Tonight, upon retiring, roll over in bed. If your belly is the last thing to flop from one side to the other? If so, maybe it’s time to think about some important belly fat facts. Bellies today come in sizes ranging from healthy to downright dangerous. The healthy bellies are pampered with healthy foods—vegetables, fruits, whole grain cereals, nuts, legumes, proteins and the valuable oils found in avocado recipes—or olive-oil based dishes.
Belly fat is a substance that often can be reduced over time by people who will modify their eating habits and increase their physical activity. In the meantime, women can invest in some pretty, free-flowing dresses. And men can attractively disguise the condition with some cool duds in plus size styles. Most will agree that looking good and feeling good are worthy goals. Belly fat tends to hinder those goals.
Unfortunately, some folks tote around downright dangerous bellies, for high up on the list of belly fat facts is the truism that excess belly fat is a seductive killer. It hugs too tightly the abdominal organs. It leads to increased chances for heart disease. It collects around the liver and kidneys and stomach like a rotund, obnoxious guest that visits for a weekend, and then brings friends who stay for a year—or a lifetime.
Digestion: a miraculous process
Bite by bite, ounce by ounce, is the way belly fat gets its foot into the door—the portal we call the human mouth. Refined sugars, corn-based sweeteners and processed flour are blamed. But taking a toll are many other factors: rate of metabolism, portion size and calorie content, frequency of eating episodes and genetic predisposition to overweight. There are remedies among belly fat facts. The acquisition of a vitamin supplement might augment one’s overall nutrition. And today there are available tasty, fruit-flavored formulas of liquid vitamin supplements.
• Increase daily exercise or physical activity
• Decrease intake of white-flour bread and sweets
• Add more vegetables and fruits as snacks
• Avoid products made with high-fructose corn syrup
• Forego candy, bakery, buttery snacks and soda drinks
• Terminate food intake two hours before bedtime
The National Institute of Health (NIH) offers a multitude of informative texts that give background to belly fat facts and make the many processes of the human body easily understood by those who wish to take charge of their health. Some fascinating info from that organization focuses on how the digestive system works. The details are helpful to those investigating belly fat facts or many other health-related topics.
Belly fat results when the amount of calories ingested is not balanced by the amount of calories burned through activity. Back in the old days, folks concerned with belly fat facts were hard to find. Today, busy people find it necessary to reinforce their mostly lightweight workaday activities with physical fitness regimes related to sports, hobbies or travel and recreation.
In the old days, however, few people needed additional exercise. They worked hard. They ate home-grown, natural foods that fueled their bodies to cope with hard work such as hunting and farming. Had someone inquired about belly fat facts, the answer might be other questions, “What do you mean by belly fat facts?” And, “What is belly fat?”
The modern lifestyle takes a toll
Today, belly fat facts illuminate the hazards of a lifestyle that is bad for our bodies. Americans consume too many calories and highly refined sugars that break down through digestion into simple carbohydrates that are mostly empty of valuable components. The substances provide calories but few nutrients, vitamins or minerals.
Empty calories do little to help the body yet today’s texts about belly fat facts mostly all note the uselessness of the calories that abound in most manufactured snacks, beverages and processed foods. The edibles are a far cry from the farm-based products of yesteryear. Belly fat facts show an increasing number of Americans today are obese and their levels of activity fall far short of those needed to maintain spare, muscular frames.
Today, when the feast consists of candy, chips, dip, fast food and soda pop, the ingested sugars trigger the production of insulin—a hormone produced by the pancreas to convert excess carbohydrates into stores of fat. Those stores were meant to help humans survive in times of famine. Those pounds of excess fat find the belly area a wonderfully handy storage compartment. And spells of famine are rare.