The Truth About Visceral Fat

Definition: Visceral Fat is a type of body fat that is stored within the abdominal cavity. It is located near several vital organs including the liver, stomach and intestines.

Visceral fat is also referred to as :Active Fat", because it can actively increase the risk of serious health poblems.

Criteria: According to Harvard Women’s Health Watch,  if you are a woman and your waist measures 35 inches or larger, you are at risk for health problems from visceral fat and men are at risk for health problems when their waist measures 40 inches or larger.

Increase in Visceral fat can start causing health problems immediately. It can increase insulin resistance, even if you’ve never had diabetes or prediabetes. 

Research says that this may be because a retinol-binding protein that increases insulin resistance is secreted by this type of fat. Visceral fat can also raise blood pressure quickly.

Most importantly, carrying excess visceral fat increases your risk for developing several serious long-term, life-threatening medical conditions. These include:

• Heart attacks and heart disease
• Digestion related issues
• Type 2 diabetes
• Stroke
• Breast cancer
• Colorectal cancer
• Alzheimer’s disease
• Infertility
• Knee pain
• Back pain
• Thyroid imbalance
• Sleep disorders

Also people with high visceral fat have high subcutaneous fat (fat under the skin)

Fortunately, visceral fat is extremely receptive to exercise, diet, and lifestyle changes. With each kilo you lose, you lose some visceral fat.

Visceral fat isn’t visible, so we don’t always know it’s there, making it that much more dangerous. Fortunately, it’s usually preventable. Maintaining a healthy, active, low-stress lifestyle can prevent visceral fat from building up in excess in the abdominal cavity.

Prevention and Cure:

1) Eating a Balanced Diet:

It is essential to follow a healthy, well-balanced diet. Eliminate processed, high-sugar, high-fat foods from your diet and include more lean proteins, vegetables, and complex carbs like crunchy fruits, beans and lentils.

Use low-fat cooking methods, such as broiling, boiling, or baking, instead of frying. When you do use oils, go for healthier ones like olive oil instead of butter or peanut oil.

2) Include Proteins with high Bioavailability:

Protein plays a critical role in reducing belly fat. By building lean muscle mass and increasing the number of calories you burn during digestion, proteins help increase the amount of energy (in calories) you expand each day. This further promotes weight loss. It also helps in fighting your hunger cravings.

It is very important to choose the protein considering your body type and body weight.
The right amount of protein intake gives faster and safer results.

3) Living Stress free:

The stress hormone cortisol can actually increase how much visceral fat your body stores, so reducing the stress in your life will make it easier to lose it. Practice meditation, deep breathing, and stress management tactics.

3) Drink Ample water to detox your system:

When water molecules interact with triglycerides glycerol and fatty acids are created; this is known as hydrolysis and fat burning takes place. 

This is why water is so integral for helping one to lose visceral fat as drinking enough water burns fat from food and drink, as well as stored fat.

4) Regular Exercise

Combining regular aerobic exercise with a healthy diet is more effective at targeting visceral fat than doing either one alone.

5) Enough Sleep

A study found that sleeping too little prompts people to eat bigger portions of all foods, increasing weight gain. And in a review of 18 studies, researchers found that a lack of sleep led to increased cravings for energy-dense, high-carbohydrate foods.

A seven to eight hrs of sleep was found to be very helpful in reducing fat levels.

 A healthy lifestyle will boost your immunity and prevent many diseases in the future. Let us begin the change today.

               Written by:                                             

                               

                          Mrs Sarita Kontham

                                 Nutritionist

* My Personal Experience
I went through a Caeserean Section to give birth to my daughter.
Post pregnancy i went through a lot of hormonal changes. I had put on excess weight, there were stretch marks on my abdomen, i was losing hair and i felt i was aging at a faster pace.
I tried all youtube and wats app remedies for 3 years and made a mess out of myself.
Then one day i realised the urgent need to take professional help.

I decided to study nutrition and use the knowledge for improving my health.
i regained my good looks, lost some extra pounds and the best part, My hair regained the same youthful thickness and bounce like before.
Seeing this awesome change in myself, friends and relatives started asking me for tips.
Now as a trained Dietician and an author of many health and fitness posts, i guide and inspire women to fitness.
You can see my transformation here.