Love handles, a spare tire, a pot belly--abdominal fat has many nicknames, but what you may not know is this type of fat is a living organ, producing toxic hormones that cause diabetes, heart disease and even cancer. While you cannot spot-eliminate abdominal fat--also called visceral fat--you can come up with a plan to burn overall body fat through strength training, cardio exercise and a healthy diet, which eventually will burn belly fat in the process.
Diet and Exercise
Step 1
Evaluate your abdominal fat honestly and come up with a sustainable plan to lose weight.
Step 2
Incorporate "superfoods" into a balanced diet to help reduce fat. Superfoods include fiber-rich oatmeal, nuts to keep you full longer, berries, eggs, whole grains and leafy green vegetables.
Step 3
Engage in 30 minutes to one hour of cardio exercise each day. Cycling or walking to work every day is one way of getting this type of exercise.
Step 4
Engage in weight training twice a week to increase your muscle mass, which helps increase your metabolism and burns abdominal fat more efficiently.
Step 5
Perform abdominal exercises such as leg lifts, crunches and pelvic tilts to tighten and tone the stomach. Abdominal exercises alone will not eliminate abdominal fat, but it will help build muscle in this area.
Tips
Step 1
Get acupuncture, which can stimulate your digestive system, helping it efficiently break down food and reduce stomach fat, according to "Acupuncture Today."
Step 2
Drink Oolong (Wu-Yi) Chinese Tea. Oolong tea may help speed up your digestive system, flushing fat and toxins out of your abdomen when combined with regular exercise and a healthy diet, according to the Linus Pauling Institute.
Step 3
Speak to a cosmetic surgeon about liposuction to get rid of stubborn abdominal fat as a last resort. Liposuction is a highly invasive abdominal surgery that takes time to recover from and may not always be a good option.
Tips and Warnings
- Eat a healthy diet and combine it with regular exercise. Lose weight slowly and safely rather than crash dieting.
- Visceral fat can cause a number of diseases, including diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol, so it is important to prevent abdominal fat.
Things You'll Need
- Superfoods
- Oolong (Wu-Yi) Chinese tea
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