The #1 Best Drinking Habit For Visceral Fat After 40, Say Dietitians
Certain types of body fat are more dangerous than others. For example, the fat in your abdominal area, which sits around your internal organs underneath your skin, is known as visceral fat and can lead to things like high cholesterol and heart disease.
Although this can be intimidating information to take in, it's also a relief to know that changing your diet and incorporating more exercise into your routine can help you lose visceral fat.
But the important question to ask is how can we know the best food and drinks to consume when we want to shrink the fat around our stomachs?
According to a few of our expert dietitians, the best drinking habit for shrinking visceral fat is limiting your alcohol consumption and staying hydrated as much as possible.
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"Cutting out drinking completely can be very difficult, but consuming too much alcohol usually leads to more calories going in and less being burned off, while there's also the added sugar in some of the more popular cocktails that many of us drink on a daily basis," says Courtney D'Angelo, MS, RD, author at Go Wellness. "In fact, there have been researched studies that suggest consuming too much sugar and alcohol can encourage fat to be stored as visceral fat, leading to a larger waist circumference."
Lisa Young, PhD, RDN, author of Finally Full, Finally Slim and a member of our medical expert board agrees, saying that it's best to limit excessive alcohol consumption, but "if you do indulge, enjoy an occasional glass of wine with a meal and not in an empty stomach."
Another important aspect of losing visceral fat as you get older is staying consistently hydrated.
"By upping your water intake, you're naturally going to begin losing weight due to increased energy, better hydration, and curbed hunger," says Trista Best, MPH, RD, LD at Balance One Supplements.
If you want to switch it up and drink water in a more "exciting" way, Best suggests trying fruit-infused water every now and then.
"Fruit-infused water provides you with important electrolytes and antioxidants that can help the body burn calories at a higher rate, and the antioxidants in this type of water can also aid in losing visceral fat by helping the body reduce oxidative stress and inflammation that can cause us to hold onto extra fat, especially around the waist," says Best.
