Fat itself is not bad. Our bodies need fat. Our fatty tissue stores up energy, regulates hormone function, helps us absorb vitamins and minerals, and provides us with built-in insulation. In fact, 20% to 35% of our daily calories should come from fat. Yep, our bodies need fat – just not too much, and not in certain parts of our bodies. Too much fat, especially saturated and trans-fats, and our bodies can become vulnerable to disease.
You may be asking yourself why belly fat can cause more harm than, say, the fat that dimples the thighs or heaps onto the hips. To answer that, you need to get to know the two kinds of fat we all have in our belly region: subcutaneous fat and visceral fat.
Subcutaneous fat is that fat you can see and grab onto – all those beer bellies, spare tires, pouches, and love handles. It’s the fat that makes a person look fat. Visceral fat, that’s the fat that hides inside. Visceral fat is the fat that surrounds the abdominal organs. Visceral fat is more insidious because it’s so hard to detect, and because it is also affected by genetics in addition to an unhealthy diet and physical inactivity.
Wondering now if you have visceral fat lurking inside? Researchers use magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), where a magnetic field and energy pulses are used to create an image of the inside of the belly. Since MRIs are not practical for most people, you can use other methods to assess the amount of belly fat you have.
One way is to measure your waist-to-hip ratio. Apple-shaped people – those who carry more of their weight around their waist – are more likely to be storing up visceral fat. Another way is to feel your belly: is it flabby or firm? If it’s firm, you may have visceral fat. But visceral fat is not just a burden of the obese and the beer-bellied. A thin person can have too much visceral fat and be at as great of a health risk as someone twice their weight.
What Causes a Fat Belly?
Where we store fat (surplus calories) is largely a combination of gender, age and genetic inheritance. Men tend to store fat around their middle (apple shape), whereas women typically store fat around the pelvic region, hips, butt and thighs (pear shape). However, women are prone to develop an apple shape in mid-life, after menopause. This is because the female hormones are present in smaller amounts and so their shape tends to become more ‘male’.
Is a Fat Stomach Unhealthy?
Yes. For people with a BMI of 34 or less, a fat belly is regarded as an additional health risk. Fatty tissue which is stored around the stomach and abdomen (sometimes called intra-abdominal, or visceral fat) carries a greater health risk than fat located in the lower body around the butt and thighs. Some health studies show that abdominal fat leads to raised blood pressure, high cholesterol levels, high blood sugar, insulin resistance syndrome (metabolic syndrome X) and heart disease. Because of this, some experts believe that waist circumference and fat-distribution is more important than your actual weight in predicting future health risks.
Stress and Stomach Fat
Some health studies show that abdominal fat can develop as a result of stress. This is because the hormone cortisol is released during stress, and a high level of cortisol in the body appears to stimulate the storage of fat around the belly and abdomen. Researchers at Yale University studied 60 women and found that the more stress they were under, the more fat they stored around their stomachs. So it appears that a fat belly is most likely to develop in stressed men of any age, and older stressed women.
How to Prevent a Fat Belly?
If you are prone to store fat around your middle, the healthiest solution is to maintain a normal weight. By matching your calorie intake to your calorie needs and prevent weight gain, you will prevent the development of any excess fat.
How to Reduce a Fat Stomach?
However, if you already have a fat belly, the best option is to follow a healthy weight loss diet, combined with fitness exercises such as aerobics (to burn extra calories) and a stomach-toning workout to help tighten and strengthen abdominal muscles. That said, reducing a fat stomach takes time – especially if you are an apple-shape. Despite what commercials say, there is no diet-plan or type of exercise that can “target” your fat stomach. So please don’t get impatient. Your fat belly will disappear, I promise.
Related posts:
