Sometimes, excess fat around the belly is due to hormones. Hormones help regulate many bodily functions, including metabolism, stress, hunger, and sex drive. If a person has a deficiency in certain hormones, it may result in weight gain around the abdomen, which is known as a hormonal belly.
A significant change in hormone levels, especially the decreased production of the hormone estrogen, can result in excess abdominal fat. And because menopause occurs at a later stage in life, age and altered amounts of exercise and diet changes can also influence how much weight a woman could gain during this time.
An endocrinologist can very often help you reverse weight gain that is associated with hormonal imbalances. Potentially useful interventions include lifestyle changes such as exercise, diet modification, or stress management, as well as treatments such as testosterone or thyroid hormone replacement.
Before you rush to your doctor to get a prescription for your hormonal belly, there are natural ways to readjust your levels. Reducing sugar intake, eliminating processed foods from your diet, and avoiding things like dairy, alcohol, and caffeine can all help reset your blood sugar and insulin levels.
D2 and K2 are a powerful duo when taken as a supplement. Each of these vitamins is involved with balancing hormones, particularly those associated with weight management, and are viewed as safe vitamin supplements for people to take to support metabolic processes.
Some causes may be related to stress, alcohol consumption, or medications. Other causes can be a result of health conditions like hypothyroidism or PCOS. Many causes of stomach swelling and weight gain can be treated with lifestyle changes and medications. However, others, such as ascites, can be serious.
While body weight and fat are distributed equally in weight gain due to excess caloric intake, people with hormonal weight gain usually notice increased weight around specific body parts, such as the waist, arms, thighs, chest, and lower body.
Causes include poor diet, lack of exercise, and short or low-quality sleep. A healthy diet and active lifestyle can help people lose excess belly fat and lower the risk of problems associated with it.
As we know, hormones support many vital functions within the body, including our ability to maintain muscle, lose body fat, and experience stress and hunger. When a hormonal imbalance occurs, it becomes considerably harder to lose weight.
Hormonal imbalance can make weight loss difficult, and carrying extra weight can increase your risk of hormonal imbalance. Unfortunately, these factors work together to make weight loss even more difficult.
What does leptin do? Leptin is made by the adipose tissue (fat-storing cells) in your body. Its main role is to regulate fat storage and how many calories you eat and burn. Leptin released from adipose cells travels to the brain via the bloodstream.
Hormones that affect female weight loss include:
Oestrogen and progesterone.
The absence of both estrogen and these crucial elements leads to progressive obesity. So, along with hot flashes, irregular menses, irritability, and depression in the menopausal transition, women have to deal with a tendency to weight gain and visceral body fat deposition that can affect their long‐term health.
Stress belly is the extra abdominal fat that accumulates as the result of chronic or prolonged stress. Although stress belly is not a medical diagnosis, it is a term used to describe the way that stress and stress hormones impact your midsection.
It plays an important role in weight regulation ( 1 ). In recent years, leptin supplements have become quite popular. They claim to decrease appetite and make it easier for you to lose weight. However, the effectiveness of supplementing with the hormone is controversial.
Some evidence suggests that estrogen hormone therapy increases a woman's resting metabolic rate. This might help slow weight gain. Lack of estrogen may also cause the body to use starches and blood sugar less effectively, which would increase fat storage and make it harder to lose weight.