Jiggly fat - what’s happening?
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uhill
Posts: 2 Member
I have a problem. It might sound gross, but my midsection (belly, hips, sides, boob fat, and thighs) seems a way more jigglier than before. What’s going on? Is that normal, if I’m exercising? It also feels more jellier too.
I’ve been exercising: running (13.1 app), started kickboxing, and doing the spotebi workouts. My diet could be better, but trying my best to eat healthy.
I’ve been exercising: running (13.1 app), started kickboxing, and doing the spotebi workouts. My diet could be better, but trying my best to eat healthy.
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Replies
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That has also happened to me, the more weight I lose the "jigglier" my fat becomes. I don't know the scientific reasoning behind this but as far as I am aware this is normal.2
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I have a problem. It might sound gross, but my midsection (belly, hips, sides, boob fat, and thighs) seems a way more jigglier than before. What’s going on? Is that normal, if I’m exercising? It also feels more jellier too.
I’ve been exercising: running (13.1 app), started kickboxing, and doing the spotebi workouts. My diet could be better, but trying my best to eat healthy.
Could be fluid retention from the exercise, particularly if the kickboxing/workouts are quite intense compared to what you were doing before.
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Maybe fat reduction faster than your skin can “snap back”? The fat could be looser in your skin causing it to be jigglier.4
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This may sound like a bad thing but it is actually not. Your body has two types of fat, visceral and subcutaneous fat. Visceral fat is hard and firm, while subcutaneous is the soft/squishy fat. Visceral fat is the more unhealthy of the two types of fat, so if you are losing that, your fat may feel squishier. But that actually means you've lost the more unhealthy type of fat. So a lot of people find that as they lose weight, the fat they have gets squishier. This is ultimately a good thing health wise. As you keep going, you will lose the subcutaneous fat too. But for now take this as a sign of progress.29
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Isn't there a really good old "squishy fat" thread that goes over all this? I can't remember who authored it.6
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It's also the case that your body won't necessarily first deplete fat from the outermost fat cells on your body, and proceed neatly inward. Fat can deplete from anywhere in your fat mass. The less-dense fat mass then feels squishy. (Think about it as a little bit similar to a water balloon: When it's totally full of water, it's kind of firm. If you let some of the water out, without letting air in, the balloon is squishier/floppier. Part way through weight loss, we can have less fat in the same-sized skin "balloon".)
The skin can't shrink until enough fat is gone to keep remaining fat from conspiring with gravity to keep the skin stretched out, so things are jiggly.
The net result of this is that some of us look worse partway to goal weight (the squishy/jiggly phase) than we will at goal weight. (I did.) Then, at goal weight, true loose skin (thin wrinkles, not 1/2" plus rolls) will still continue shrinking, possibly for quite some time. It can't really start to shrink until that fat/gravity conspiracy thing is over with, and skin shrinks much slower for most of us than weight loss happens anyway, so many of us see appearance improvements for quite a while after reaching goal. (My loose skin kept shrinking well into year 2 of maintenaince, but I'm old - 60+ at the time).
Hang in there: Things will get better if you stick with it!
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quiksylver296 wrote: »Isn't there a really good old "squishy fat" thread that goes over all this? I can't remember who authored it.
Yes I tried to find it in the search to link to it but I couldn't so I loosely paraphrased from memory. I think it's a combination of what I said and what @AnnPT77 said.4 -
quiksylver296 wrote: »Isn't there a really good old "squishy fat" thread that goes over all this? I can't remember who authored it.
Yes I tried to find it in the search to link to it but I couldn't so I loosely paraphrased from memory. I think it's a combination of what I said and what @AnnPT77 said.
Ann summed up what I thought it said, so we're good!3 -
Thank you all. I wasn’t sure where to look for this in all the different discussions listed. This makes me feel really good about myself. You guys are very helpful.7
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quiksylver296 wrote: »Isn't there a really good old "squishy fat" thread that goes over all this? I can't remember who authored it.
Didn't find the old thread but the article is by Lyle McDonald.
https://bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/of-whooshes-and-squishy-fat.html/5 -
@mmapags Thanks for posting the article! That seems to explain so much about my recent uptick/stalls and downward "whooshes" where I drop 1-2 pounds below where I was! (I still have quite a bit of visceral belly fat to lose)3
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Well, this ain't happening for me - either jiggly fat getting less jiggly, or skin snapping back. It didn't happen at 11% bf (hydrostatic) and it's of course no better now that I've put about 7 lbs back on.0
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StatChicBayes wrote: »@mmapags Thanks for posting the article! That seems to explain so much about my recent uptick/stalls and downward "whooshes" where I drop 1-2 pounds below where I was! (I still have quite a bit of visceral belly fat to lose)
Happy to help! And yes, it does help one to stay calm about these things. I always drop in whooshes. I'll go 2 weeks with no change but I'll know I'm on plan. Then I'll have a day where I have to pee about every hour or so it seems. Next time I weigh in, I'm down 2 lbs. A weight trending app or software helps too. It shows you a trend over time so that you don't worry about the blips.5 -
BTW, visceral fat does not show on your belly. That is subcutaneous fat. Visceral fat is internal around your organs and within your ribcage. If it's abdominal fat, it's subcutaneous. Typically but not always, when we start to lose fat, it is visceral fat that goes first to a large degree.1
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Said up there, but more reassurance.....totally normal. You often look way worse, then boom — one day you look better. Hang in there.2
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Honestly, this thread has BLOWN my mind. I have learnt so much.4
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I remember the old thread. Thanks for the article link, I find Lyle very informative. I’m happy to report that I was noticing the jiggly, squishy, dimpled pattern on my thighs yesterday. They look horrible, yet I was encouraged because I know this is happening behind the scenes.3
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