How To Lose Stubborn Belly Fat, Part 1: Diet Modification

You cannot easily burn off a spare tire with more exercise. The most troublesome form of belly fat, known as visceral fat, can linger because of deeply rooted hormone dysregulation and chronically stressful lifestyle patterns. Visceral fat collects around your liver, intestines, and other internal organs. It makes for a firm midsection, the extreme example being a noticeable beer belly. Subcutaneous fat, by contrast, collects all over your body; it's the soft fat you can pinch under your skin. 

Visceral fat is far more destructive to your health because it is metabolically active, secreting inflammatory cytokines into the bloodstream. This promotes the catch-all disease condition known as chronic inflammation, or systemic inflammation. Fat tissue also contains an enzyme called aromatase, which converts testosterone into estrogen, and inflammation can ramp up this process. Because of its ability to secrete hormones and other chemicals into the bloodstream like other organs do, fat tissue (visceral fat in particular) is regarded by many researchers as an endocrine organ in its own right.

Fortunately, the same quality that makes visceral fat so dangerous (it's metabolically active) also makes it highly responsive. Visceral fat tends to come off faster than subcutaneous fat when you make the right changes. Following are some ways you can reduce visceral fat accumulation and improve hormone and metabolic function:

1. Eliminate processed foods: Consuming heavily processed, nutrient-deficient, chemical-laden foods can compromise your gut lining and allow lipopolysaccharide (LPS) to leak into the bloodstream. LPS is an endotoxin (a toxin found in the cell walls of certain gut bacteria) that promotes systemic inflammation and interferes with your ability to burn stored energy. Mark Sisson considers refined industrial seed oils (canola, corn, soybean, sunflower, safflower, etc.) arguably the single worst agent you can consume in the modern food supply, contending that they hamper fat metabolism, promote visceral fat accumulation, and drive oxidative stress, inflammation, and insulin resistance. Clean up your act!

Dr. Robert Lustig, pediatric endocrinologist at UC San Francisco and leading anti-sugar crusader, argues persuasively in his book Metabolical that if you simply eliminate processed foods, you won't get fat, won't get diabetes, and won't get metabolic disease. A bold contention, but consider how difficult it would be to grow obese by eating too many eggs, salmon, steaks, salads, or fresh fruit! When you consume exclusively wholesome, nutrient-dense foods, your magnificently fine-tuned appetite and satiety mechanisms guide you to consume the optimal amount of energy to truly thrive.

2. Eliminate or greatly reduce alcohol consumption: They don't call it a "beer belly" for nothing! Alcohol calories are known as "first to burn" because your body can't store alcohol and must metabolize it right away. While your liver is busy clearing alcohol, fat burning slows dramatically, so the other calories in your bloodstream (from the food and mixers you consume alongside your drinks) are more likely to be stored as fat.

Note this distinction from the popular but inaccurate notion that alcohol itself gets "converted" into fat. Rather, these nutrient-devoid, non-satiating liquid calories drive excess calorie consumption and the storage of those calories as fat. When you consume a daiquiri or margarita, for example, the alcohol gets burned first, the sugar is more likely to be stored, and alcohol's tendency to stimulate appetite and destabilize blood sugar soon gives you the munchies.

Some research suggests that occasional heavy drinking drives the accumulation of visceral fat more so than regular moderate drinking. When the liver becomes overwhelmed with more energy and/or toxins than it can process, it can accumulate fatty deposits, a condition known as fatty liver disease. Since your liver is the control tower for all manner of energy and micronutrient processing and distribution, an overwhelmed, poorly functioning liver drives all manner of disease and dysfunction. This includes the suppression of sex hormones and the accumulation of visceral fat.

3. Consume nutrient-dense foods: If you ditch processed foods and then kick-start an extreme calorie restriction program, or otherwise think you can shed visceral fat through starvation, you will activate compensation mechanisms: chronic stress hormone production to make the sugar you ain't getting from your diet, and chronic inflammation, which together conspire to keep your tummy at square one.

Strive to eat an animal-based diet with the best-sourced foods (grassfed meat, pastured eggs, wild-caught fish, heritage breed pork, pastured chicken), plus sufficient natural, nutritious, easy-to-digest carbohydrates (well-prepared plant foods, honey, fresh fruit, fermented foods) to fuel your active lifestyle. Eat at a leisurely pace in pleasant, low-stress circumstances to the point of satiety, and refrain from crash diets or extremes that become too stressful (prolonged fasting, extreme carb restriction you're not prepared for, etc.). Get metabolically healthy first, then worry about dropping excess fat.

In Part 2 of this article, we’ll cover exercise and lifestyle strategies that will help you shed visceral fat.