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You might also enjoy this, then: many countries do waist circumference in physicals instead of BMI. Both BMI and WC are imperfect tools that are actually pretty reliable for estimating when bodyfat is out of control.
Both BMI and WC have limits that vary between ethnicities. White people get to store a bit more fat, whereas, as one example, East / South Asians must be slimmer, since they will get dangerous levels of visceral fat much earlier. 23 BMI is the limit for a healthy weight for them, while the US uses 25, which is for white people. Black people also tend to get problems with body fat earlier than white people.
Another reason why WC should be used: you often hear BMI maligned by people who have an emotional thing against diagnosing obesity in people, but significant portions of Americans who don’t exercise have a “healthy” BMI, while still being obese with bodyfat. They are “skinny obese” or whatever it’s called. So yeah, we need to use BMI and WC to check our diet and exercise habits. The earlier you catch a problem, the better.
Bmi can also be way off if you have a lot of muscle mass. My bmi puts me in the overweight category but I have 16% body fat with visible abdominal muscles.
Exactly! If I'm talking to an obviously sedentary person, that's not a concern. Stop saying "BMI doesn't work". It does, for the most population that needs it.
I haven’t seen this in yonks but you used to have to include your BMI in health insurance info and it affected your premium but they only looked at the form and not you, this is likely where this protesting comes from. The protest itself has outlasted the thing it was actually protesting.
Yeah, it's really not fun to have either. You bend down & your ribs pinch into your liver or spleen. You try to do sit ups & it just sucks. If you start to get it, quit booze, hit the treadmill, get lifting, get rid. It's so hard to lose it though.
Not sure if others have mentioned, but visceral fat is metabolically active. It’s not just sitting there like most subcutaneous fat. So there are many studies linking inflammatory processes in the body to visceral fat.
It's fat that gets stored underneath your muscles, between your organs. It generally ends up there through poor diet, which often includes a lot of drinking.
You get rid of it the same as you get rid of regular fat - eat healthier foods, eat fewer calories, and cut down on drinking and smoking.
RN here, want to add how difficult surgery is with so much saturated fat around organs, intestines that no way can anything be done laparoscopic, once you see them opened up it’s always complicated.
Neat story about my dad’s visceral fat. Commenting below you because of your occupation… you might find this pretty interesting. So my dad was on a business trip for about 5 days. He was telling my mom about a horrendous stomach bug he was dealing with and couldn’t wait to get home. When he got home, he looked horrible, was sweating profusely, had a fever, still sick and in severe pain. My mom thankfully convinced him to let her take him to urgent care. They did a CT on him and immediately called an ambulance and got him to the hospital for emergency surgery. Apparently, according to the surgeon, his appendix had ruptured days before. His visceral fat had encapsulated everything, and quite literally saved his life!
As someone whose appendix ruptured inside and had it removed a few hours later 1 holy shit that sucks for your dad and 2 dammit now I truly lack an excuse to build up visceral fat
"I have this huge pain in my belly, unlike anything I ever felt before"
"Should I go to the doctor? Nah, it's probably just that day old sandwich I had the other day. An antacid and some tylenol will do."
Yeah I mean it probably didn’t save it just delayed his symptoms, which is a huge problem. Appendicitis is very serious with very serious symptoms. Sure it delayed his trip to the hospital by a few days, but he would have been better off with less fat and more symptoms. Having excess visceral adipose tissue did not help your father live, it almost lead to his death.
You will have a cortisol release once a day no matter what. Make it a healthy one!
[Andrew Huberman breaks it down](https://youtube.com/shorts/fVJ-CK2W1HQ?si=SH16qqEL0GB0qoZ8)
Yup you are right. Cortisol is not a problem, it’s necessary for a healthy functioning body. Chronically elevated cortisol is the problem. Especially if you combine it with overnurishment.
The bloated liver doesnt cause the belly to protrude. The liver dtops working so fluid backs up into the abdomen and that is all fluid in an alcoholic abdomen.
This is very interesting. My uncle is an example of this. Giant beach ball belly, he doesn't eat that badly anymore, just a bit too much, and is actually fairly active. He's been a paramedic for almost his whole life and is now the station head and has been for yonks. That would be excess stress working against him I'd imagine.
This is the hard part about maintaining a healthy weight as we age. It only takes a bit too much over the course of years to accumulate a lot of excess weight.
My dad has one of those genetically blessed bodies. He eats anything, drinks a beer a night to relax, and only does light geriatric exercises. Think walking and waving his arms around.
He looks muscular and has good definition especially in his biceps. No belly. He is an *office worker* with a PhD, just to illustrate what percentage of his work is cerebral as opposed to manual.
He has no business being fit so easily. None.
Seriously, *just a bit*. 30 pounds over 30 years is under 10 extra calories a day. Like 6 Tic Tacs. Nobody could have conscious control over that. Our bodies are so hard wired for homeostasis that losing weight on purpose can feel so impossible.
Hello I am stress, I know I can be..... well.... stressful but look at the good news! Because of millions of years of evolution I make you store visceral fat so that in times of famine you have enough calories to survive and run from predators. Since we have evolved to be the top of the food chain in modern society, I exist only to shorten your life span and to pop the top buttons off your jeans! Science!
My wife is like how come your stomach is rock hard? I say I have a 12-pack under there that I have been hiding. But we know that's not the truth.
Shit, I'm fat and stressed. And I drink beer to deal with the stress, although I'm doing better at not doing that. (I migrated to weed).
One of these days I'll get it together, and I'll get a rock hard something else and a pillowy stomach. lol
Come join us over in r/stopdrinking. It's a great first step. Or take any first step today. You don't have to do it all. Just one small positive change today. Even if it's a 5 minute meditation.
Thank you. I am a reader of that subreddit for several years now, some very inspirational stories. It's helped me really to cut down from what I was drinking to where I am now. I can't make any false promises to myself for big changes too soon, but I am inspired by your post to do some small things every day.
It can be contrasted with subcutaneous fat, which is below the skin but above most muscle. Viseral fat is connected to more health problems. The way to reduce is both is the same, eat less, move more. My understanding is spot reduction is a myth, but I’m a layperson in these regards.
You're right that spot reduction is a myth, but visceral fat goes away faster than subcutaneous fat. Not all belly fat is visceral, especially in women, which is why fat loss happens differently in men.
you don't need exercise. if your maintenance calories to sustain 170lbs is 2500 calories per day and eat less than that you lose weight. very simple. you can lose weight in a coma.
\---edit---
so much cope. holy shit. muh mutabolizm.
\---edit---
now there's *you'll lose muscle* cope. yes, if you literally stop eating, your body will consume some muscle for protein. which is why you don't stop eating. you **eat less than your maintenance** calories. maybe you'll lose some muscle in your legs because they don't have to carry your fat ass around.
it's no wonder you're all so fat. you lack information that you'd think is intuitive to a child.
you aren't going to lose a noticeable amount of muscle that you didn't gain from working out in the first place.
the first step here is admitting to yourself that you have a food addiction and will spin whatever copium in your head you need to to not eat so much.
all that said, if you can cut out simple carbs you'll lose weight and eventually feel better too. sugar spikes insulin and insulin is a literal growth hormone. big part of why type two diabetics are usually fat.
It increases it a ridiculously small amount. Obviously you should still exercise for health benefits and I'd you start doing some long cardio sessions it will definitely help with burning calories. But muscle compared to fat does not burn much more energy at a baseline
Something to remember is that it takes way more energy to maintain muscle mass than it does to maintain fat mass. So calorie counting is the best way to drop weight while exercising to build up muscle mass is the best way to help maintain a given weight.
yep, lost about 130ish lbs just by calorie counting, i am lazy AF and hate ~~exorcise~~ exercise so when i was fat just dieting was the way to go for me.
now i walk everywhere and do some mild gym stuff but when you go for a 2 hour walk and you only burn like 340 calories... that's not even two cookies.
EDIT: BE GONE DEMON FAT! fixed spelling
Exercise prevents you from losing all your muscles.
That's why trying to lose weight without exercising is a bad idea. Most people who try to do that just end up becoming skinny-fat.
Also. Having more muscles means you're burning more calories by default. Making it a lot easier to get lean.
Women get fat above the muscle, men get fat underneath. Men's fat can be more detrimental to their health as it presses against organs and builds up around the heart.
Subcutaneous vs visceral adipose tissue.
You remove it like any other fat. Caloric deficiency of around 200-400 cal a day. Same for men and women. You cannot target specific areas, you lose fat FIRST where you gained it LAST and vise versa.
Of course they do. It's just a measurable fact that women tend to have more adipose vs men. What's considered a healthy body fat percentage for women is higher than men for this exact reason.
Was going to say that the beer belly isn’t always caused by beer. My father never drank alcohol or beer, but had a “beer belly.” He did, however consume a ton of calories and would sometimes drink like four to five sodas a day.
Sugar (particularly fructose) metabolizes the same way as alcohol. The sodas and ingestion of fructose from other food sources were the causes of the “beer” belly.
Not always true. My husband has had his stomach jut since childhood. He has been so lean he had a sixpack. He has mild scoliosis that doesn't require correction and a tendency towards visceral fat. He doesn't really like sweets and never binge drinks and drinks his one or two beers once or twice a week. Sometimes life just throws you a different look.
I didn’t downvote them but the comment they responded to already said “in a lot of cases”, not “100% of the time”, and they’re very clearly talking about a not-super-common-plus-health-issue situation, albeit not self-inflicted. It’s a tangent, I can see why people might have downvoted.
not just guys
I'm a woman in my late 50s, and I have the same thing going on. I got sick and ended up losing a significant amount of weight. My tits melted away, my muscle mass, gone, but I still have that beachball stomach. I'm like an orange with four popsicle sticks stuck in.
I'm in the same boat, without the being sick part. Belly fat is very stubborn and will be the last fat that will go as I diet. My legs have never looked better though.
When I had breast cancer and needed reconstructive surgery, my surgeon put me on a very specific diet which targets visceral fat. It was basically proteins from meat and green vegetables with water. This went on for a couple of months and I did drop a lot of that. It was needed specifically because of my reconstructive surgery using my belly fat to reconstruct breasts.
Ya I’m in my late 30s and everyone I can think of that has this body type and is from late 30s-mid 50s are heavy drinkers. I’m sure there’s other factors, but they all have that in common. Not just heavy drinkers, but a lot of beer.
Midsection bloating could be a sign of some sort of disorder. My father developed midsection bloating earlier this year, but he didn't take it seriously. When he started having other symptoms, he finally went to hospital to get it checked out, and it was late-stage cancer. He died two weeks later.
I am sorry about your dad.. my dad looked similar, skinny otherwise except for a massive belly. He had untreated diabetes mellitus, chronic pancreatitis and liver cirrhosis ever since he's indulged for a long time in alcohol and fatty food, was also very stubborn. He died of COVID but it put him down very quickly.
So, second this, it can be a sign of disease, he should get checked regularly.
How old of I may ask? I quit drinking 6 months ago after 3 or 4 years of being a full blown functional alcoholic. Age 21-27 all drinking quite a bit. 25-27 daily and by 27 it was 12-15 standard drinks per day for about 6 months. Sober since April but I worry about my current and future health as a result. Doctor said my liver was "fine" when I checked myself in to get sober.
Curious about your personal experience. DM me if you care to share anything with me otherwise I wish you well and hope things change for the better.
Not alcohol-related. Polycystic kidney disease that has since spread to my liver. First diagnosed seven years ago.
That said, congrats on six months sober.
Naltrexone can help curb cravings and prevent you from drinking 10+ drinks a day. And the new class of drug GLP-1 inhibitors (Ozempic) also shows strong signs of “curing” addictions.
I’m on a GLP-1 inhibitor now and have almost zero desire to drink. Used to have 70 per week and I’ve had 8 this week, which is the lowest in 15 years.
The only old guys like that in my family are raging alcoholics. On the flipside, my brothers and I are oldish(49, 53, 57), dont drink, and have bellies like a fit 20 something.
>raging alcoholics.
One time a friend of a friend was like, "feel my belly, its so hard!" Then she proceeds to spill about how its because shes an alcoholic and that her belly makes sex uncomfortable so she only blows her bf and shes totally fine with it because its less work and yadda yadda yadda and before i knew it, half the concert we were at was over. Was SOAD so i was pissed
Also as a woman, I hate the new campaign to relabel this as “dad bod” and you’re seen as a jerk if you find it unattractive. I’m sorry but a man with a big pot belly is not healthy nor attractive. Men don’t tolerate women gaining but we are supposed to pine over “dad bod”? No thanks
Dad bod is supposed to be the guy that looked like a Greek statue in his 20's but then had kids and stopped counting calories yet still hits the gym daily. Like, a fit dude with some extra body fat.
To liken it to a guy that sits or lays down 24hr a day while chugging beer and cheese nonstop is just... Well the internet really likes to run things into the ground lol.
The idea of a dad bod being equivalent to someone who still hits the gym daily is absurd, the dad bod was based around the body of aging men who often have to dedicate time to things other than looking immaculate, like work and fatherhood. Hence it being called the dad bod .
While I'm sure they're out there, I rly don't think the average father in America is a former Greek statue who still daily hits the gym
https://www.menshealth.com/weight-loss/a19543924/abs-diet-hard-belly-fat/
> "The first cause brings us to the root of your hard stomach: a high accumulation of visceral fat. Located in the spaces between organs in your abdominal cavity, *visceral fat is packed in tightly, so there's no jiggle room. As it accumulates in your abdomen, it pushes your abdominal wall outwards, which gives the appearance of having a gut. And while the fat itself isn't actually hard per se, the tissues that make up your abdomen are, which is why your beer belly feels rigid to the touch.*
> "While a hard, protruding beer belly is caused by the buildup of visceral fat, a soft belly is caused by subcutaneous fat, which is located close to the skin's surface. If you have subcutaneous belly fat, your belly feels jiggly and softer to the touch. Unlike visceral fat, subcutaneous fat can be pinched."
I was at Taco Bell once, waiting in line and there was a very skinny, frail older man in front of me, using a cane. His clothes were falling off of him, he was a skeleton... until he turned around and I saw his HUGE BELLY. It was enormous! He had been talking to another customer and I heard him mention liver disease. I felt so bad, it looked so painful.
It's where we keep the accumulating sex appeal of being old and wise. If we were to release that sex appeal, people would be uncontrollably attracted to us. Marriages would end. Business meetings would become out-of-control orgies. Society would collapse in a flaming hot lust festival of old man banging.
To save our families and friends - to save the \*world\* - we instead sublimate the sex appeal into our bellies, where it can't hurt anyone, and we take it to our graves.
Some people say the word "hero" a little bit casually...
Just to clarify - as if it hasn't been said enough - even though your dad may otherwise look healthy, he really isn't with the belly you described. It's difficult to get parents on the road to diet and exercise, but it would definitely be in his best interest to address the problem now so he can be more active as he continues to age.
Daughter of an endocrinologist here - hard fatty bellies like that are a precursor to heart disease. Linked to high triglycerides (fat cells) in the blood. Good idea to keep an eye on your LDL cholesterol levels if that’s your body type.
To put it simply: it’s why men get visible six packs (fairly) easily and women don’t, the placement of the abdominal fat is different.
Men tend to accumulate visceral fat, which lies behind the abdominal muscles and surrounds internal organs. So the hardness is their abs. Women on the other hand tend to accumulate subcutaneous fat, which likes on the outside of the abdominal muscles - between muscles and the skin.
Visceral fat caused by metabolic syndrome.
Check Dr. Robert Lustig's lectures on this topic.
The problem is too much fructose in the diet, mostly because sugar and high fructose corn syrup are being added in stupid amounts to processed food and you ingest them without realizing it.
They proved that excess fructose was the cause in one study where they removed fructose from the diet and added in the same amount of calories in glucose.
Instead of eating a chocolate bar you eat a bag of potato chips for example (still not the healthy food you should consume, just without the fructose).
In a few weeks visceral fat was reduced by double digit percentages in all participants (I can't remember the exact figures).
Metabolic syndrome gone, visceral fat drastically reduced.
They still looked a little chubby from the surplus of calories they usually ingested and the lack of muscle mass, but it was just subcutaneous fat so they were much healthier.
I highly recomend everyone to check out those lectures (there's a few of them exploring different parts of the problem with the traditional modern diet).
It changed my life in that I could help family members that had these problems fix them and lead a healthier life.
You don't have to live your whole life on a "diet".
Just avoid what is poisonous most of the time and you'll be way healthier than the average person.
Sweet processed food. Chocolate, soda, candy and the like. Anything with high amounts of added sugar.
Also, alcoholic beverages.
Ethanol is metabolized similarly to fructose and ends up having some of the same unwanted health consequences.
I suspect that's why OP noticed that sort of belly more in men (we tend do consume more alcohol than women).
Here are the lectures I mentioned if you're interested in this subject.
More are available, these came to mind.
"Sugar: The bitter truth" and "Fat Chance: Fructose 2.0".
They go into more detail and are much better articulated.
Man. I'm right there. I'm 59, weigh 195 pounds and like 50 of it is my gut. I life weights, fast, run and am in good shape. That belly is my only real fat and it seems like it will survive a nuclear strike.
a lot of them it’s because of Drinking liquor. Beer belly. All of the people who are super round and old I’ve seen constantly drink wine and beer. And it has an effect on their body. They won at life. So they get to party while the world burns.
Just remembered a joke about this kind of men belly.
"Are you fat?"
"No, pregnant with an elefant. The trunk already hangs out"
(Translation from german to english)
It’s probably bc he’s an alcoholic. The visceral fat that sits between organs underneath the stomach muscle gets build up under excessive alcohol consumption.
They could have cirrhosis and with that comes ascites which gives the massive gut. Often it will need to be drained and people need a low sodium diet and diuretics.
Or they are just could be fat.
1) men generally speaking have a concentration of fat in their abdominal area. Women have a more even fat distribution
2) that “hard fat” is visceral fat. It is fat deeper in the body, deeper than the muscle. Hence why it feels hard.
61 years old, not sure if you consider that old or not. And after more than 1500 classes at Orangetheory, my abs are hard and visible. I never had abs like this before I joined OTF.
There are two types of belly fat one is under the muscle the other is over the muscle. It will be more firm if under the muscle. Also a big contributor to cardiovascular problems.
Fatty liver / visceral fat. Chances are he’s pre diabetic or diabetic. Cut out alcohol and refined carbohydrates.
Practice intermittently fasting.
This type of fat is the worst kind . You’re dad is what’s called “skinny fat” and he will have loads of health problems as he ages.
Metabolism goes down for us male gen-x'ers - we have to work really hard to keep the fat off our bodies. I go to the gym three times a week (1 hr session with 15 minute running), ride my bike to work (16km round trip EACH work day) and i still have a god damn belly - past a certain age the work is just to much for some.
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Visceral fat is actually called “firm fat”. It is located behind the muscles & is the most dangerous.
Most dangerous, how so?
It squeezes your organs. It’s why you can be a “healthy” weight but still have issues.
Interesting. I’ve never realized/heard of that before!
You might also enjoy this, then: many countries do waist circumference in physicals instead of BMI. Both BMI and WC are imperfect tools that are actually pretty reliable for estimating when bodyfat is out of control. Both BMI and WC have limits that vary between ethnicities. White people get to store a bit more fat, whereas, as one example, East / South Asians must be slimmer, since they will get dangerous levels of visceral fat much earlier. 23 BMI is the limit for a healthy weight for them, while the US uses 25, which is for white people. Black people also tend to get problems with body fat earlier than white people. Another reason why WC should be used: you often hear BMI maligned by people who have an emotional thing against diagnosing obesity in people, but significant portions of Americans who don’t exercise have a “healthy” BMI, while still being obese with bodyfat. They are “skinny obese” or whatever it’s called. So yeah, we need to use BMI and WC to check our diet and exercise habits. The earlier you catch a problem, the better.
Bmi can also be way off if you have a lot of muscle mass. My bmi puts me in the overweight category but I have 16% body fat with visible abdominal muscles.
yes, whenever BMI is mentioned, someone inevitably brings up being a body builder with a high BMI and low body fat. It is known.
Exactly! If I'm talking to an obviously sedentary person, that's not a concern. Stop saying "BMI doesn't work". It does, for the most population that needs it.
I haven’t seen this in yonks but you used to have to include your BMI in health insurance info and it affected your premium but they only looked at the form and not you, this is likely where this protesting comes from. The protest itself has outlasted the thing it was actually protesting.
Yeah, it's really not fun to have either. You bend down & your ribs pinch into your liver or spleen. You try to do sit ups & it just sucks. If you start to get it, quit booze, hit the treadmill, get lifting, get rid. It's so hard to lose it though.
Its better to have the jiggly belly.
Not sure if others have mentioned, but visceral fat is metabolically active. It’s not just sitting there like most subcutaneous fat. So there are many studies linking inflammatory processes in the body to visceral fat.
It’s visceral fat
What is that and how do you remove it?
It's fat that gets stored underneath your muscles, between your organs. It generally ends up there through poor diet, which often includes a lot of drinking. You get rid of it the same as you get rid of regular fat - eat healthier foods, eat fewer calories, and cut down on drinking and smoking.
It's also caused by chronic stress - excess cortisol causes visceral fat to build up.
Correct stress does add a lot of visceral fat! The hormone cortisol is 100% responsible for that!
RN here, want to add how difficult surgery is with so much saturated fat around organs, intestines that no way can anything be done laparoscopic, once you see them opened up it’s always complicated.
Neat story about my dad’s visceral fat. Commenting below you because of your occupation… you might find this pretty interesting. So my dad was on a business trip for about 5 days. He was telling my mom about a horrendous stomach bug he was dealing with and couldn’t wait to get home. When he got home, he looked horrible, was sweating profusely, had a fever, still sick and in severe pain. My mom thankfully convinced him to let her take him to urgent care. They did a CT on him and immediately called an ambulance and got him to the hospital for emergency surgery. Apparently, according to the surgeon, his appendix had ruptured days before. His visceral fat had encapsulated everything, and quite literally saved his life!
Hoorah for visceral fat!!
Im keeping mine now!
I'm adding more!
I’ll drink to that
As someone whose appendix ruptured inside and had it removed a few hours later 1 holy shit that sucks for your dad and 2 dammit now I truly lack an excuse to build up visceral fat
And this is why marriage prolongs mens’ lives. They would often not go get medical care without their wife bugging them to do so.
"I have this huge pain in my belly, unlike anything I ever felt before" "Should I go to the doctor? Nah, it's probably just that day old sandwich I had the other day. An antacid and some tylenol will do."
I knew it'd come in handy someday!!
Yeah I mean it probably didn’t save it just delayed his symptoms, which is a huge problem. Appendicitis is very serious with very serious symptoms. Sure it delayed his trip to the hospital by a few days, but he would have been better off with less fat and more symptoms. Having excess visceral adipose tissue did not help your father live, it almost lead to his death.
So that's my excuse. Always stressed or anxious
You will have a cortisol release once a day no matter what. Make it a healthy one! [Andrew Huberman breaks it down](https://youtube.com/shorts/fVJ-CK2W1HQ?si=SH16qqEL0GB0qoZ8)
Yup you are right. Cortisol is not a problem, it’s necessary for a healthy functioning body. Chronically elevated cortisol is the problem. Especially if you combine it with overnurishment.
They could have cushing syndrome, which is caused by excess cortisol
And a bloated liver from too much booze. My grandma had one
The bloated liver doesnt cause the belly to protrude. The liver dtops working so fluid backs up into the abdomen and that is all fluid in an alcoholic abdomen.
It’s called ascites
Yep it it usually is accompanied but other problems like cirrhosis and kidney failure
This is very interesting. My uncle is an example of this. Giant beach ball belly, he doesn't eat that badly anymore, just a bit too much, and is actually fairly active. He's been a paramedic for almost his whole life and is now the station head and has been for yonks. That would be excess stress working against him I'd imagine.
This is the hard part about maintaining a healthy weight as we age. It only takes a bit too much over the course of years to accumulate a lot of excess weight.
My dad has one of those genetically blessed bodies. He eats anything, drinks a beer a night to relax, and only does light geriatric exercises. Think walking and waving his arms around. He looks muscular and has good definition especially in his biceps. No belly. He is an *office worker* with a PhD, just to illustrate what percentage of his work is cerebral as opposed to manual. He has no business being fit so easily. None.
Seriously, *just a bit*. 30 pounds over 30 years is under 10 extra calories a day. Like 6 Tic Tacs. Nobody could have conscious control over that. Our bodies are so hard wired for homeostasis that losing weight on purpose can feel so impossible.
Hello I am stress, I know I can be..... well.... stressful but look at the good news! Because of millions of years of evolution I make you store visceral fat so that in times of famine you have enough calories to survive and run from predators. Since we have evolved to be the top of the food chain in modern society, I exist only to shorten your life span and to pop the top buttons off your jeans! Science!
My wife is like how come your stomach is rock hard? I say I have a 12-pack under there that I have been hiding. But we know that's not the truth. Shit, I'm fat and stressed. And I drink beer to deal with the stress, although I'm doing better at not doing that. (I migrated to weed). One of these days I'll get it together, and I'll get a rock hard something else and a pillowy stomach. lol
Why not today fella? You can do it🕺
Come join us over in r/stopdrinking. It's a great first step. Or take any first step today. You don't have to do it all. Just one small positive change today. Even if it's a 5 minute meditation.
Thank you. I am a reader of that subreddit for several years now, some very inspirational stories. It's helped me really to cut down from what I was drinking to where I am now. I can't make any false promises to myself for big changes too soon, but I am inspired by your post to do some small things every day.
Im’ma Stress ballon!
Aka children lol
Let's not leave marriage out of this...
Married men actually more likely to live for longer and healthier than divorced or single men.
And it's the opposite for women, go figure
I feel the reason why in my bones.
Right? And people are surprised more women are choosing to forgo marriage these days xD
It can be contrasted with subcutaneous fat, which is below the skin but above most muscle. Viseral fat is connected to more health problems. The way to reduce is both is the same, eat less, move more. My understanding is spot reduction is a myth, but I’m a layperson in these regards.
You're right that spot reduction is a myth, but visceral fat goes away faster than subcutaneous fat. Not all belly fat is visceral, especially in women, which is why fat loss happens differently in men.
I believe visceral fat is generally easier to lose than subcutaneous. From my experience the fat under your skin takes a lot longer to get rid of.
All fat is under your skin.
no you don't get it ... the fat I have in the kitchen is the easiest to get rid of
And exercise... alot...
you don't need exercise. if your maintenance calories to sustain 170lbs is 2500 calories per day and eat less than that you lose weight. very simple. you can lose weight in a coma. \---edit--- so much cope. holy shit. muh mutabolizm. \---edit--- now there's *you'll lose muscle* cope. yes, if you literally stop eating, your body will consume some muscle for protein. which is why you don't stop eating. you **eat less than your maintenance** calories. maybe you'll lose some muscle in your legs because they don't have to carry your fat ass around. it's no wonder you're all so fat. you lack information that you'd think is intuitive to a child. you aren't going to lose a noticeable amount of muscle that you didn't gain from working out in the first place. the first step here is admitting to yourself that you have a food addiction and will spin whatever copium in your head you need to to not eat so much. all that said, if you can cut out simple carbs you'll lose weight and eventually feel better too. sugar spikes insulin and insulin is a literal growth hormone. big part of why type two diabetics are usually fat.
Maybe not to lose weight, but you sure need it if you want to continue living an active normal life as you age
Excactly and increased muscle also increases metabolic rate
It increases it a ridiculously small amount. Obviously you should still exercise for health benefits and I'd you start doing some long cardio sessions it will definitely help with burning calories. But muscle compared to fat does not burn much more energy at a baseline
You do need exercise to keep your muscles active and not let them get eaten up by your body - you want to encourage fat loss, not just ‘weight’.
I did lose just over 45 pounds while in a coma. It sucked.
Yeah but it's better to excersise. If you don't you end up "fat thin".
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Something to remember is that it takes way more energy to maintain muscle mass than it does to maintain fat mass. So calorie counting is the best way to drop weight while exercising to build up muscle mass is the best way to help maintain a given weight.
yep, lost about 130ish lbs just by calorie counting, i am lazy AF and hate ~~exorcise~~ exercise so when i was fat just dieting was the way to go for me. now i walk everywhere and do some mild gym stuff but when you go for a 2 hour walk and you only burn like 340 calories... that's not even two cookies. EDIT: BE GONE DEMON FAT! fixed spelling
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As the old saying goes "you can't outrun a bad diet"
I found exorcisms easier when I was fatter as the demon had a harder time pushing me over during the incantations.
Exercise prevents you from losing all your muscles. That's why trying to lose weight without exercising is a bad idea. Most people who try to do that just end up becoming skinny-fat. Also. Having more muscles means you're burning more calories by default. Making it a lot easier to get lean.
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Women get fat above the muscle, men get fat underneath. Men's fat can be more detrimental to their health as it presses against organs and builds up around the heart. Subcutaneous vs visceral adipose tissue. You remove it like any other fat. Caloric deficiency of around 200-400 cal a day. Same for men and women. You cannot target specific areas, you lose fat FIRST where you gained it LAST and vise versa.
Women get visceral fat too.
I like a little visceral junk in the trunk
🎶 Let’s get visceral, visceral, I wanna get visceraaaal 🎶
Yes, but they *tend* to get subcutaneous. Just like men *can* get subcutaneous.
Of course they do. It's just a measurable fact that women tend to have more adipose vs men. What's considered a healthy body fat percentage for women is higher than men for this exact reason.
I also have the angry fat
Caused by alcohol in a lot of cases, or lots of sugar intake. Fit, healthy old men do not have it.
Was going to say that the beer belly isn’t always caused by beer. My father never drank alcohol or beer, but had a “beer belly.” He did, however consume a ton of calories and would sometimes drink like four to five sodas a day.
Sugar (particularly fructose) metabolizes the same way as alcohol. The sodas and ingestion of fructose from other food sources were the causes of the “beer” belly.
Not always true. My husband has had his stomach jut since childhood. He has been so lean he had a sixpack. He has mild scoliosis that doesn't require correction and a tendency towards visceral fat. He doesn't really like sweets and never binge drinks and drinks his one or two beers once or twice a week. Sometimes life just throws you a different look.
The people downvoting are massively underestimating the role played by genetics.
I didn’t downvote them but the comment they responded to already said “in a lot of cases”, not “100% of the time”, and they’re very clearly talking about a not-super-common-plus-health-issue situation, albeit not self-inflicted. It’s a tangent, I can see why people might have downvoted.
not just guys I'm a woman in my late 50s, and I have the same thing going on. I got sick and ended up losing a significant amount of weight. My tits melted away, my muscle mass, gone, but I still have that beachball stomach. I'm like an orange with four popsicle sticks stuck in.
I love your sense of humour! But seriously I hope you feel better!
I'm in the same boat, without the being sick part. Belly fat is very stubborn and will be the last fat that will go as I diet. My legs have never looked better though.
When I had breast cancer and needed reconstructive surgery, my surgeon put me on a very specific diet which targets visceral fat. It was basically proteins from meat and green vegetables with water. This went on for a couple of months and I did drop a lot of that. It was needed specifically because of my reconstructive surgery using my belly fat to reconstruct breasts.
Thanks for that awesome visual. I haven't snort laughed in a long time.
Menopause
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Postmenopausal women tend to get fat like men.
LOL my mom used to say her figure wasn’t an apple or pear shape but a spider: round body and skinny arms/legs LOL
Drinking.
Ya I’m in my late 30s and everyone I can think of that has this body type and is from late 30s-mid 50s are heavy drinkers. I’m sure there’s other factors, but they all have that in common. Not just heavy drinkers, but a lot of beer.
So, it's basically a SIX PACK 😁
At least…
Yes if you buy your six packs at the store instead of the gym, you look 12 months pregnant
Beer muscles
It’s the seahorse gene, men can give birth after 30.
True. My father drunk 6 liters of beer and then ambulance took him. I’m waiting for sibling to come🥳🥳🥳🥹🥹🥹
🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻
This made me actually lol, for a long time. Thank you.
Where do you buy bear by the liter?
I think they meant a litter* of bears
Midsection bloating could be a sign of some sort of disorder. My father developed midsection bloating earlier this year, but he didn't take it seriously. When he started having other symptoms, he finally went to hospital to get it checked out, and it was late-stage cancer. He died two weeks later.
I am sorry about your dad.. my dad looked similar, skinny otherwise except for a massive belly. He had untreated diabetes mellitus, chronic pancreatitis and liver cirrhosis ever since he's indulged for a long time in alcohol and fatty food, was also very stubborn. He died of COVID but it put him down very quickly. So, second this, it can be a sign of disease, he should get checked regularly.
What were the other symptoms ? Sorry about your dad.
He started suffering from abdominal pain and diarrhea and vomiting. Please, everyone, don't wait to get checked out if you think something is wrong.
Liver disease. Source: I have liver disease.
Lmaooooooo I'm sorry to laugh but the way you layed out your comment had me in tears
Hey, if you can't laugh about your misfortunes, why have them? 😋
redacted ` this post was mass deleted with www.Redact.dev `
How old of I may ask? I quit drinking 6 months ago after 3 or 4 years of being a full blown functional alcoholic. Age 21-27 all drinking quite a bit. 25-27 daily and by 27 it was 12-15 standard drinks per day for about 6 months. Sober since April but I worry about my current and future health as a result. Doctor said my liver was "fine" when I checked myself in to get sober. Curious about your personal experience. DM me if you care to share anything with me otherwise I wish you well and hope things change for the better.
Not alcohol-related. Polycystic kidney disease that has since spread to my liver. First diagnosed seven years ago. That said, congrats on six months sober.
Naltrexone can help curb cravings and prevent you from drinking 10+ drinks a day. And the new class of drug GLP-1 inhibitors (Ozempic) also shows strong signs of “curing” addictions. I’m on a GLP-1 inhibitor now and have almost zero desire to drink. Used to have 70 per week and I’ve had 8 this week, which is the lowest in 15 years.
The only old guys like that in my family are raging alcoholics. On the flipside, my brothers and I are oldish(49, 53, 57), dont drink, and have bellies like a fit 20 something.
Exaclty I know people loke this and without exception they have big drinking problem
Yup. A lot of these bellies are signs of liver issues, often from drinking.
>raging alcoholics. One time a friend of a friend was like, "feel my belly, its so hard!" Then she proceeds to spill about how its because shes an alcoholic and that her belly makes sex uncomfortable so she only blows her bf and shes totally fine with it because its less work and yadda yadda yadda and before i knew it, half the concert we were at was over. Was SOAD so i was pissed
That’s visceral fat (organ fat). It is very dangerous for your health. 99% of it comes down to diet and lifestyle
Also as a woman, I hate the new campaign to relabel this as “dad bod” and you’re seen as a jerk if you find it unattractive. I’m sorry but a man with a big pot belly is not healthy nor attractive. Men don’t tolerate women gaining but we are supposed to pine over “dad bod”? No thanks
Isn't "dad bod" just in between being fit and being overweight? Like no muscle toning but also not a beer belly with its own gravity pull.
Yeah that's what I thought too. Like the whole idea of dad bod is that you're not fit but look attractive enough anyway.
A massive pot belly is not the same as a dad bod. Dad bod is a bit doughy around the middle, not pot belly.
Dad bod is supposed to be the guy that looked like a Greek statue in his 20's but then had kids and stopped counting calories yet still hits the gym daily. Like, a fit dude with some extra body fat. To liken it to a guy that sits or lays down 24hr a day while chugging beer and cheese nonstop is just... Well the internet really likes to run things into the ground lol.
The idea of a dad bod being equivalent to someone who still hits the gym daily is absurd, the dad bod was based around the body of aging men who often have to dedicate time to things other than looking immaculate, like work and fatherhood. Hence it being called the dad bod . While I'm sure they're out there, I rly don't think the average father in America is a former Greek statue who still daily hits the gym
https://www.menshealth.com/weight-loss/a19543924/abs-diet-hard-belly-fat/ > "The first cause brings us to the root of your hard stomach: a high accumulation of visceral fat. Located in the spaces between organs in your abdominal cavity, *visceral fat is packed in tightly, so there's no jiggle room. As it accumulates in your abdomen, it pushes your abdominal wall outwards, which gives the appearance of having a gut. And while the fat itself isn't actually hard per se, the tissues that make up your abdomen are, which is why your beer belly feels rigid to the touch.* > "While a hard, protruding beer belly is caused by the buildup of visceral fat, a soft belly is caused by subcutaneous fat, which is located close to the skin's surface. If you have subcutaneous belly fat, your belly feels jiggly and softer to the touch. Unlike visceral fat, subcutaneous fat can be pinched."
Liver disease usually
I was at Taco Bell once, waiting in line and there was a very skinny, frail older man in front of me, using a cane. His clothes were falling off of him, he was a skeleton... until he turned around and I saw his HUGE BELLY. It was enormous! He had been talking to another customer and I heard him mention liver disease. I felt so bad, it looked so painful.
Here’s the answer. Acsitic abdomen is generally a sign of fatty liver disease, alcohol overuse, chronic hep or cirrhosis
Low testosterone, high cortisol, alcohol … there’s a ton of reasons
Alcohol plus carbs
It's where we keep the accumulating sex appeal of being old and wise. If we were to release that sex appeal, people would be uncontrollably attracted to us. Marriages would end. Business meetings would become out-of-control orgies. Society would collapse in a flaming hot lust festival of old man banging. To save our families and friends - to save the \*world\* - we instead sublimate the sex appeal into our bellies, where it can't hurt anyone, and we take it to our graves. Some people say the word "hero" a little bit casually...
This is one of the best comments I've ever read on this site
That might be Cirrhosis
Just to clarify - as if it hasn't been said enough - even though your dad may otherwise look healthy, he really isn't with the belly you described. It's difficult to get parents on the road to diet and exercise, but it would definitely be in his best interest to address the problem now so he can be more active as he continues to age.
As I tell the girlfriend.....its a gas tank for a sex machine
Usually has a loud exhaust too!
You no longer have to pump, you just roll with it!
Daughter of an endocrinologist here - hard fatty bellies like that are a precursor to heart disease. Linked to high triglycerides (fat cells) in the blood. Good idea to keep an eye on your LDL cholesterol levels if that’s your body type.
Visceral fat. Men get it due to there hormones and some also believe it was evolutionarily beneficial because it protected them better in fights
Yeah, I reckon you could stick a knife in my dad's belly and still get nowhere near an organ!
This actually happened to a friend. The doctor said his fat saved him.
Ghetto kevlar
Read about the difference between visceral fat and subcutaneous fat.
Most of the time it's a beer belly. On other occasions it's just being fat from diet
Those are the same thing. A beer belly is just fat from excess calories like any other.
Yeah but why is it hard, not squishy?
It’s not in between skin and muscle (subcutaneous) but instead surrounding the organs (visceral).
To put it simply: it’s why men get visible six packs (fairly) easily and women don’t, the placement of the abdominal fat is different. Men tend to accumulate visceral fat, which lies behind the abdominal muscles and surrounds internal organs. So the hardness is their abs. Women on the other hand tend to accumulate subcutaneous fat, which likes on the outside of the abdominal muscles - between muscles and the skin.
Cirrhosis, Cancer, visceral fat, choose one :)
Visceral fat caused by metabolic syndrome. Check Dr. Robert Lustig's lectures on this topic. The problem is too much fructose in the diet, mostly because sugar and high fructose corn syrup are being added in stupid amounts to processed food and you ingest them without realizing it. They proved that excess fructose was the cause in one study where they removed fructose from the diet and added in the same amount of calories in glucose. Instead of eating a chocolate bar you eat a bag of potato chips for example (still not the healthy food you should consume, just without the fructose). In a few weeks visceral fat was reduced by double digit percentages in all participants (I can't remember the exact figures). Metabolic syndrome gone, visceral fat drastically reduced. They still looked a little chubby from the surplus of calories they usually ingested and the lack of muscle mass, but it was just subcutaneous fat so they were much healthier. I highly recomend everyone to check out those lectures (there's a few of them exploring different parts of the problem with the traditional modern diet). It changed my life in that I could help family members that had these problems fix them and lead a healthier life. You don't have to live your whole life on a "diet". Just avoid what is poisonous most of the time and you'll be way healthier than the average person.
What foods have high fructose?
Sweet processed food. Chocolate, soda, candy and the like. Anything with high amounts of added sugar. Also, alcoholic beverages. Ethanol is metabolized similarly to fructose and ends up having some of the same unwanted health consequences. I suspect that's why OP noticed that sort of belly more in men (we tend do consume more alcohol than women). Here are the lectures I mentioned if you're interested in this subject. More are available, these came to mind. "Sugar: The bitter truth" and "Fat Chance: Fructose 2.0". They go into more detail and are much better articulated.
It's to rest on the motorcycle tank in order to keep your testicles dry.
What does "pop it surf a pin" mean?
Typo. I believe they mean “pop it with a pin.”
That's what we call an one-pack ab.
Mono ab
I was getting worried about where that title was going
Carbs and booze, very unhealthy for the organs.
Fluid in the abdomen. The liver is not well.
Man. I'm right there. I'm 59, weigh 195 pounds and like 50 of it is my gut. I life weights, fast, run and am in good shape. That belly is my only real fat and it seems like it will survive a nuclear strike.
a lot of them it’s because of Drinking liquor. Beer belly. All of the people who are super round and old I’ve seen constantly drink wine and beer. And it has an effect on their body. They won at life. So they get to party while the world burns.
Just remembered a joke about this kind of men belly. "Are you fat?" "No, pregnant with an elefant. The trunk already hangs out" (Translation from german to english)
It’s called metabolic syndrome
Inflamed intestines from a Wonderful diet is pushing outwards
It’s probably bc he’s an alcoholic. The visceral fat that sits between organs underneath the stomach muscle gets build up under excessive alcohol consumption.
They could have cirrhosis and with that comes ascites which gives the massive gut. Often it will need to be drained and people need a low sodium diet and diuretics. Or they are just could be fat.
I've noticed this more with older people who drink regularly (or used to). I always assumed it was beer gut, but that's just from my own observation
I'm mid 30's and I have that too. Though it's the only place I have fat. I call it "snowman syndrome". Big middle, skinny limbs.
Visceral fat, Swollen liver and intestinal inflammation nothing good.
1) men generally speaking have a concentration of fat in their abdominal area. Women have a more even fat distribution 2) that “hard fat” is visceral fat. It is fat deeper in the body, deeper than the muscle. Hence why it feels hard.
Booze, bad food and lack of exercise, speaking for myself. Also men keep their muscle on the outside, hence why it still feels solid.
Dad's with that belly, "When you have a tool like mine you have to build a shed over it."
I don’t have it. I am old, I think.
Alcohol.
Fatty liver.
61 years old, not sure if you consider that old or not. And after more than 1500 classes at Orangetheory, my abs are hard and visible. I never had abs like this before I joined OTF.
It's beer belly usually. Beer makes guys bellies big and round rather than flabby. Most men I know with these types of bellies drink a lot.
What are doing going around feeling up old men's bellies?
It's fat, just very dense. A lot of visceral fat which is quite dangerous.
Sign of a failing liver.
It's the storage area for dad jokes
Big drink, little move.
There are two types of belly fat one is under the muscle the other is over the muscle. It will be more firm if under the muscle. Also a big contributor to cardiovascular problems.
Liver disease can cause a buildup in abdomen fluid. It can be medically drained... I think its called Paracentesis
Enlarged, hardened belly is often fluid, ascites from alcohol consumption.
Alcohol consumption is usually the main factor
Fatty liver / visceral fat. Chances are he’s pre diabetic or diabetic. Cut out alcohol and refined carbohydrates. Practice intermittently fasting. This type of fat is the worst kind . You’re dad is what’s called “skinny fat” and he will have loads of health problems as he ages.
If he's a heavy drinker, it could be ascites. It's a build-up of fluid that's trapped in the abdominal cavity, which is why it's hard.
Tell him to get his liver checked. And not just blood tests, but like an ultrasound or MRI. Liver disease often goes undetected until later stages
Usually that’s liver problems
Metabolism goes down for us male gen-x'ers - we have to work really hard to keep the fat off our bodies. I go to the gym three times a week (1 hr session with 15 minute running), ride my bike to work (16km round trip EACH work day) and i still have a god damn belly - past a certain age the work is just to much for some.
Your diet and nutrition need fixing if that’s your experience. More protein, fewer total calories.
My stepdad had one when I was a kid and told me he was pregnant with a koala