Metabolic Health
Here Are 4 Reasons You Can’t Reduce Visceral Fat and Lose Muscle Mass Instead
Unless you correct these mistakes, fat loss can be arduous, and you might face sarcopenia as you age.
A widespread problem, causing unnecessary suffering
Maintaining muscle and losing visceral fat is not rocket science. The principles are well documented in the literature and practiced by millions. However, still, some of us lose muscle and gain visceral fat due to incorrect practices.
Unfortunately, the internet and media are inundated with too much misleading and inappropriate content about muscle maintenance and fat loss. The weight loss noise is unbearable for consumers.
For example, people with no knowledge of human physiology, a tenuous understanding of metabolism, or no experience of sustainable fat loss give erroneous advice to create sensations. Some of these articles go viral as influential bloggers write them to make money or sell products.
In addition, some risky content is, sadly, written for commercial gains to sell products to consumers. I also came across misleading or biased information in sponsored scientific studies that we need to consume with a grain of salt.
I wrote many articles about fat loss, muscle maintenance, and healthy weight management published on EUPHORIA. I also wrote about seven mistakes during weight loss practices previously. Like many others, I made those mistakes but corrected them with knowledge and diligence.
Some readers keep asking me why they cannot lose visceral fat, and some even lose muscles even if they follow the advice written on the internet. Some elderly readers even face sarcopenia, which concerns them a lot.
These mature-age readers mention that they walk every day, go to the gym, do a lot of work at home, and eat very little to lose fat, but they lose muscles instead of belly fat. This sad yet valuable information inspired me to write this piece, hoping I might give a valuable perspective.
Purpose of the Article
The purpose of this article is to highlight and explain four reasons you can’t get rid of visceral fat and lose muscle mass instead.
In this article, I simplify the common problems related to fat loss and muscle maintenance by summarizing the key points based on my experience, reviews, and observations to inform and inspire my readers.
I believe this practical piece can answer frequently asked questions on fat loss and muscle maintenance and give valuable ideas to those who experience this widespread issue.
1 — You might have chronic stress.
I start with this critical point as even if you make the following three points, the problem will persist.
And when you miss the next three points, oxidative stress in the body will further increase and lead to undesirable situations as stress affects us at the genetic level.
Stress is paradoxical and leads to a catch-22 situation if not corrected in a timely manner. For example, exercise and food are essential. Nevertheless, too much or too little of them causes stress to the body and leads to fat gain or muscle loss.
So lowering oxidative stress by balancing our lifestyle habits is a critical success factor for fat loss and muscle maintenance.
For example, when I cut calories by eating less food and doing more cardio, such as running daily around five kilometers and doing other activities in my younger years, I lost weight but couldn’t lose belly fat. So, sadly, I ended up with a skinny body with a bulging belly.
Later I discovered that excessive cardio and cutting calories too much caused chronic stress, which was evident from elevated cortisol levels identified by an endocrinologist.
As a result of excessive and prolonged cortisol releases, I lost muscles instead of visceral fat. Sadly my body became insulin resistant, and I faced metabolic syndrome.
So the key point is no matter how little you eat and how much you exercise when cortisol levels are elevated due to excessive stress, the body cannot tap into fat stores, which might cause visceral fat gain and muscle loss.
Remember that cortisol is a catabolic hormone that can shrink muscles when elevated for a prolonged time.
Therefore, we need to optimize this hormone carefully by lowering our stress with healthy lifestyle choices. If lifestyle habits cannot help, we need to seek medical support.
For example, when I lowered my stress, I started losing visceral fat, gaining lean muscles, and maintaining a healthy body weight. My solutions to defeat chronic stress were to get restorative sleep, rest properly, meditate, take breaks at work, have fun, express my unpleasant feelings, and improve my relationships.
The takeaway point of this section is to lower stress with restorative sleep, rest, fun, and timely recovery. In addition, when we decrease oxidative stress, we can also lessen inflammation and prevent some metabolic and mental health disorders.
2 — You might not be consuming enough bioavailable proteins.
One of the critical factors in muscle building is consuming enough bioavailable proteins daily. This might vary from person to person. For example, the protein requirements of a 20-year-old active man are widely different of an 80-year-old sedentary woman.
Thus, we need to obtain advice from professionals such as qualified sports nutritionists who can create a personalized diet rich in bioavailable protein sources.
We need to consume proteins from whole foods. Some processed food has additives and antinutrients, which can affect the bioavailability of proteins.
We need to eat some fat or carb with each protein intake, as protein digestion and absorption require one of these macronutrients.
Besides, we need fats or carbs for energy, as even though protein can give energy, it is not its primary purpose. The main purpose of proteins is to establish the building blocks for our bodies.
Unfortunately, some people ignore this fact. However, the good news is whole foods will have at least some healthy fats or carbs to support protein synthesis and lower the energy demands from proteins.
Consuming food with bioavailable protein can activate mTOR. It is a serine-threonine protein kinase activated when we consume enough protein. It is also activated by resistance training, as I explain in the next section.
Literature indicates that we need around 30 grams of protein in a meal to activate mTOR. The most critical amino acid to activate mTOR is leucine.
Thus, we must ensure that our protein source has enough of this amino acid and the other eight essential amino acids the body cannot produce.
The takeaway point of this section is to consume adequate protein from bioavailable sources.
If you follow restrictive diets for some reason and have underlying health conditions, you might need to supplement essential amino acids with guidance from a qualified healthcare professional.
3 — You are not doing sufficient resistance training.
After protein, the second factor to activate mTOR is resistance training in the form of weightlifting, calisthenics, or exercises with resistance machines in gyms.
The good news is that even if we don’t eat any food during the day, we can still maintain muscle by doing resistance training.
For example, I eat only one meal at dinner, but I do my resistance training in the morning. Since I started this protocol, I have maintained my lean muscles and quickly melted my visceral fat.
People think that when we fast intermittently and do resistance training, we can lose muscles. From my reviews, experience, and observations, it is not valid.
As long as we eat a nutritious meal and get enough calories, daily resistance training does not cause muscle loss. However, excessive cardio can do due to hormonal effects.
Interestingly, I perform long-term fasts from five to seven days a few times a year, and I never lose muscles as measured by DEXA scans after the fasting periods.
This is because the growth hormone significantly increases when fasting, protecting muscles. In addition, ketosis also has a protective effect on muscles.
4 — You are not recovering timely and doing more exercise before recovery.
I left this to end as even if we make previous points correctly, when we miss this point, we might lose not only precious muscles but also cause severe health conditions such as chronic inflammation.
Timely recovery is crucial. Starting a new exercise session before recovering can damage muscles and further increase oxidative stress leading to chronic inflammation.
Unfortunately, I made this mistake in my younger years, causing me muscle loss, sleep deprivation, and chronic inflammation. Some fitness enthusiasts say, “no pain, no gain.”
This is a piece of bad advice in terms of fitness and overall health. If your muscles hurt and you attempt to exercise, you stress the body unnecessarily, which can cause injuries and inflame the body.
In addition, starting a new exercise before recovery will significantly increase the cortisol hormone and will prevent fat burning.
Excessive and prolonged cortisol break the balance of the body and causes insulin resistance, metabolic disorder, bone loss, and mental health disorders. So, timely recovery is essential to maintain muscles and lose fat sustainably.
Conclusions and Takeaways
I wrote about typical mistakes during a weight loss journey previously. I also posted a simple yet powerful story in my blog titled ups and downs of losing weight.
These simple yet powerful stories were an eye-opener for some readers. The key message of the article was weight loss needs to be slow and gradual to remain healthy and fit.
Two main reasons cause these four mistakes mentioned in this piece: misinformation and the rush to lose weight. Paradoxically we can lose weight and gain muscles by slowing down.
I’d like to end this story by summarizing key takeaway points.
1 — Lower stress with restorative sleep, rest, and fun.
2 — Consume adequate bioavailable protein and healthy fats.
3 — If you, for some reason, cannot get adequate protein from food, consider supplementing amino acids with support from qualified professionals.
4 — Refrain from refined carbs, processed foods, and antinutrients.
5 — Perform resistance training using body weight or weightlifting devices.
6 — Lower excessive cardio and replace it with HIIT if you don’t have underlying conditions, as HIIT might give too much stress to some people.
7 — Most notably, always recover in a timely manner and never start a workout session before recovering from the effects of the previous one.
Improving the health of our cells, mitochondria, and organs using holistic health principles is a wise approach.
Health is our responsibility. Knowledge is power, but unless we act and consistently apply it to our daily lives, knowledge does not mean much.
In addition, constantly monitoring our health with home tests and with support from qualified healthcare professionals and getting timely treatment is necessary to stay healthy and fit.
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