The first place men typically lose weight is the belly, while women tend to lose weight all over, but hold onto weight in their thighs and hips, Dr. Block explains.
Mostly, losing weight is an internal process. You will first lose hard fat that surrounds your organs like liver, kidneys and then you will start to lose soft fat like waistline and thigh fat. The fat loss from around the organs makes you leaner and stronger.
Excess visceral fat can pose serious health risks, but when you embark on a healthy diet and exercise plan, this fat is often the first to disappear. This means you're likely to notice weight loss in your abdominal area first. Too much visceral fat can make your belly protrude.
As against areas such as legs, face and arms, our stomach and abdominal regions possess beta cells that makes it difficult to reduce the fats easily and lose weight in these areas. However, as per research, belly fat is the most difficult to lose as the fat there is so much harder to break down.
While everyone loses weight differently, dropping as little as 3 to 5 pounds can show up on your face first, Eboli says.
The correct answer is that fat is converted to carbon dioxide and water. You exhale the carbon dioxide and the water mixes into your circulation until it's lost as urine or sweat. If you lose 10 pounds of fat, precisely 8.4 pounds comes out through your lungs and the remaining 1.6 pounds turns into water.
Scientifically, you can start to see results and lose belly fat for yourself in something as little as 2 weeks time. That being said, even if the timeline might be short, cutting around inches off your waistline could require a lot of hard work and following the right balance of diet and workout.
The first stage of weight loss is when you tend to lose the most weight and begin to notice changes in your appearance and how your clothes fit. It usually happens within the first 4–6 weeks ( 1 ). Most of the weight loss in this stage comes from carb stores, protein, and water — and to a lesser extent, body fat.
In addition to an oily appearance, your urine might also have a milky white color. This is due to the presence of fat and protein in lymph fluid.
If you're losing inches but maintaining your weight and you regularly strength train, you may actually be losing fat and gaining muscle. The process of gaining muscle and losing fat at the same time is called body recomposition. Most scales don't differentiate between the amounts of body fat and muscle you have.
If you're only losing fat, you'll likely notice a smaller waist and hips, while the rest of your body may start looking shapelier. “For example, a person at 120 pounds with 22% body fat will have shape, curves and leanness, while the same person at 120 pounds with 35% body fat will look wider and looser,” Clancy says.
If you are on a low-carb diet, it will help you lose weight as there will be water loss from glycogen in the muscles. But in this case, fat will not burn. Also, if you are doing cardio, you may lose weight quickly but burning belly fat might take time.
The best types of cardio to aid in weight loss are either low-impact, low intensity cardio like rowing, incline walking, and biking, or HIIT workouts implemented in small doses such as kickboxing, interval training, and weight training.
Lifting weights has a unique weight loss advantage that makes it superior to other forms of exercise for weight loss: When you lift weights, you build muscle and lose fat.
The best way to tell if you have visceral fat is to measure your waist. The waist circumference is a good indicator of how much fat is deep inside the belly, around the organs. For women, your risk of chronic disease is increased if the waist circumference is 80 cm or more and for men 94cm or more.
You may notice that your urine smells different. This is due to the release of ketones into your urine. Ketones are a byproduct of fat burning and can give your urine a sweet or fruity smell.
The color of your urine can indeed signal that fat-burning processes are underway. A good indicator of weight loss is the presence of ketones and a urine color of bright or dark yellow.