Is Your Weight Loss Program Making You Fat?

By Dr. George Best | April 4, 2009

One of the most common areas of weight gain – the lower belly “pooch” can be a huge source of frustration from those who are working hard through their diet and exercise programs to get rid of it. In most cases, the frustration comes from the fact that restrictive diets and intense exercise may actually be contributing to the development of belly fat rather than helping to burn it.

To understand why belly fat is such a common problem and why the harder you try to eliminate it, the worse it gets, it is necessary to have a little background in physiology. From a hormonal perspective, the belly fat problem is an issue of overworked adrenal glands. The adrenal glands are small organs that sit on top of each kidney that produce a variety of hormones. With regards to weight control, the two adrenal hormones that are of most importance are adrenaline and cortisol. The levels of these two hormones are reactive to the body’s exposure to stress, both mental and physical.

Adrenaline stimulates fat burning and cortisol stimulates fat storage, particularly around the lower abdomen. During short periods of stress, there is a balance between the fat burning effects of adrenaline and the fat storage effects of cortisol. With chronic, long-lasting stress though, the production of adrenaline begins to drop, but the cortisol production remains high much longer. With long periods of stress, the fat storage effects of cortisol will overtake the fat burning effects of adrenaline.

So, to sum things up, chronic stress leads to excess cortisol, and cortisol causes your body to store fat in the lower abdomen. If you have belly fat accumulation as your primary pattern of weight gain, chances are it is at least largely related to your body’s reaction to stress. As I mentioned earlier, stress can be both mental and physical. You may be well-aware of the mental stress you are under, such as you work, family responsibilities, traffice, crime, etc.. Those are things you may or may not be able to do anything about, but have you considered the self-imposed physical stress your weight loss program may be causing?

Weight loss programs typically involve diet and exercise. A healthy diet and a moderate exercise program are not overly stressful and will not significantly increase cortisol levels, but if you get too restrictive on your diet and/or get too intense with your exercise program, the resulting stress on the body can not only prevent you from losing belly fat, it could actually cause you to gain more!

So how can a diet contribute to stress? The body senses excess calorie restriction as starvation. Since starvation is a threat to your life, your body considers it to be a highly stressful state. A simple way to be able to tell if you’ve restricted your food intake too much is if you feel hungry constantly and/or develop symptoms of hypoglycemia such as dizziness, feeling faint, headaches, moodiness, etc. Now, I’m talking about actual hunger pangs and/or low blood sugar reactions. True hunger is different from simply craving some decadent food you want to eat. What it comes down to is if you are getting hungry all the time, you need to eat more and/or more frequently. People who are having difficulty losing weight are often afraid to eat more, but as long as you stick to healthy food choices, eating enough to prevent constant hunger pangs will make it easier to lose weight than suffering through the hunger will.

As with not eating enough, exercising too much and/or too intensely will stimulate cortisol release and tend to cause fat storage in the lower abdomen. In people with belly fat, high intensity workouts will only lead to feeling tired and getting frustrated with the failure to lose any weight. For people trying to lose belly fat (as the main location of their weight gain), low intensity, and longer duration exercise is best. Aerobic activities like walking, bicycling, and other low-impact and low muscular effort exercises are best. The recommended duration and intensity is to exercise for about 30 to 60 minutes continuously at a pace at which you have enough breath to carry on a conversation without gasping. A freqency of 3 to 4 days per week will provide the best results. Individuals who carry their extra weight in areas other than the abdomen may benefit from a more intense exercise program, but the less intense exercise approach will reduce cortisol release and help those with belly fat burn it off.

With reducing the stressfulness of your weight loss regimen, you will actually find it easier to get rid of that annoying belly fat and you’ll likely have more energy while doing it. Some people are scared they’ll gain even more weight on this “less is more” approach. I say at least give it a try for a few weeks and see what the results are. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised with how much easier your weight loss is and how much better you feel.

To find out how lose weight programs can often be counter-productive and to get your free weight loss plan and report visit Dr. Best’s lose weight help website.

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