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In an effect to deal with weight control and to help people to be healthier, a TV and radio community awareness program held last year told us to check the size of our belly or stomach by putting a tape measure around it. For most Australians a waist measurement of over 94 centimetres for men and 80 centimetres for women means you are at increased risk of developing a chronic disease. If your waist measurement is over 102 centimetres for men and 88 centimetres for women, your risk greatly increases. The research has shown stomach or belly fat leads to raised blood pressure, high cholesterol levels, insulin resistance syndrome high blood sugar and heart disease. So it can be a health risk. Besides this, as a hypnotherapist in Melbourne, I am often told that it just does not look good.
So what determines where the fat is stored? In the first case the main way to store fat is to eat when you are not hungry. If you do eat when not hungry you can store fat in a number of areas around the body. A number of genes have been identified by scientists and these determine the number of fat cells in the body and where they are to be located. Generally, men will store fat around their middle. Whereas women more typically store fat lower down around the pelvic region, hips, butt and thighs. Women can store fat in around the stomach or belly due to their genetics. It can also occur after menopause due to the changes in hormones and it can occur due to life’s stressors.
So to reduce the level of fat in your body there is something you need to know first. According to the Harvard University Health, there are two main types of abdominal fat. It can be subcutaneous, where it is lying between the skin and the abdominal wall. The subcutaneous is that roll of fat that shows up when you pinch the fat around your stomach. The other type is visceral, which surrounds the abdominal organs. Fat located behind the abdominal cavity, called retroperitoneal fat, is generally counted as visceral fat. Several studies have shown that visceral fat is more strongly correlated with risk factors such as insulin resistance or type 2 diabetes.
Visceral fat is easy to remove through exercise, eating when hungry and reducing stress. The benefits include lower blood pressure and more favourable cholesterol levels. Subcutaneous fat can be difficult to move, but with people who have normal weight, it’s not generally considered as much of a health threat as visceral fat is. A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2004 found that using liposuction removal of the subcutaneous fat in 15 obese women had no effect after three months on their levels of blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol, or response to insulin.
Health studies have shown that belly fat can develop as a result of stress. This is because the hormone cortisol is released during stress. High level of cortisol in the body appears to stimulate the storage of fat around the belly and abdomen. Yale University researchers studied 60 women and found that the more stress they were under, the more fat they stored around their stomachs. Their conclusion was that abdominal fat is can develop in stressed men of any age, and older stressed women. It seems as if that fat can be both visceral and subcutaneous.
Researchers support the need for exercise and good eating habits to reduce the abdominal belly fat. A study comparing sedentary adults with those exercising at different intensities, researchers at Duke University Medical Center found that the non-exercisers experienced a gain in visceral fat after six months of nearly 9%. Exercisers who did an equivalent of 12 miles per week walking or jogging put on no visceral fat, and those who exercised the equivalent of 20 miles per week jogging lost both visceral and subcutaneous fat.
Don’t lose hope. As you learn more about your body you are able to realise that you can get to your idea weight by dealing with the different problem that arise. As you get your eating under control, do exercise and de-stress, you lose the fat and achieve your goals.