Poor diet

Sugary food, such as cakes and candy, and drinks, such as soda and fruit juice, can:

cause weight gain

slow a person’s metabolism

reduce a person’s ability to burn fat

Low-protein, high-carb diets may also affect weight. Protein helps a person feel fuller for longer, and people who do not include lean protein in their diet may eat more food overall.

Trans fats, in particular, can cause inflammation and may lead to obesity. Trans fats are in many foods, including fast food and baked goods, for example, muffins or crackers.

The American Heart Association recommends that people replace trans fats with healthful whole-grain foods, monounsaturated fats, and polyunsaturated fats.

Reading food labels can help a person determine whether their food contains trans fats.

Too much alcohol

Consuming excess alcohol can cause a variety of health problems, including liver disease and inflammation.

A 2015 report on alcohol consumption and obesity in the journal Current Obesity Reports indicates that drinking excess alcohol causes males to gain weight around their bellies, though study results in females are inconsistent.

Lack of exercise

If a person consumes more calories than they burn off, they will put on weight.

An inactive lifestyle makes it hard for a person to get rid of excess fat, particularly around the abdomen.

Stress

Asteroid hormone known as cortisol helps the body control and deal with stress. When a person is in a dangerous or high-pressure situation, their body releases cortisol, and this can impact on their metabolism.

People often reach for food for comfort when they feel stressed, and cortisol causes the excess calories to remain around the belly and other areas of the body for later use.

Genetics

There is some evidence that a person’s genes can play a part in whether or not they become obese. Scientists think genes can influence behavior, metabolism, and the risk of developing obesity-related diseases.

Poor sleep

Too little rest can have an impact on well-being.

A study in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine links weight gain to short sleep duration, which could lead to an excess of belly fat.

Both poor quality and short duration of sleep can play a part in the development of abdominal fat.

Not getting enough good sleep may, potentially, lead to unhealthful eating behaviors, such as emotional eating.

Smoking

Researchers may not consider smoking to be a direct cause of belly fat, but they do believe it to be a risk factor.

How to lose belly fat

By considering the following changes, people may be able to lose their unwanted belly fat:

Improve your diet

A healthy, balanced diet can help a person lose weight, and it is also likely to have a positive effect on their overall health.

People should avoid sugar, fatty foods, and refined carbohydrates that have low nutritional content. Instead, they should eat plenty of fruit and vegetables, lean proteins, and complex carbohydrates.



Reduce your alcohol consumption

A person trying to lose excess abdominal fat should monitor their alcohol intake. Alcoholic drinks often contain additional sugar, which can contribute to weight gain.

Increase your exercise

A person can lose belly fat by exercising as part of their daily routine.

A sedentary lifestyle brings with it many serious health problems, including weight gain. People trying to lose weight should include a good amount of exercise in their daily routine.

Get more sunlight

A 2016 review in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health indicates that exposure to sunlight in animals could lead to a reduction in weight gain and metabolic dysfunction.

The review highlights that few studies have looked at the effects of sunlight on humans, in respect of weight gain. It states that more research is required to support the findings so far.

Reduce your stress

Stress can cause a person to gain weight. The release of the stress hormone cortisol influences a person’s appetite and could cause them to eat more.

Stress-relieving tactics include mindfulness and meditation, and gentle exercise, such as yoga.

Improve your sleep pattern

Sleep is vital to people’s overall health, and too little rest can have a severe impact on well-being.

Why do we get belly fat?

Before we discuss how to naturally get rid of a flabby tummy, let’s first look at what led to the belly fat accumulating in the first place. There are three reasons women collect belly fat:

Hormones

Lifestyle choices and habits

Dietary habits

Hormones:

The female body has been designed to naturally store fat in the hips, thighs, and buttocks to support childbirth and breastfeeding during childbearing years. But as you age, estrogen production decreases, and much of that fat is redistributed to the belly. This turns into visceral fat.

Lifestyle choices and habits:

Lifestyle choices such as the amount of sleep you get, the amount of stress you carry, and your activity levels have a large impact on your belly fat and overall wellbeing. Are you active? How much TV do you watch in a given night?

Dietary habits:

Arguably more important than the previous two causes of belly fat, your dietary habits must be kept in check. Excess calorie consumption and the type of foods you consume are a large contributor to belly fat as well.

Now that we understand what has lead to the muffin top, let’s talk about how to get rid of it. I’ve compiled the top 22 ways to shed your belly fat naturally: that means no pills, no wraps, no surgery. Consider this your ultimate guide to naturally getting rid of your gut!

Avoid sugary foods

We all know that sugar isn’t healthy. It contains fructose, which has been linked to several chronic diseases such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and liver disease when consumed in excess.

Grab a hand full of nuts for your afternoon snack. These contain healthy fats and don’t contain sugar like most snack foods.

Avoid sugary drinks

Sugar-sweetened drinks are full of liquid fructose, which can lead to belly fat. And since your brain doesn’t process liquid calories the same as solid calories, you’re likely to end up consuming more than you should. And that’s why sugary beverages can even be worse than high-sugar foods.

To lose and prevent belly fat, it’s a good idea to avoid those sugary beverages and alcoholic mixers containing sugar.

Exchange your soda for sparkling flavored water.

Consume soluble fiber

Consuming high-fiber foods each day has been shown to promote fat loss. Studies show that soluble fiber causes you to feel full and naturally promotes fat loss. In an observation study, soluble fiber was shown to help reduce belly fat. Soluble fiber has even been shown to combat belly fat.

“An observational study of over 1100 adults found that for every 10-gram increase in soluble fiber intake, belly fat gain decreased by 3.7% over a 5-year period,” according to Healthline.com. Flaxseeds, Brussels sprouts, avocados, legumes, and blackberries are all excellent sources of soluble fiber.

Make avocado toast for breakfast, sprinkle some blackberries onto your yogurt, or make a side of Brussel sprouts for dinner.

What Causes Belly Fat in Women

Avoid trans fats

Trans fats have been linked to fat gain along with several other diseases.

A study conducted over six years found that monkeys consuming a high-trans-fat diet gained significantly more weight and abdominal fat than the test group.

To avoid gaining belly fat, make sure you are proactively reading labels, and avoid products containing trans fats.

Avoid large amounts of alcohol

It’s called a beer belly for a reason. Research has shown that too much alcohol will lead to belly fat. Carefully monitoring, and cutting back if needed, can help reduce the size of your tummy.

Begin your night with a number in mind. Then don’t surpass that number of drinks. Switch to sparkling water once you’ve hit your predetermined number of adult beverages.

Eat protein

Studies have proven that if you consume more protein you’ll be more likely to have less fat around your belly.

When you consume protein your body releases a hormone called PYY. This hormone helps to decrease your appetite.

Get a good protein powder: one without the added junk. I talk about my favorite protein powders and what I look for when buying protein powder in this post: Best Supplements for You and Your Family.

Reduce stress

When you are stressed your body produces cortisol (a.k.a. the “stress hormone”) and in turn, increases your appetite causing an increase in belly fat.

Where you tend to gain fat depends on your genes, your hormones, your age, your birth weight (smaller babies more readily add belly fat later in life), and whether you’ve had children (women who have given birth tend to develop more visceral fat than women who haven’t).

As young adults, women on average have less visceral fat than men, but that changes with menopause. In a four-year study at Louisiana State University tracking healthy middle-aged women, every one of them put on some subcutaneous belly fat, but only those who entered menopause added significant amounts of visceral fat. Lowered estrogen levels (which increase the proportional influence of testosterone) contribute to the shift toward a male pattern.

You can’t change your birth weight or your genes, and you can’t hold off menopause. (Studies are mixed about whether hormone replacement therapy influences visceral fat gain.) But there are several ways you can minimize the accumulation of visceral fat. The good news is that because it’s more readily metabolized into fatty acids, it responds more efficiently to diet and exercise than fat on the hips and thighs. Here are some approaches that may help:

Keep moving. Exercise can help reduce your waist circumference. Even if you don’t lose weight, you lose visceral fat and gain muscle mass. In the Louisiana study, the women going through menopause (those who gained visceral fat) also became less physically active.

Engage in at least 30 minutes of moderate-intensity activity most days, such as brisk walking or bicycling at a casual pace. Also, Kahn suggests, create opportunities to add motion to routine tasks. For example, park farther from your destination and walk the rest of the way, take the stairs instead of the elevator, and stand while you talk on the phone.

Studies have shown that you can help trim visceral fat or prevent its growth with both aerobic activity (such as brisk walking) and strength training (exercising with weights). Spot exercises, such as sit-ups, can tighten abdominal muscles but won’t get at visceral fat.

Exercise can also help keep fat from coming back. In a study at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, dieting women lost an average of 24 pounds and reduced both visceral and subcutaneous fat, with or without aerobic or strength-training exercise. In the following year, those who maintained their exercise programs — a modest 40 minutes twice a week — maintained their visceral fat loss, while those who didn’t exercise or abandoned their programs showed a 33% average increase in visceral fat.

Eat right. Choose a balanced diet that helps you achieve and maintain a healthy weight. Include plenty of calcium: according to another study from the University of Alabama, Birmingham, the more calcium a woman consumes, the less visceral fat she gains. Avoid products that seem to encourage belly fat deposition, including trans fats (hydrogenated vegetable oils) and fructose-sweetened foods and beverages.

Don’t smoke. The more you smoke, the more likely you are to store fat in your abdomen rather than on your hips and thighs.

Get your sleep. Too little is bad. A five-year study found that adults under age 40 who slept five hours or less a night accumulated significantly more visceral fat. But too much isn’t good, either — young adults who slept more than eight hours also added visceral fat. (This relationship wasn’t found in people over age 40.)

Mind your mood. In the Study of Women’s Health Across the Nation, middle-aged women who showed more hostility and had more depressive symptoms also had more visceral fat — but not more subcutaneous fat. In other studies, higher levels of the stress hormone