose Weight
Including plenty of good quality protein in your diet will not only help with weight loss but will help slow muscle loss.
Older women have higher protein needs than those of their younger counterparts and it is shown that eating a protein rich diet can not only prevent but reverse muscle loss that occurs at this time in your life.
A bonus of eating protein is that it keeps you feeling fuller for longer meaning you are less likely to snack.
Foods To Reduce If You’re Trying To Lose Belly Fat
Notice we said reduce, though, not remove. It’s really important to avoid unnecessarily cutting out entire food groups. ‘This will lead to a restrictive diet that is unsustainable and likely cause a yo-yo effect with weight loss and regaining,’ explains Catherine Rabess, dietitian and NHS dietetic manager. ‘Don’t demonise your food or view meals like good or bad or cheat days or treats as this could develop into an unhealthy relationship with food.’
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Lifestyle Changes To Reduce The Liver Belly Type
You can do a lot to help your liver to heal and get rid of that stubborn belly fat. The first thing you need to do to support your liver is to remove toxins from your life. This includes alcohol as well as processed foods like snack chips or frozen dinners!
The post I linked to above is very helpful for those who are finding it difficult to cut down on their alcohol consumption.
The liver is a busy organ, and it does not have time to sort through the chemicals in processed food. If you eat natural foods like those that are cooked at home or found on your own property then this will take some of the burden off your liver
There are other ways too for example getting enough sleep so stress doesnt contribute more unnecessary strain on an overworked liver system.
So in summary, some lifestyle changes that you can make to support your liver are
- Get enough good quality sleep. Lack of sleep raises stress hormones which tax the liver.
- Do some form of physical activity or exercise. 30 mins walking a day is good.
- Eat a healthy diet of unprocessed foods.
- Cook from scratch at home save eating out for special occasions.
- Stop smoking.
- Remove stress from your life.
- Aim to get to a healthy weight for your height.
These lifestyle changes, combined with the following diet changes will help to lower your health risk.
Drinking alcohol can be responsible for a liver belly.