That darn stubborn belly fat!?

Question

Ok, so I am 5'3" and 96 lbs. (20 years old) Yes I am VERY skinny, EXCEPT for my belly. It has a rather large pouch (no I am not pregnant!) of belly fat and I need to know how to get rid of it. I dont want to "lose weight: as I have read that the only way to get rid of belly fat is to lose weight in general. I cant really afford to do that. Any suggestions??

and yea I am looking into lyposuction, but that would be a last case senario!

Answer 1

There is no site specific way of losing fat... the old myth about working your abs to burn belly fat isn't true. To get rid of love handles, you need to lose overall fat. That happens with exercise and watching your diet. More on that below.

The most effective way to lose fat is aerobic exercise in the "moderate" fat-burning range, ideally first thing in the morning before you eat. When you wake your body is ready to burn fat and your levels of growth hormone are highest at that time. Later in the day it can take up to 30 minutes just to put your body into a fat-burning mode.

Another overlooked way to burn fat is by lifting weights. Skeletal muscle has very high caloric needs... almost twice that of adipose (fat) tissue. Put on a little muscle and you will burn calories all day even at rest. Be aware that skeletal muscle weighs more, so with this approach you may see your weight increasing while your body fat is melting away. Not realizing this often stresses folks who think they should be losing weight as a measure of fitness. Forget the scale, look in the mirror and you will be happy.

In your case this would be the ideal approach... put on some weight in the form of muscle and watch the belly fat melt. Six-packs are 20% abdominal exercise and 80% diet. There is one caveat... abdominal muscles will form in the position that you work them, so be certain to pull them tightly toward your spine while doing crunches, etc. Also, during most lifting, the "core is active" which means that you should be stabilizing with contracted abs then too. Fail to do this and the abs will form, but bulging outward and the result is not attractive.

If you are trying to build muscle as a way to lose fat, then you may need to increase total calories and specifically your protein intake. I target about 0.8 g of protein per pound of body weight each day when actively building. That is far more protein than most people need in their diets.


Aloha

Answer 2

There is a difference in losing weight and losing body fat. If your body fat is over 20 %, according to the American Heart association , you would be "average" and it would not hurt you to strip a little fat (which would, most likely get rid of the pooch) If you are 19% or below and you still have a pooch it may be indicative of week transverse muscles which can be easily fixed with some good core exercises or Pilates

Answer 3

My personal trainer told me that working your ab muscles (i.e. doing crunches, etc.) won't get rid of the belly fat. All that does is build up the muscle underneath the fat and make it pooch out more. What he told me to do was lots of cardio and that fat will melt away. I understand that you say you can't afford to lose weight but unless there is lots of fat on the rest of your body then the cardio shouldn't really cause you to lose that much weight overall. I've had several trainers tell me that spot workouts (only working out one area) doesn't really work. Sorry hun, you're gonna have to work out all over. Good luck!!

Answer 4

Yea... Its genetically normal for women to have belly fat even if the rest of you is skinny... Its annoying, i have it too. All you can really do is crunches and more crunches... I guess for it to really really work you would need to do 50-100 a day for a month, and try some of those ab workouts, they get you moving in diff ways and are usually only 10 mins a day, but YOu will feel it the day after.. TRUST ME. I do them and it has worked..but i still have that pooch... women get it so we have warmth (fat) to keep our growing child warm when we are pregnant.

Answer 5

There are exercises you can do to tone your stomac muscles. Try doing 25 situps morning and night. Ask your local gym if they do sessions for toning tums. But don't worry too much just keep excersizing those muscles and in time ( yes time it's not instant unfortunatly) you will notice a difference. Give it at least a month. I hope this helped a bit, take care.

Answer 6

you should realize that you are beautiful the way you are and as long as you are healthy and strong then you are gorgeous. who and what are you trying to look like? You are young and beautiful and I guarantee there are a lot of people out there who would be happy to tell you that. It is the small variations and individual characteristics of your shape that make you so beautiful in the first place, stop thinking about your beauty in terms of an unreachable ideal that is nothing like who you are. you want to be beautiful? smile and share some happiness with this world. That is much more effective than worrying.

Answer 7

I bet it's just the nromal abdominal pertrusion. Hold your tummy in when you work out. This will reshape your abdominal muscles and I bet that's all you'll need. I have a hard time picturing actual fat on someone your size. You just need to reshape your stomach muscles.

Answer 8

If you have stubborn belly fat, the only way you can reduce your fat is by doing aerobic exercises. During activities like swimming, rowing and walking, enough oxygen is supplied to the body to burn fat. More information available at http://tinyurl.com/jax5h

Answer 9

Shift the fat to another area working it into muscle. For me it's bike riding. Those extra calories stored in your belly will be needed in your legs for peadling. Do some good hills in the riding mix. Your not really loosing weight you are shifting the calories.

Answer 10

Try a workout with weights that work the abs