No more muffin top! Here’s how to get rid of love handles for good
While the term “love handles” refers to affection, no woman on earth — at least, one I’ve never met — loves her love handles. Also known as a “muffin top” (because instead of sitting flush with the waist of your pants, it hangs like a muffin top), love handles are popular among women—especially as we age, and most notably as we enter menopause. Although completely natural, it also makes us feel self-conscious about our size and silhouette. Although we are all as perfect as we’re made to be, there’s no denying that losing weight—specifically, reducing body fat and belly fat—has health benefits. Thus, the search for how to get rid of love handles continues.
The good news is that a healthy diet rich in proteins, veggies, and healthy fats combined with a regular exercise routine of strength training and fat-burning moves can go a long way toward reducing and even getting rid of love handles. Here’s what you need to know.
What are love handles?
Before proceeding with stubborn love handles, it helps to understand what they are and why they develop. Love handles occur when the body stores excess fat—usually caused by excess calorie consumption—in the midsection. (Since many of our vital organs are near the hips and waist, the body deposits excess fat there to protect them.)
A common myth surrounding love handles is that they can be targeted. While it’s true that some parts of the body may respond more quickly to certain exercises, spot reduction — where visceral fat is reduced in just one area of the body — isn’t actually possible. Instead, love handles should be reduced over time by increasing muscle mass and strengthening the whole body.
However, people have different body compositions and their weight loss journeys look different from person to person, which explains why some people develop obvious love handles and others don’t.
How to get rid of love handles
Love handles can be uncomfortable, especially in form-fitting clothing, and excess weight is a risk factor for many chronic diseases. Here are steps you can take to reduce the appearance of love handles and improve your overall health.
1. Adjust your diet
Losing fat, especially losing belly fat around your midsection, requires a healthy diet. Since love handles cannot be targeted on their own, the goal is overall weight loss (as this will shrink your love handles and other problem spots simultaneously).
To get started, find a diet that fits your needs; Punitive or restrictive diets often lead to fat retention because the body perceives that it is in starvation mode. Instead, make small changes like reducing your consumption of sugar, alcohol, and processed foods, all of which cause weight gain and inflammation. Replace these foods with foods that build abdominal muscles, such as proteins and healthy fatsAnd replace sugary sweets with fruits.
A healthy diet is the one that meets your needs, so adjust and adjust the ingredients as you go. It should be noted that losing 1 pound per week equals a deficit of 3500 calories per week (or 500 calories per day). A healthy diet provides enough calories, but he gets those calories from foods that fuel the body.
2. Stay active
Many of us work sedentary jobs that keep us pinned to a chair all day. Thus, adding regular movement to our routine can have a huge impact on our bodies, including how we maintain weight. A comprehensive workout routine with cardio, squats, and lunges is, of course, ideal. But even simple movements, such as yoga, stretching, cycling and walking, can lead to weight loss. These small changes can also help reduce your risk of chronic obesity-related diseases, such as diabetes. To get started, create a workable routine that matches your rhythm of life. This is what’s known as the “success environment,” and it greatly increases the likelihood that you will stick to your weight loss goals. why? Because convenient, accessible software is easier to maintain in the long run.
3. Focus on building strength
There are, of course, benefits to more intense exercise routines, such as weight training, HIIT (High intensity interval training), and exercises that focus on the muscles of the trunk. Resistance exercises and strength exercises such as crunches, obliques, and dumbbells can help your body burn fat while you’re at rest. (This means that the weight-loss effects of your exercise continue even after you get off the treadmill.) However, it’s important to listen to your body when working out, especially when performing upper-body strength exercises such as push-ups. and withdrawals, where there is a potential for injury. Start small and increase the intensity of your workouts over time.
4. Stay hydrated
Reducing love handles requires increasing physical activity. This, in turn, means increasing your water intake, whether to stay hydrated or to stimulate weight loss. Water helps suppress appetite, so we only eat as much as we need and only when we need it. It also makes us happy, energetic, and energetic, which makes us less inclined to sit on the couch eating chocolate. Keep a water bottle on your desk and practice sipping on a glass of water instead of snacking throughout the day.
5. Research stress management techniques
Stress can have a huge impact on weight gain and loss, so it’s a good idea to find management techniques for the things that call for it. In simple terms, stress causes the body to produce cortisol, the stress hormone that provides bursts of energy. Often referred to as the fight-or-flight hormone, it acts as a trigger alerting us to danger. However, today’s world does not present the same risks as in the past – when, for example, we need to run away from a lion or avoid approaching robbers – so when cortisol levels increase due to stress at work or school, we lack an outlet to redeem ourselves. of excess energy.
The result is a rapid and massive drop in energy levels, which – along with low blood sugar – causes cravings for sugary foods and snacks. long term cortisol levels It’s also been shown to increase belly fat, so reducing stress will help you reduce your love handles, too.
6. Get more sleep
Sleep is another important piece of the weight loss puzzle. In the beginning, when we don’t get enough sleep, it can increase our stress levels and cause us to overeat. In addition, when we feel tired during the day, we eat sugary snacks to give us energy. The lack of sleep was also directly affected associated with overeating. This comes from both pressure to stay active and chemical changes in hormones. Aim for seven to nine hours of sleep, if possible.
conclusion
Having a little extra fat around the waist and lower back is relatively common and affects women of all ages. There are many benefits to eating love handles and accumulating fat in sustainable, long-term ways, including increased energy and a reduced risk of chronic disease. Simple changes to lose love handles include dietary changes that reduce your intake of sugar and alcohol and Increased hydration And your activity level, whether it’s low-impact or high-impact. Also, make sure you get enough sleep and manage stress, as both can cause hormonal changes that lead to weight gain. At the end of the day, losing love handles is more about feeling good than “looking” good. You are really cool – and don’t forget about it!