Afraid of Extra skin after loosing weight

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Sissisoli
Sissisoli Posts: 4 Member
edited July 2017 in Motivation and Support
Hello everyone! I am 45 yo and gained too much weight during and after my pregnancy of my second boy. Now, he is 5 yo and I still cannot loose weight or more frankly I am afraid to loose weight and found myself with extra skin or wrinkles. My goal is to loose 66 lbs. I started a week ago and I try as much as I can to exercise to avoid this as I won't accept to go through surgery but I would be grateful to have some of your personal experiences. Thanks a lot from sunny Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt :)

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  • Brendaflores114
    Brendaflores114 Posts: 15 Member
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    Keep it up. Don't let yourself get preoccupied with having extra skin. I also gained too much weight during my pregnancy. I am determined to lose the weight. At first I worried about the same thing, but I decided to stay focused on making good choices day to day.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,419 Member
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    No sense in worrying about something that may not happen. Just try to lose at a sensible, gradual rate, and stay healthy. Exercise can't hurt.

    Even though I was 59-60 when I lost a similar amount of weight to your goal, I didn't have huge amounts of loose skin, and what I did have continued shrinking slowly over time since (I'm 61 now). Definitely not noticeable, even at first. So, there's hope! :)
  • CynthiasChoice
    CynthiasChoice Posts: 1,047 Member
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    The younger you are when you lose weight, the better for your skin. Aim to get proper amounts of fat and protein in your diet, limit sugar and carbs and stay well hydrated. A multi vitamin and fish oil might also help. Somewhere or other I gathered the info that too much sugar and not enough healthy fats can cause extra wrinkles over time.

    If you're worried about facial wrinkles, begin a skin care regimen with retinol and peptides which help increase collagen in your skin.

    Everyone is different, but if it helps: I've lost 63 pounds and have minimal excess skin only on my upper arms. Best wishes! And please visit this thread again in a year and let us know how your skin survived!
  • VeronicaA76
    VeronicaA76 Posts: 1,116 Member
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    Incorporate weightlifting. I'm 40. Used to weigh +350lbs. My monthly weigh in was today: 187lbs. Loose skin, minimal. Okay yeah, I have some but nothing scary or embarrassing. Interestingly, once I started seriously lifting weights my skin started to tighten up.
  • millea84
    millea84 Posts: 242 Member
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    I was going to make a thread about this, because I am terrified of having loose skin. I am 33 and need to lose about 90 pounds. This thread has given me hope. Does anyone know if swimming helps reduce loose skin. I feel my core tighten when I am swimming. Plus swimming is low impact and it does not aggravate my fibromyalgia.
  • Spiegelchan
    Spiegelchan Posts: 78 Member
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    I think that moisturising your skin, and eating omega 3s and protein, as someone else said, will help it keep its elasticity and not be as saggy or loose? I was also under the impression that you only get loose skin if you lose weight very fast.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 32,419 Member
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    Spiegelchan wrote: »
    I think that moisturising your skin, and eating omega 3s and protein, as someone else said, will help it keep its elasticity and not be as saggy or loose? I was also under the impression that you only get loose skin if you lose weight very fast.

    I'm not sure whether it's that (bolded), or that skin shrinkage is inherently slow/gradual, so that when losing fast the creation of loose skin (by fat depletion) outpaces skin shrinkage and thus loose skin appears worse for a time, whereas when losing more slowly, the skin is closer to keeping up with the slower fat loss pace. I truly don't know.

    Of course, losing too fast can impair general health & vitality, which might itself impair skin elasticity. I don't know of any good research related to this topic.

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