Tips on avoiding loose skin?

marelthu

Lovelylivie wrote: »

marelthu wrote: »

Lovelylivie wrote: »

Hi, I am looking for tips on how to avoid getting loose and saggy skin during my weight loss journey. I am around 5ft 9in and currently 190lbs. Doctor said a healthy weight for me would be 140-150lbs and majority of my extra fat is in my belly.
I know if I lose weight at a slower pace that will help, but I am searching for other tips also!
I want to get healthy but I know if I had lota of extra skin hanging around, my confidence would be lower than it is now being 192lbs.
Thanks!

Depending on how young you are - like under 40s - and since you don't have a massive amount of weight to lose, you may not have a big problem with hanging skin. Just lose the weight, maybe do some weight lifting and enjoy your healthy new body.

I'm 22 and I personally don't think I look overweight but my scale says otherwise haha

I doubt you'll have loose skin problems then. You'll look terrific.

AnnPT77

lucerorojo wrote: »

When I was younger I lost 30 lbs. and never had any issues with lose skin. 40-50 lbs. is a bit more but you are also tall. Why don't you just start with a goal of losing 10-20 lbs. and see how the skin looks? And then just take it by 5 lbs. increments? At 22, I don't think you have anything to worry about. In the 20s the body is still very young and resilient.

This kind of strategy can mislead, for some: Fat depletes anywhere within the fat mass, and varies by individual, so moderate fat loss can leave some squishy subcutaneous fat that conspires with gravity to keep the skin stretched out, but more loss will deplete the area enough for skin to shrink.

OP, be aware that true loose skin is thin folds like you could pinch on a non-fatty part like back of hand or kneecap. Thicker folds, like half an inch or thicker, almost certainly have some subcutaneous fat in there.

The true loose skin can continue to shrink well after weight loss. Mine continued to shrink for at least a year into maintenance, and I'm 60 freakin' years old!

For areas with remaining subcutaneous fat, you can't necessarily keep losing pounds until all fat is gone (not remotely healthy), but once you're at goal weight you can consider recomposition (or bulk/cut cycles) to further reduce fat at that weight.

So, see how you look when you get to goal, but give it some time after that to continue shrinking. At your age, with moderate amounts of weight to lose (vs. 100 lbs plus), your odds of a good outcome are excellent.

Lovelylivie

AnnPT77 wrote: »

lucerorojo wrote: »

When I was younger I lost 30 lbs. and never had any issues with lose skin. 40-50 lbs. is a bit more but you are also tall. Why don't you just start with a goal of losing 10-20 lbs. and see how the skin looks? And then just take it by 5 lbs. increments? At 22, I don't think you have anything to worry about. In the 20s the body is still very young and resilient.

This kind of strategy can mislead, for some: Fat depletes anywhere within the fat mass, and varies by individual, so moderate fat loss can leave some squishy subcutaneous fat that conspires with gravity to keep the skin stretched out, but more loss will deplete the area enough for skin to shrink.

OP, be aware that true loose skin is thin folds like you could pinch on a non-fatty part like back of hand or kneecap. Thicker folds, like half an inch or thicker, almost certainly have some subcutaneous fat in there.

The true loose skin can continue to shrink well after weight loss. Mine continued to shrink for at least a year into maintenance, and I'm 60 freakin' years old!

For areas with remaining subcutaneous fat, you can't necessarily keep losing pounds until all fat is gone (not remotely healthy), but once you're at goal weight you can consider recomposition (or bulk/cut cycles) to further reduce fat at that weight.

So, see how you look when you get to goal, but give it some time after that to continue shrinking. At your age, with moderate amounts of weight to lose (vs. 100 lbs plus), your odds of a good outcome are excellent.

All of these tips are very helpful. Thank you

DebLaBounty

When I was in my late 30's, I lost about 25 pounds and didn't have any loose skin issues. Ah, youth! I'm in my mid-50's now and recently lost 22 pounds. I have loose skin in the old tricep area, kind of flabby hanging lack-of-muscle-tone skin this time around. I'm doing some exercises to see if that helps. At the age of 22, my guess is that you will have very minimal issues with loose skin. So really, the key is losing the weight now while you're younger instead of later!

lucerorojo

The key is not putting the weight on to begin with! But hindsight is 20/20!