Trouble Zone: 1 Problem, 3 Solutions

Forget what you've heard. There are ways to get rid of stubborn belly fat. Here are three!

It’s the bodily equivalent of the guest who refuses to leave: You’ve dieted and exercised, but the fat around your middle just won’t take the hint. It’s not only an aesthetic problem: A waist measurement of more than 35 inches in women (or 40 inches in men) is one of several risk factors that make up metabolic syndrome, which can predispose you to heart disease and type 2 diabetes. Stubborn as it may be, it is possible to banish belly fat. We asked experts from three disciplines to weigh in with ways to take inches off your waistline for the sake of your beach body and your health.

Solution 1:
Diet If you want to rid your middle of excess fat, consider your relationship with gluten, says Ellen Harnett, a chef, holistic health coach and co-founder of Back to Basics Wellness in Wayne. “It’s the main reason people accumulate weight in the belly,” she says. To find out whether you have a gluten sensitivity, cut out all foods that contain it for two weeks, then slowly reintroduce them one by one to see whether you feel better or worse afterward. (Find a list of foods with gluten at diabetes.org.) A sensitivity to dairy and/or soy can also pack on belly fat, says Harnett’s partner Kathy D’Agati, a holistic nutrition coach, and the way to determine if you’ve got one is the same as for gluten. Avoid foods with dyes and chemicals, which have also been implicated in belly fat.

Solution 2:
Exercise When people ask her what they can do about belly fat, Gina Griffith, co-director of Total Workout Fitness in Montclair, starts with a caveat: “You can’t do it with exercise alone—you need to combine diet and exercise.” That said, she notes that exercise can indeed help to tone the muscles underlying the layer of abdominal fat. “Up until about 10 years ago, the focus was almost exclusively on crunches, but today most trainers recommend them in concert with other exercises,” says Griffith. For example: reverse curls (lifting a barbell or set of dumbbells to shoulder height, starting at thigh level, with knuckles facing forward), plank exercises (supporting your body with your toes and forearms, back straight and in alignment with your head and legs, and holding the position for 10 seconds or longer) and rollouts with an ab wheel (a wheel with handles protruding through the center). An especially effective move to work abs is the bicycle crunch: Lying with your lower back flat on the floor, hold your head gently with your hands and lift your knees to a 45- degree angle, then pedal your legs while touching your elbows to opposite knees. (Before you attempt any of these exercises, consult with a healthcare professional to make sure that they’re safe for you.)

Solution 3:
Liposuction/Tummy Tuck If diet and exercise aren’t reducing that pooch, you may have more success with a surgical option like liposuction or a tummy tuck (also known as abdominoplasty). Both remove fat, but liposuction “vacuums” out fat, while a tummy tuck also removes excess skin and often involves re-contouring the abdominal wall. “Keep in mind that either procedure can only work on fat outside the abdominal wall, not the fat around abdominal organs, which is known as visceral fat. The determination of what kind of fat is causing your problem can be made by your surgeon,” advises Scott Spiro, M.D., a plastic surgeon in West Orange. According to Dr. Spiro, the best candidate for liposuction is someone with reasonably good skin quality and at least fair abdominal muscle tone. If you have a great deal of excess skin and/or abdominal wall problems—such as muscle weakness, a hernia, or bulging due to pregnancy or genetic predisposition—a tummy tuck would be a better option. A tummy tuck involves more down time than liposuction (7 to 10 days as opposed to 2 or 3), more time before you can resume working out (3 to 4 weeks versus about 10 days) and about twice the cost. “But the results of a tummy tuck are circumferential,” says Dr. Spiro—meaning that they’re visible all around the middle, as opposed to just the stomach area, as with liposuction.