If you search online for information concerning lemon juice and weight loss, you'll be bombarded with tips from bloggers, forum posters and workout enthusiasts that claim lemon juice can help you lose weight. This is not strictly true. Simply drinking lemon juice will not burn away your abdominal fat; however, it can give your immune system a boost and aid in digestion.
Abdominal Fat
No single food, herb or supplement can burn abdominal fat. According to MayoClinic.com, your body does one of two things with the dietary calories you consume: it burns them for energy or it stores them as fat. If your body stores them as fat, they will stay there until your body requires more calories for energy. To force your body to use those stored calories and reduce your abdominal fat, you can diet, exercise or do a combination of both.
Cleansing Agent
While lemon juice can't burn fat, it's easy to see why some people believe it might --- after all, lemons do have an affect on your digestive system. In "Drink to Your Health," author Anne McIntyre notes that fresh lemon juice functions as a cleanser and detoxifying agent. Lemon juice prompts your liver to produce bile, which can help your body better digest food. McIntyre suggests adding fresh lemon juice to a cup of hot water each morning, an hour before you eat breakfast.
Body Chemistry
According to author Theresa Cheung in "The Lemon Juice Diet," lemon juice can help restore your body's pH balance. Your body is designed to function at a particular pH, with acids and alkalis in balance. Cheung notes that a diet high in sugar and processed foods --- common for many Americans --- results in a high acid balance. Because an acidic environment is favorable for viruses and bacteria, having a consistently acidic bodily pH can leave you vulnerable to illness. Ingesting lemon juice causes your body to produce an acid-neutralizing alkaline substance that helps restore the pH balance.
Other Benefits
Lemon juice can do more than restore body pH and aid digestion. McIntyre notes that lemon juice acts as a diuretic, helping your kidneys filter out toxins and retained water. It also functions as an antiseptic --- it can help treat simple infections in your kidneys or bladder, as well as protect you against the yearly onslaught of cold and flu.
Considerations
According to the Harvard Medical School Family Health Guide, abdominal fat can change the way your body's hormones function, possibly contributing to diabetes and cardiovascular disease. The guide suggests you limit your intake of saturated fat, trans fat and simple carbohydrates like those in white bread and pasta. In addition, you should exercise for at least 30 minutes a day and target ab fat with targeted exercises such as sit-ups.
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