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The more you eat and the less exercise you get, the higher your chances of getting a belly. It’s what most people know and it is true. However, there is more to belly fat than eating and exercising. Even the smallest routines can contribute to a bigger stomach. You’d be shocked to know what those are.
Lack of Sleep
With people living busier life, it is easy to undermine the importance of sleep. However, the lack of it doesn’t just make you drowsy so you can fight it off with a cup of coffee. Unbeknownst to most, it contributes to weight gain and ultimately, belly fat.
Most would think that lack of sleep means more time being on their feet, thus, more activity that burns calories. This can even be justified with the hunger you feel after pulling an all-nighter. However, that has something more to do with your hormones and less on your burnt calories.
Out of the many hormones affected by lack of sleep are leptin and ghrelin. These appetite hormones will make you hungrier. To make things worse, your cravings tend to lean towards carby and junk foods. According to a study, women who slept only 4 hours immediately ate an additional 329 calories the next day.
Unfortunately, that isn’t where it all ends. Cortisol levels also increase with lack of sleep. Their main role is to increase the amount of fat stored in your belly. So, even if you don’t eat much, the body will store all the available fat you have in your abdominal region.
Insomnia, the inability to maintain a linear sleep pattern and awake, and illogical actions during sleep are all referred to as sleep behavior disorders. There are a few medical therapies for sleep disorders, however, it has recently been discovered that there are medicines that are now available and more effective in the treatment of sleep disorders. After speaking with a doctor, they can be taken Read More.
Now we continue with the other causes of belly fat.
Alcohol Consumption
They say that alcohol is healthy when consumed in moderation. It does have its benefits but only to a certain extent. Go beyond that and you are looking at earning yourself a belly.
There are a lot of reasons that link alcohol to weight gain, and belly fat in general. For one, alcohol still contains tons of calories despite being liquid. You are not getting any nutritional value, but with every bottle or glass you chug down, it’s useless calories you need to burn.
To put things into perspective, a 12-ounce beer contains 155 calories. Five ounces of red wine translates to 125 calories. It takes 44 minutes of walking just to burn 150 calories.
If that isn’t enough, alcohol disrupts the digestive system. It prevents organs from breaking down food properly. When that happens, it affects your metabolism and that is catastrophic when it comes to weight gain.
Stress
Everybody knows that stress contributes to belly fat, but for the wrong reasons. The common idea is that stress causes stress eating. So, as long as you don’t fall victim to the urges, you are in a safe place. Better yet, if you substitute junk food cravings with healthier options, everything will be fine.
Unfortunately, that is not the case. Stress literally causes you to gain belly fat because just like lack of sleep, your brain will release cortisol. Cortisol manages your stress levels and as mentioned earlier, the hormone increases the buildup of fat on your abdominal region. So, it doesn’t matter what you eat because all of your fat, no matter how little, will be running to your belly.
Sitting Down All Day
Everybody is guilty of sitting down all day. With the dawn of computers, people are bound in front of their desks at work hours at a time. Even recreational and relaxing activities will keep you seated. Every day, an average person is sitting down for over six hours.
What people think is that sitting down contributes to the lack of physical activity, thus resulting in weight gain. So, you’d think that cutting back on the carbs and picking up on your exercise will solve that. Unfortunately, it won’t completely solve the issue.
Sitting down literally makes your abdomen bigger. According to a study, the pressure placed on an area will lead to the growth of abnormal fat cells. In just two weeks, fat cells grew by 50 percent in locations that are constantly experiencing pressure, that includes the buttocks, hips, and abdomen.
So, even if you eat well and exercise, you will still experience the consequences of a bigger butt and belly just from sitting all day. The only way to reverse the effects is to take breaks in between and stand up with every opportunity you get.
Take Away
As Per Harvard Health Publishing, having a good diet and proper exercise are important. But you should never limit your understanding of weight gain to the two. A healthy lifestyle extends beyond what you eat and your physical activity. You should also take into account the little things like stress, sleep, and recreational activities.
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