Feel like your doing everything possible to get flat abs and nothing is working?
There may be other influences besides exercise preventing your from making progress.
Below are two belly types and ways to deal with their specific issues.
1. ‘Bloated Belly’?
If you start the day off with flat abs and then it ‘builds’ during the day, then you have bloated belly.
Here’s what you should do about it:
1. Eliminate common culprits like wheat, processed dairy, carbonated drinks, and broccoli/cauliflower for 21 days.
2. Reintroduce the above items one at a time and take note of how you feel.
3. Focus on Protein and Produce (the 2 P’s!) However, there’s no need to completely eliminate carbs. Reach for sweet potatoes, oats, and brown rice.
4. Drink lots and lots of water. Flavor your water with lemon and lime or cucumber and mint.
5. Take a probiotic to help promote good bacteria in your gut. Look for a probiotic with at least 5 strains and 25 Billion CFU.
2. ‘Skinny but Stressed Belly’
Do you have skinny arms and legs, but have excess around the middle?
Do you typically store fat around the waist or hips?
Then yes, you are ‘skinny but stressed.’
These body types have high cortisol and other fat storing hormone levels, often do they wrong type or combination of exercise, don’t eat enough, are easily mentally stressed, and are susceptible to digestive issues.
What to do?????
1. Prioritize sleep, rest, and recovery, which I know sounds like the opposite of what most women I work with think they should do! But yes, less is sometimes more. And smarter is always more!
2. Get 7-8 hours of sleep. Lack of sleep disrupts the production of leptin and increases cortisol.
3. Too much exercise and/or too little food also increases cortisol.
4. Set a daily stress-relieving schedule, like 5-10 minutes of stretching, journaling, taking a bath, or just sitting and doing nothing!
5. Make sure there is balance in your workouts. Not everything can be high intensity.
6. Limit caffeine. 1 cup, or a small at Tim’s or Starbucks, is fine. You don’t need the extra large!
7. Take magnesium before bed. Magnesium is essential for getting better sleep (it’s nicknames the relaxation mineral!), bone health, nerves, and muscles. Start by taking around 300 mg, the RDA for women, at night before bed along with your calcium and vitamin D.
Look for chelate, malate, or citrate. Oxide is the cheapest but the worst kind. I use chelate because magnesium can have a laxative effect for some people and this kind has less of that side effect. If you do have this effect happen, lower your dosage a little or split your dosage up into two or three separate times during the day.
Look for chelate, malate, or citrate. Oxide is the cheapest but the worst kind. I use chelate because magnesium can have a laxative effect for some people and this kind has less of that side effect. If you do have this effect happen, lower your dosage a little or split your dosage up into two or three separate times during the day.
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