Stress And Abdominal Weight Gain

Stress And Abdominal Weight Gain

Stress could affect almost any part of the body and produce mental, physical and emotional symptoms that include dizziness, headache, allergies, heart palpitations, ecological sensitivity, impaired coordination, impaired immunity and weight gain.

Carbohydrates are converted to glucose in a healthy body and a blood glucose level of 70-130 mg/dl is maintained. In glucose intolerant people, carbohydrates are readily converted to glucose and an excessive amount of hormone, insulin is secreted by pancreas as a response to this shift in blood sugar. The task of insulin involves removing the glucose from the blood stream and helping it to enter the body cells.

If done properly, regardless of the amount of carbohydrates consumed the blood glucose level returns to normal range. The blood glucose rises quickly followed by an overproduction of insulin if the system isn't working properly. The body cells are unable to remove the glucose from the blood stream as they don't recognize the excess insulin. This results in increase of blood insulin levels that have a craving stimulating effect.

Abdominal weight gain is frequently related with emotional eating and a hectic lifestyle of people under recurrent stress. However, according to the researchers, elevated cortisol levels that occur due to the changes in the body can cause insulin resistance and weight gain.

Individuals, when they consume more calories than they burn, tend to put on abdominal weight. When the calorie intake exceeds calorie expenditure, the body by default stores the fat in it. The chances of health disease increase if there is excess fat around the abdomen. Thus, it's vital to take corrective measures to get rid of excess fat from the abdomen.

Stress and weight gain, i.e. abdominal gain in particular goes hand in hand. Contrary to popular belief, your abdominal weight is not only increased due to lack of exercises, but also due to stress that plays an unnecessary role in stomach weight gain. In fact, nowadays, stress has become one of the most vital causes of abdominal weight gain. As per a medical study, a large amount of cortisol is produced by the body due to stress. Producing cortisol is a body's way of reacting to stress. However, the damage worsens when cortisol stays in the bloodstream as an increase in its level promotes the accumulation of fat. Thus, bear in mind that you don't stress over each and everything that comes in your way. Learn to handle the stress, so that you can keep away the abdominal fat.

The body excretes corticotrophin which releases adrenalin and hormone when under stress. This reaction forces the adrenal cortex to release cortisol. In turn, cortisol, a glucocorticoid forces the release of glucose into the bloodstream. This glucose creates a surplus release of insulin during the periods of chronic stress. Insulin which is a part of the endocrine system is a fat storage hormone that gives the stress signal from the adrenalin to burn fat. Due to this surplus release of insulin, the body gets the signal to store fat in the abdomen.

Abnormal levels of cortisol are surely not only due to stress. Abnormal levels of cortisol can be due to a number of diseases and conditions. There are various medical problems that result in extremely high levels of cortisol and Cushing's syndrome, a medical term used by doctors, is one of them. This further leads to changes in the appearance of the body and its function.

There are number of factors on which weight gain or loss depends and those include food intake, resting metabolic rate, the types and the time of food consumed and the amount of exercise performed. Genetic factors also influence your metabolism and might be the reason for some people to gain abdominal weight rapidly than others.

The level of cortisol and weight gain cannot be predictable as the stress level of every individual is different. The amount of cortisol produced due to stress could vary among people, with some individuals being naturally reactive to stress. Studies on women also reveal that women when are under stress and whose cortisol levels are high, tend to eat more than women with low cortisol levels.

Another study revealed that women who stored surplus fat in the abdominal area had higher levels of cortisol and also reported to have more lifestyle related stress than women who stored fat mainly in the hips. The diet industry has also attempted to find from these studies the cause for higher cortisol and have made dietary supplements aiming to lower the cortisol levels and enhance weight loss. However, the genuineness of these dietary supplements has never been proved. In fact, the best method to lower cortisol levels is to perform exercise as it also has the added benefit of burning calories to stimulate weight loss.

Thus, from the above points it's evident that stress weight gain is a result of several health related conditions, both mentally and physically and you need to take some corrective measures to get rid of unnecessary stress and weight gain.






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