5 reasons why you're not losing fat around your midsection

Struggling to lose fat around your midsection? Here are 5 possible reasons why your belly fat won't budge.

Weight gain around the midsection is fairly common, but losing fat from this area can be hard. Excess abdominal fat, particularly visceral fat, is linked to high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, insulin resistance, heart disease, and even certain cancers. Visceral fat is a type of body fat that's stored deeper, underneath the abdominal muscles, around your abdominal organs like the stomach, liver, and intestines. Exercise alone won't help get rid of the belly fat. To get a flat stomach, you need to eat right, exercise regularly, get proper sleep, and limit stress. Struggling to lose fat around your midsection? Here are 5 possible reasons why your belly fat won't budge.

You're drinking too much alcohol

Not only alcohol delays your liver's ability to break down fat, it also suppresses testosterone production, the hormone that helps you break down fat. Alcohol is seen by the body as a toxin and so it gets immediate attention. When you drink alcohol, the body focuses on processing it instead of break down foods containing carbohydrates and fat. These excess calories are converted and stored as fat, resulting in a bigger waistline.

Drinking alcohol can also make you eat more. This is because alcohol increases your appetite by suppressing leptin, the hormone which tells the brain to stop eating. In addition, alcohol can disrupt your sleep, which can trigger you to eat more calories.

You're getting older

As you get older, your body's metabolic rate declines as well as the number of calories it needs to function normally. For women, menopause may lead to weight gain in the abdominal area. Menopause slows down the production of the hormones estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone. The drop in hormone levels leads to the accumulation of fat in their bellies.

You're doing only cardio workouts

For a flat stomach, you need to do a combination of strength training and cardio workouts. Strength training increases muscle mass, and more muscle means your body will burn more calories. In addition, you have to ramp up your workouts to eliminate that stubborn belly fat. A high-intensity workout regimen can make lose more belly fat than a low-intensity plan, suggested a study published in the journal Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise. With high-intensity workouts, you'll burn more calories in less time.

You're eating a lot of processed foods

Eating too many processed foods like white bread, crackers, chips, sweetened drinks and desserts, can hinder your ability to lose fat around your midsection. These foods can increase inflammation in your bodies and contribute to the widening of your waistline. So, avoid processed foods as much as possible and include more natural foods like fruits, vegetables, and whole grains in your diet. Natural foods are loaded with antioxidants that have anti-inflammatory properties and thus they may help prevent belly fat.

You're stressed

Too much stress may make it harder to lose weight, especially from around your midsection. When stressed, people tend to reach for high-fat, high-calorie foods. In addition, stress also leads to higher levels of cortisol known as the stress hormone which contributes to the storage of fat, particularly in the belly.