Belly fat

Josh2040
Josh2040 Posts: 45 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I have been trying for about a year now to lose the fat around my mid section. I have dropped from 225 lbs down to my current weight of 192 lbs. But i have been stuck right around there for a few months now. I work out on average 3-4 time a week. I do cardio and strenght training. I also do my best to stick to eating about 1600 Calories per day that has helped me get this far. Anyone have any Ideas on how to lose what is hanging around my mid section?

Thanks Josh

Replies

  • jenneal89
    jenneal89 Posts: 243
    Just keep at it. I had a lot of belly fat after having my daughter and nearly 2 years later it's almost gone. You can't spot reduce fat and for lots of people tummy fat is the last thing to go. Keep losing weight all over and eating healthy and it will happen
  • Taundry
    Taundry Posts: 21
    I'm glad you posted this as I was going to ask the same thing, sorry to gatecrash your post.

    I gained around 56lb whilst pregnant and have managed to loose this but still have the baby pouch and don't seem to be able to shift it! I was going to put a post in exercise forum to see if there were any specific exercises which helped people :smile:

    Well done on your weight loss your doing great!
  • wazzanz
    wazzanz Posts: 78
    great subject. will follow with interest.
  • wingchunrick
    wingchunrick Posts: 267 Member
    Sorry to say this but you cannot "spot reduce". You need to incorporate a healthy lifestyle that constitutes eating the right foods and regular exercise. As long as you're in a calorie defecit, you will eventually lose body fat but alas, most is strored around the midsection so will be the last place you will see noticable differences. Hope that makes sense.
  • jenneal89
    jenneal89 Posts: 243
    I'm glad you posted this as I was going to ask the same thing, sorry to gatecrash your post.

    I gained around 56lb whilst pregnant and have managed to loose this but still have the baby pouch and don't seem to be able to shift it! I was going to put a post in exercise forum to see if there were any specific exercises which helped people :smile:

    Well done on your weight loss your doing great!

    I gained65lbs while pregnant and have now lost nearly 85lbs. As I said above my tummy is nearly flat after 2 years of working on it. I can say that it has gone down the most and quickest since I started p90x. I would definitely recommend getting it as its amazing. Good balance of cardio, weights, and the best ab work ever IMO
  • Taundry
    Taundry Posts: 21
    Thank you :flowerforyou:

    I'm currently doing 30 day shred and are thinking of moving onto p90x after this, I do work out at the gym 5 times a week also and do a couple of toning classes so hoping to see results :ohwell:
  • nxd10
    nxd10 Posts: 4,570 Member
    We all store fat differently. That's where yours is (sorry). It will come off when your body gets to it.

    Good luck!

    And I bet it looks better with all that workout. What I hate is that as everything else gets skinnier, it sticks out more. So it is smaller in an absolute sense but not relatively.
  • Mlkshk26
    Mlkshk26 Posts: 3
    I asked my trainer that same exact thing. I was losing inches every where, EXCEPT my mid section. She said that everyone loses differently, but in the end, it all equals itself out. There is no way of focusing on just losing in that area. I guess patience comes into play with this.
  • luvinlaurakate
    luvinlaurakate Posts: 145 Member
    OMG ^^ I have quite the belly from having twins, and it is the ONE thing that I really struggle with. I have told my husband on several occasions that I almost wish I weighed 220 again so that my stomach wasn't as obvious. Cause now, I look relatively normal everywhere else, and then just have this bulge of a stomach. Drives me crazy!
  • AngryDiet
    AngryDiet Posts: 1,349 Member
    I'm down from 240 to 192, and my belly is where it mostly shows. First on, last off. Genetics. Joy joy!

    Do you have any idea of your body fat percentage (or more precisely, an estimate of how much fat weight you have)? I figure another 15 to 20 pounds and I should have abs again, but that's really just a guess. I'll see when I get there.

    A couple of months at the same weight is a bit odd though, at 1600 calories. How tall are you?
  • monkeydo56
    monkeydo56 Posts: 1
    I found that building up and toning muscle is essential to losing fat as long as you expend more calories than you consume. Doesn't have to be body-building like you see at the gyms (big buff guys and gals). You can use simple graduated hand weights as you get stronger, therabands for legs and core, and exercises in your home that target muscles all over. The internet has a lot of different exercises you can follow. I try to do cardio one day, muscle strengthening the next day, rest the next day, and then back to square one. Belly fat eventually starts to go away with consistent exercise and diet....as long as you expend more than you consume. Changing the mentality of "diet" to "life style change" has also been important to me. Your reward will come...slowly, yes....but it will come. At 55yrs old, I am stronger now with more vitality than I was 20 yrs ago. Good luck and please be patient!
  • Lightbulb1088
    Lightbulb1088 Posts: 189 Member
    try and change things up. Do different things (change the days and exercises) different days. pIck something new to try for a few weeks. Try some new foods. take a look at your dairy sometimes I look at mine when stuck and see things I can change.
    Good luck!
  • Mini_Medic
    Mini_Medic Posts: 343 Member
    I hate the pudge that just won't budge! I went fron 168lbs to 130lbs (at 5'3.5") and I have protruding hip bones and from a front or rear profile I have curves and love my shape, but from the side, whoa... That's a whole other story! I have indentions along my hips and an unbearably not cute pooch. The indentions and definition I have just make the belly pudge stick out worse and look worse than when I was full around the middle and had no definition! Alas I will take the pooch over the extra 38lbs any day!
  • aj_31
    aj_31 Posts: 994 Member
    In the same boat. No matter what my stomach isn't shrinking.


    I've heard working your abs when having a lot of belly fat is pointless because you will never see abs until the fat is gone. Thoughts on this? I know a lot of people do 30 Day Shred and they have abs work in there and people tend to tone up in that area even though they had a lot of belly fat when they started.
  • phildawson75
    phildawson75 Posts: 205 Member
    You can do ab work with any amount of BF% really, but as you say you won't see them defined until you lose weight covering them. You cant target the fat there so the actual exercises do pretty much nothing to get rid of the belly fat other than helping burn a few calories for the movement. I found them pretty difficult and uncomfortable at first, but it gets much much easier the lighter you are.

    I'm now at 145 lbs with 17% BF and still have fat covering mine though getting more visible each week. It is the last place to come off for me too.

    I estimate I'll need to have ~10-14% BF to have them clearly visible. :/
  • aj_31
    aj_31 Posts: 994 Member
    You can do ab work with any amount of BF% really, but as you say you won't see them defined until you lose weight covering them. You cant target the fat there so the actual exercises do pretty much nothing to get rid of the belly fat other than helping burn a few calories for the movement. I found them pretty difficult and uncomfortable at first, but it gets much much easier the lighter you are.

    I'm now at 145 lbs with 17% BF and still have fat covering mine though getting more visible each week. It is the last place to come off for me too.

    I estimate I'll need to have ~10-14% BF to have them clearly visible. :/

    I'd be happy with just having my roll disappear to the point of being able to wear a tank top or tight shirt and not have to question if it looks okay. I figure I will probably never seen actual ab muscles on me.
  • SyStEmPhReAk
    SyStEmPhReAk Posts: 330 Member
    1. Stick to your calorie deficit - weigh and measure food
    2. Hit your daily MACROS - very important
    3. Weight train 3-4 days a week

    Measure your body fat% and as you decrease to about 10% you will start to see abs.
  • Josh2040
    Josh2040 Posts: 45 Member
    I'm down from 240 to 192, and my belly is where it mostly shows. First on, last off. Genetics. Joy joy!

    Do you have any idea of your body fat percentage (or more precisely, an estimate of how much fat weight you have)? I figure another 15 to 20 pounds and I should have abs again, but that's really just a guess. I'll see when I get there.

    A couple of months at the same weight is a bit odd though, at 1600 calories. How tall are you?

    I'm 6 foot, I have about 19% body fat right now, so I figure i have about 15-20lbs of fat to lose also. I don't know if i have been stuck at the same weight because of stress of moving around. I am Military over seas right now, and move around quite a bit so I don't get steady sleep or regular intervals of food intake.
  • AngryDiet
    AngryDiet Posts: 1,349 Member
    I'm down from 240 to 192, and my belly is where it mostly shows. First on, last off. Genetics. Joy joy!

    Do you have any idea of your body fat percentage (or more precisely, an estimate of how much fat weight you have)? I figure another 15 to 20 pounds and I should have abs again, but that's really just a guess. I'll see when I get there.

    A couple of months at the same weight is a bit odd though, at 1600 calories. How tall are you?

    I'm 6 foot, I have about 19% body fat right now, so I figure i have about 15-20lbs of fat to lose also. I don't know if i have been stuck at the same weight because of stress of moving around. I am Military over seas right now, and move around quite a bit so I don't get steady sleep or regular intervals of food intake.

    I'm also 6 foot and I think I'm around 21% fat, and I've found through months of tracking that my TDEE is around 2300 kcal. Everyone is different, and I bet you're more active than I am, so is it possible that you need to increase your calories for a while? Mix it up? 1600 seems a bit low. Perhaps others will chime in with a thought. You could add 250 kcal or so and see if it helps or hinders.

    I will say that my weight loss is weeks of no loss at all followed by a big jump down. Then more weeks of no loss again, etc. I think I did go about 2 months once before, and was starting to doubt the whole thing.
  • Josh2040
    Josh2040 Posts: 45 Member
    I'm down from 240 to 192, and my belly is where it mostly shows. First on, last off. Genetics. Joy joy!

    Do you have any idea of your body fat percentage (or more precisely, an estimate of how much fat weight you have)? I figure another 15 to 20 pounds and I should have abs again, but that's really just a guess. I'll see when I get there.

    A couple of months at the same weight is a bit odd though, at 1600 calories. How tall are you?

    I'm 6 foot, I have about 19% body fat right now, so I figure i have about 15-20lbs of fat to lose also. I don't know if i have been stuck at the same weight because of stress of moving around. I am Military over seas right now, and move around quite a bit so I don't get steady sleep or regular intervals of food intake.

    I'm also 6 foot and I think I'm around 21% fat, and I've found through months of tracking that my TDEE is around 2300 kcal. Everyone is different, and I bet you're more active than I am, so is it possible that you need to increase your calories for a while? Mix it up? 1600 seems a bit low. Perhaps others will chime in with a thought. You could add 250 kcal or so and see if it helps or hinders.

    I will say that my weight loss is weeks of no loss at all followed by a big jump down. Then more weeks of no loss again, etc. I think I did go about 2 months once before, and was starting to doubt the whole thing.

    It looks like we have the same goal weight in mind and had similar starting weights. Maybe the same thing is happening to me that you were seeing.
  • shakybabe
    shakybabe Posts: 1,578 Member
    I have same issue I'm much thinner everywhere else, My wrist is only 5" now they look like they'd snap really easy but around my middle is still 33 " (from 48")

    I think I look older now as I lost loads of face and neck, can see outline of collarbone, ribs, boobs have shrunk loads and thighs are thinner and leaner but cos of tummy am still in size 14 (UK).

    Trousers are nightmare as end up having to get size bigger then there miles too big in the legs. I hate the fact I look older as always have young face when I was chubbier and bigger and people never guessed my age right often many years younger. For first time someone guessed me older recently and it really depressed me.

    I'm thinking I'll have to stop with diet and just accept I'll always be fat around the middle and get maternity trousers for comfort as sat all day in wheelchair. I'm 43 and going through early menopause I suspect from all dieting so emotions are all over the place and tiniest thing sends me into depression at the minute, have no energy and constantly exhausted from only living on low calories to lose weight and it hasn't changed for the last 3 months! It's really frustrating.
  • ShoOff007
    ShoOff007 Posts: 5
    All working out does is help you to burn extra calories and build muscle under your existing fat. Sit ups will help your core, but you won't see the results until all the belly fat is gone. Just hang in there, that belly fat will go away eventually. One thing that helps me is that I try to keep my belly sucked in all day. By doing this you train you belly muscles to stay tight so your belly doesn't hang out so much. What ever you do, don't give up. Weight loss is about more than being skinny, it's about living a healthy lifestyle.
  • shakybabe
    shakybabe Posts: 1,578 Member
    I have since read about oestrogen dominance and this does also affect males after age 40 too when your testosterone levels drop leaving you with more oestrogen. abdominal fat is one of the symptoms.

    I have got some progesterone cream to try and starting a diet to reduce oestrogen dominance and hoping I will see a difference if that's what's causing mine.
  • nsblue
    nsblue Posts: 331 Member
    Sorry to say this but you cannot "spot reduce". You need to incorporate a healthy lifestyle that constitutes eating the right foods and regular exercise. As long as you're in a calorie defecit, you will eventually lose body fat but alas, most is strored around the midsection so will be the last place you will see noticable differences. Hope that makes sense.

    ^^agreed^^

    I wasnt even looking to drop certain fat areas when losing weight..i had it all over LOL My last surgery the surgeon told me i have absolutely no substanial fat and very very little viseral. ... sooo what you eat and exercise DOES get that fat off. Concentrate on that.... before you know it your belly will be just skin.
    I made sure every day i was having a minimum of 60-80 grams of protein. ate fruits and veggies, low sugar, low sodium and very very little starches...stuck to low cal crackers n ryvita.... little brown rice or potato and no pasta... and had NO bread during weightloss ... WALKED, LIFTED WEIGHTS, USED ENCUMBANT BIKE, SWAM, DANCED etc etc....this is what worked for me.

    n yes..i realize you are not really wanting to lose weight... but what you eat will determin the fat that is in your body....

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