The Greatest Fear Among Weight Losers

Exercise is an essential component to health and wellness. Exercise provides numerous health benefits that cannot be gained through any other methods like a strengthened heart and lungs, better sleep and stronger muscles.

Another benefit that exercisers hope to get from exercise is weight loss, since obesity leads to all sorts of health problems and is generally not what we want to see in the mirror.

But one thing that terrifies successful exercisers informed about the weight loss process is the loose skin.

What’s the problem?

When weight is gained, the skin stretches in order to encompass the added diameter of the body. This is great, since bursting at the seams would be much more disastrous. But when the weight is lost, much of the skin remains.

For one, skin continues to hang long after the weight loss, creating a body that looks like an empty sack. But in addition to that, skin that has been stretched will look older than skin that is still firm.

The good news

The hanging skin isn’t permanent. The skin is designed to adjust to the rest of the body. There have been many cases of individuals who lost 20% or more of their skin after consuming adequate amounts of water.

Also, much of the hanging skin is flabby due to the fact that there is still body fat underneath this skin.

Also, much of the flab results from crash diets that result in a loss of supportive body muscle. This is especially true during water fasts, when the muscles destroy much of their protein in response to dehydration.

How else can I prevent loose skin during weight loss?

The best way to avoid loose skin during weight loss is to lose weight gradually. This is a good idea in general since your body is always adapting to your body weight. If you engage in crash dieting, your body does not delicately lose the fat that you want while maintaining muscle mass.

Instead, your body tries to draw nutrients from as many parts of the body as possible including the muscles. When exercising, be sure to include exercises that tone your muscles.

Do resistance training at least 3 times a week in order to maintain your muscle tone. Also, be sure to eat plenty of lean protein. This will give your muscles a continual supply of protein, which will prevent your muscles from degenerating.

Body contouring

The removal of excess skin through surgery is called body contouring. These include tummy tucks, thigh-lifts, body-lifts, belt lipectomy, panniculectomy, buttock-lift, breast-lift, gynecomastia, arm-lift, face-lift and neck-lift.

Though these are options, body contouring is not necessary in order to lose the excess skin. The skin will go away on its own as long as you tone your body.