BELLY FAT

Everyone has some belly fat, even thin ones. Some of your fat is right under your skin. Other fat is deeper inside, around your heart, lungs, liver, and other organs. Visceral fat or deeper fat may cause bigger problem.

Deep Belly Fat

Visceral fat usually provides cushioning around your organs. However, too much of it may likely result to  high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, dementia, and certain cancers, including breast cancer and colon cancer. If you gain too much weight, your body starts to store your fat in unusual places like the organs and around the heart.

How Much Belly Fat Do You Have?

Get a CT scan or MRI to determine how much visceral fat you have. But there’s a much simpler, low-cost way to check—measure  your waist. For your health’s sake, you want your waist size to be less than 35 inches if you’re a woman and less than 40 inches if you’re a man.

Having a “pear shape” — bigger hips and thighs — is considered safer than an “apple shape,” which describes a wider waistline.

How much visceral fat you have is partly about your genes, and partly about your lifestyle, especially how active you are. The key is to be active, no matter what size you are.

4 Steps for Beating Belly Fat

There are four keys to controlling belly fat: exercise, diet, sleep, and stress management.

1. Exercise. Vigorous exercise trims all your fat, including visceral fat. Get at least 30 minutes of moderate exercise at least 5 days a week. Walking counts, as long as it’s brisk enough that you work up a sweat and breathe harder, with your heart rate faster than usual.

2. Diet. There is no magic diet for belly fat. But when you lose weight on any diet, belly fat usually goes first.

Getting enough fiber can help. Hairston’s research shows that people who eat 10 grams of soluble fiber per day — without any other diet changes — build up less visceral fat over time than others. That’s as simple as eating two small apples, a cup of green peas, or a half-cup of pinto beans.

3. Sleep. Getting the right amount of sleep. In one study, people who got 6 to 7 hours of sleep per night gained less visceral fat over 5 years compared to those who slept 5 or fewer hours per night or 8 or more hours per night.

4. Stress. You have to handle your stress. The best things you can do is include relaxing with friends and family, meditating, exercising to blow off steam, and getting counseling. That leaves you healthier and better prepared to make good choices for yourself.