Exercise questions to help lose weight in the middle safely

Hi Dreamer - I've always heard from reliable sources that you can't lose pounds in a targeted area. If you are losing weight, you will lose it from all over. Muscle tone is another matter. With POP you will have to throw out some of the moves of your pre-prolapse days. Once you have the WW posture principles down, you have to apply those to whatever you do. Lifting weights, situps, I'm thinking both of those need to go! Use WW as your guide.

Dreamer, the only way to loose weight in the mid section is thru cardio and a lower calorie diet. I've been in Weight Watchers a good while and have exercised nearly all of my adult life. I still need to loose about 25 lbs, and it's mostly all in the belly/middle area. As I've grown a little older (52) and now must deal with POP, my cardio isn't as rigorous as it needs to be to keep more weight from gathering in my middle. Also, menopause can wreak havoc with one's midsection (it's like the fat just gravitates there and won't let go)! It's an endless battle, but Surviving60 is right...you can't target specific areas for weight loss...it's all systemic. You can certainly tone areas, but the fat in women usually comes off first in the breasts and face first, and belly last...unfortuantely.

You are right about the mid section in women as i have been walking for a few months now every day and the last bit of weight to come off me will definitely be my mid section.I want to lose more off my breasts too as i find it hard to lose weight there.

Hi everybody, I wanted to know if anyone knew if the dance "Zumba Light" is safe. I used to do this at my gym every Tuesday. Now I'm reconsidering as to whether it is safe or not. Does anyone know?? Thanks so much. I just started reading "Saving The Whole Women" - maybe it will tell me. Appreciate your info.

Jaylove

Hi Jaylove

Saving the Whole Woman was revised before Zumba came along, so I don't think you will get advice from it in this. Christine is not really prescriptive about most exercise programs because the safety of them is so dependent on how well you know your own body, your own symptoms, and how far you are willing to push to do things that your body is telling you it doesn't like.

Zumba strikes me as being something done in a group, that you strive to keep up the pace with. In my experience any form of exercise or activity that doesn't allow me to do it mindfully, and at a pace which suits me, is bound to cause symptoms. Hurrying with anything, dance or not, is not for me. I can do almost anything these days, except heavy lifting of awkward objects or where I cannot adjust my positioning, as long as I can think my way through it and do it without hurrying.

I say, give it a try, but listen to what your pelvic region and vulva are telling you about what you can do and cannot do, eg pelvic movements that tuck the butt or thrust the pelvis forwards would be strictly off the menu, but the rest may be OK. Unless you are doing it for 'performance aesthetics' you can modify those manoeuvres and pick up the rest of the movements.

Actually, in my experience, I think most people in dance classes are concentrating pretty hard on their own movements that they won't see what you are doing anyway. ;-)

Louise

Hi Jaylove. I have never done a Zumba class so I don't know how (or even if) they define good posture. If it involves sucking it in/tucking the butt, then you must ignore, or head for the door! You might want to do a search here; recently, a member attributed a worsening of her symptoms to Zumba (at least in part). A thorough understanding of WW posture is essential, so you might even want to put this off until you have been able to study Christine's book, especially the section near the back that talks about exercise in general. Maintaining the lumbar curve is important, as is the right angle or acute angle of the body during movement (NOT an obtuse angle). All very well-described. Good luck!

Hi jaylove
I will give you my thoughts on Zumba. I was doing at the end of 2010 before my prolapse reoccurred. I wouldn't say it was the cause but in hindsight I can say that in my case it certainly didn't help.

Brief timeline: August 2010 felt like I had prolapse. Saw gyno, he said do physio. I did, and was doing so well I cancelled the appt I had with urogyn (i wasn't doctor shopping, it is just that I had made that appt back in August, but it takes 3 months to get in to see her). So my point is I made such great progress I felt I didn't need to see her by Nov.
Shortly after that i started doing Zumba, and going to the gym, and by March my prolapse was feeling quite bad again.
Opted for surgery as sadly I had not discovered WW at that stage (anterior repair for cystocele, thankfully no mesh) . Then 5 weeks post op my prolapse was worse...and so I am here...but doing so much better thanks to all the support an advice here.

So as you can see in hindsight, for me it is really plain to see that all that activity was not helpful. But then maybe it was all just waiting to occur. So while I cannot blame Zumba, I personally will not return to it. For me it is not worth the risk...and that is saying something because I LOVE dancing. My husband and I met dancing. We can salsa, jive, swing and rock and roll our hearts out. I hope that we will be able to again when my prolapse stabilises further, but with 3 children under 9 it is not high on our list of priorities. Just a twirl around the lounge room is nice now and again.
Maybe if you feel strong, and stabilised enough Zumba might be ok, but Louise's and surviving's comments are good advice. If posture can be maintained then it might be ok. Your body will soon tell you.
Lindy

Thanks so much for the advice. My gut was telling me that I had better lay off. Now you guys have confirmed it for me. I think I'll order some of the DVD's instead and focus on them. Appreciate your replies. This forum is absolutely awesome.

Jaylove

Thanks Lindy for sharing your experience with me. I will take it to heart. I think you have confirmed what my gut was telling me. I appreciate your thoughts. I also thank Louise and Surviving for their comments. You guys are awsome. I think I'm just going to order some of Christine's DVD's and focus on them for now.

Jaylove

This question is for Christine. I am having symptoms when I sit in the car passenger seat and when I drive. I bought a back support but I'm still having symptoms. I don't know what to do. Please give me some advice or information. Thanks

Jaylove

Hi jaylove,
If you do a search, I am pretty sure you find a thread where Louise gives some good advice on car seat cushioning.
I keep meaning to fashion a cushion that suits, with layers of foam, but just have not got around to it. In the mean time I get a couple of towels and fold and layer them accordingly so that I am sitting on the seat, not In and back in the seat.
Also a small cushion in the lower back to keep my lumbar curve.
When I am going somewhere that I will have to sit for an hour or more I just take in a towel and fold it as necessary. If anyone ever asks (and no one has) I will just say I have a sore back and sitting higher in the seat is better for me. Sitting in posture has become second nature to me now, it is the standing, walking I still work at, check and correcting.
Do a search for seat cushion or car seat, and see what you find here.
Lindy

as far as prolapse safe, so far i see that planks are ok. Maybe butt lifts (when you lay on the floor with legs in the air and lift your butt) but i dont know if that puts too much pressure on the area?

I lost 5 kilos and most of it from around the tummy area - merely from cutting out sugar and foods which contain it. I read the book Sweet Poison by David Gillespie - tried it - and it was remarkable - my cholesterol levels also lowered. I had tried all sorts of diets and exercise regimes - and knew I was limited after menopause due to my spinal problems - yet simply cutting out sugar over a period of six months made a difference I had never seen before. The book explains why the tummy fat in particular and particularly why women seem to carry it around their middle during and post menopause.
I hope it's okay to recommend something like this and I also realise there will be many who jump in and say it can't be possible for a specific area but sincerely it worked for me.
I have had a rough time the last few months and the sugar has crept back in - as has some of the thickening in the middle .... but at least I know how to lose it again.

but! you found something that worked. I say go for it and share as much as you want about it.

Is a metabolic poison, for sure. A little bit of honey seems to be good medicine though!

I know I have some questions asked of me to respond to...it may be Sunday night before I'm able to do so.

I also haven't been able to put together a video on making seed cheese that I promised - sorry! I'm overwhelmed with work for my teacher-training class and other local responsibilities. I will get to it just as soon as I'm able.

Christine

My guidelines would be similar to any seating. Ensure that your thighs are horizontal, not sloping back, and that your back is pretty vertical. Not easy to do with some car seats, that seem to be designed to cocooning the body. In the driver's seat of my car I have a high density foam wedge under my car seat cover, trimmed to suit the profile of the seat. In the passenger seat or when in my husband's car I sit on a small cushion that fills the dip in the middle of the seat and makes it more or less horizontal.

Most head restraints will push your head forward or bang against a hair clip if the seat is as vertical as possible. You can get around this by putting the seatback, back slightly. Then wriggle your butt right back into the angle and simply plop your back rest in between your back and the seat back. I find that my woman's butt fills the space nicely and the back rest will find its spot too. Adjust the seat back to fine tune it, then sew on an adjustable strap to hang the back rest from your head restraint .

I find that a low line back rest works best because I can get my shoulder blades over the top of it. If necessary trim a little foam from the bottom of the back rest to make room for your butt. A serrated knife works quite well for this. You might not even have to adjust the cover, but a well fitted cover stops it slipping around on the seat.

Have fun. Just make it right for you.

L

I Also Heard "The Truth About Abs" by Mike Geary has a good ab program for men and women who want to lose stomach fat. They claim there are 7 Foods you can eat that KILL stomach fat whether you exercise or not. They have a free video you can watch at http://www.truthaboutsabs.com , Good Luck and God Bless!

Hi Gmason972,

Instead of just deleting this, I think I'll leave it up as a bit of WW education about the dangers of anti-woman marketing schemes. Flat, six-pack abs are a male artifact of modern culture that have no place in the female mindset. A sleek, WW belly is curved from breastbone to pubic bones and we get it this way through safe, anatomically correct exercise that keeps the pelvic organs against the lower belly as we work. Also with whole wheat - lol - which metabolizes to enterolactones in the gut, inactivating excess estrogen so it can be excreted from the body. Please do not post further about this product.

Christine

Sorry christine, I did not quite understand your comment about whole wheat - is it in fact beneficial for us? I have been trying to avoid wheat recently due to all the negativite (and scary) info about it. Freekeh, which is young wheat harvested and roasted when it is still green is a big part of our traditional diet and I would like to go back to eating it - but only if it is good for me. I would love your feedback re this issue. Thank you

Hi CB,

This is an entire book in itself, but from what I've been able to determine, the same whole grains that sustained entire civilizations through thousands of years also provide important phytoestrogens to women (and men!). In this country, wheat has become a poison for many, many people. Some say it has always been so, which I don't believe. Bread flour has been terribly adulterated with bleaching agents and dough conditioners, some of which form extremely toxic substances in the gut. I think it's possible that these agents (esp. the ones used in the 1930s-1940s) not only caused extreme allergies to wheat, but even breaks in DNA and multi-generational intolerances.

Wheat is very plentiful in my diet - but it's always ground fresh and lightly handled, and I never eat it more than once a day. Always starting the day with some combination of fruit and nuts.

Hope this helps a little.

Christine

In relation to working on specific areas of the body for weight loss/toning etc. I have read about not tucking in your tail bone and relaxing the stomach, therefore not tightening the stomach. Not doing anything that requires you to hold your breath (if I understood correctly).

My question is, is there any exercises you 'can' do that include tightening the stomach. For example, low step up then lifting your knee in a crunch style whilst up. Controlled while maintaining the ww posture. I guess I am hoping that correct breathing and emphasis at the correct point may make it ok to tighten your mid section. Therefore tighten the mid section...?
I shouldn't push boundaries but I actually want to get the most out of my exercises as a pose to 30% results because I didn't ask (and push myself)

Thanks

Hi Findmehappier

I read from your post that you want to move some stomach fat and tone your abdominal muscles, but you have POP, and have realised rightly that crunches will produce POP symptoms. you have also picked up that anything that worsens your POP symptoms may ultimately worsen your POPs. So far, so good.

When you say 'tightening the stomach', I think you might mean shortening the rectus abdominus muscles by contracting them, to try and pull the pubic bones at their lower extremity, closer to the underside of the ribcage, their upper extremity. There is another way of tightening these muscles, which involves exactly the opposite of the first exercise. This is by moving the pubic bones and the underside of the ribs further apart, instead of closer together, by lifting the chest. This stretches the RA muscles, which contract slightly at the end of the chest lift, to limit this stretch.

Ideally, muscles need to be stretched long, and contracted up short, to make them stronger. So both are OK as long as the pelvic organs are 'around the corner', and away from intraabdominal pressure.

I am having a little difficulty visualising the exercise that you propose. Does it have a name?

There isn't anything intrinsically wrong with tightening your mid-section when needed. That's what these muscles do when they are working. One exercise you could do would be bent or straight leg lifts in a Captain's Chair. These will probably not give you symptoms because your lumbar curve will be in place, and your butt will not be tucked. The RA is also used for forced expiration, when intraabdominal pressure generated by inhaling, is being decreased, so poses little threat to pelvic organ structure (I think).

The difference between these leg lifts and a crunch type exercise is that in the former the pelvis is hanging from the spine, whereas in the latter the pelvis has the weight of the spine and all the abdominal muscles pressing down on it. Also, when the body is supported from the shoulder joints the lumbar curve will form spontaneously, whereas when the whole weight of the torso is acting on the pelvis in a crunch the lumbar curve will spontaneously straighten, which puts the structure of your pelvic organ support at risk.

Another exercise you could do is on all fours. Weight on both hands and your left knee and foot, stretch your right leg to the back and up to probably just above horizontal, then bend the right knee and bring it to your chest. This will shorten the RA on the righthand side. Repeat on the left, and repeat both sides as many times as you want to. This exercise will both stretch and contract your RA muscles, one side at a time. It will also work your internal and external oblique muscles. Because it is a one-sided exercise I would imagine that the transverse abdominus muscle would be used to stabilise the abdominal contents on the non-working side during the forward movement of the working leg. You can get really tricky with this exercise and lift the left hand when you work the right leg. This makes balancing quite difficulty and will bring in all sorts of muscles to stabilise your torso and enable you to keep your balance.

I am not a personal trainer, so check the technique of this with a personal trainer. I have worked out this exercise intuitively as a way of stretching and working all your abdominal muscles without directing intraabdominal pressure at the top of your vagina. I have done it myself, but not specifically for abs.

If you can do the exercise you described without producing symptoms it is probably OK. Becoming aware of the manoeuvres that give you symptoms, and tweaking them, perhaps in a different direction, you can invent new exercises that work OK.

You will find that the WW Yoga DVDs also have exercises that strengthen the abdominal muscles, but also strengthen other muscles as well as a part of the whole exercise being done.

If you are going to strengthen your abdominal muscles then you will also need to strengthen your pelvic floor muscles to balance the pressure at the front with the pressure at the back. If you turn a trampoline on its side and hit a golf ball at the tramp mat it will bounce off hard. If you fasten a bed sheet in all corners and hit the golf ball at the bed sheet the golf ball will probably tumble to the ground because the sheet has no elasticity. It merely deforms and absorbs the force of the ball. This is analogous to having abs of steel compared to abs of an invalid.

If the golf ball is bounced hard, straight back at the top of your vagina your pelvic floor muscles have to be like steel to bounce it back again, without deforming and allowing your pelvic organs to move down the vagina.

Wholewoman abs are somewhere between the two, soft enough to absorb much of the intraabdominal pressure generated during exercise and breathing, so it is not deflected back forcefully at the pelvic floor. The pelvic floor is thin, sinewy muscle like a curtain, designed to be retracted to let out babies, urine and faeces. It is not designed for keeping things in. That's why it is tucked away around the bend in the lumbar spine. That is also why pregnant women often feel like they have a lot of pressure on their pelvic floor during later pregnancy. This ability to open up at the very end of pregnancy is probably related to the straightening of the lumbar spine at the very end, when the baby's head engages, and assists in dilatation of the cervix and birth canal by gently putting pressure on the pelvic floor.

Hope these explanations help.

Louise

Unfortunately there is no targeting of weight lost. Having lost 136lbs - I have found that consistency is the key (No I didnt typo that 136lbs - LOL)

I have found that the easiest way for me to lose weight - Without really trying too hard was to - Give up ALL diet products! I will eat none of those Aspartame filled poisons. used to drink a ton of diet coke - I gained a ton of weight - When I gave up the final diet product (hermesetas in tea) my weight returned to where I started! - It took me a long long time to get the gist of it - And I am now more slender than I was when i was 16-17yrs old!

I look on life like this - I eat to live, I dont live to eat. I eat as many good foods as I can, but I still like chocolate - LOL. I am 'Calorie conscious' to make sure I do not go UNDER 1700-1800 cals or so a day - I do not work out so I hafta keep my eye on myself but I also dont count every morsel of food I eat. I read on this thing called Hara Hachi Bu - that we should eat 80% of what we think we should and our weight will be relatively level. My weight is pretty level within a pound or two up or down - Returning to the number it chooses where it likes to reside LOL - I had my Cholesterol checked recently and my Dr was happy with me at 3.9 (mighta been 3.8 i forget lol) I do not eat a ton of meat.

Methinks that if you focus on one area - That seems to be the only one where fat doesnt go from LOL - I have always hated my legs and I still ain't too keen on them now LOL

To be honest - I think just being in posture helps the belly to look fitter and tighter - Although i cannot prove that - I know my belly FEELS better and less loose since I have been in posture for quite a few years now - How many years I forget - Hmmm - I think it must be about 6 or 7yrs I have been part of this wondrous site now!

All I know is a guy said to me recently 'You look fit for someone whose had 3 kids' First real compliment I have had in many a year! - Kind of embarrasing when he said I was sexy - I am sure he needs a sight test LOLOL

I hope you find your answer :-) Good luck!

Thank you so much louiseds for your response to this. I will re-read a few times to really understand your suggestions.
I know of no name for the exercise. Just to clarify - I step up onto a ledge with my right foot and in one fluid movement, lift my left leg off the ground into bent knee, kinda in line with my chest (I place a bit of oomph/crunch at that point) and lower it back down again. Then returning my right foot to the ground after the left. and repeat 20 times then swap legs.

I understand what you are saying about stretching as a pose to crunching. I think I can use this whilst standing straight and tilting side to side.
I will definatly try the one on all fours your suggest also. Any advise on dead lifts? It sounds like thee will be ok. I just have in my head that I will also get better results from resistance training like step ups, assisted squats and leg presses so I need to change my mind set and focus on technique firstly.

I am frequently (although not enough) exercising my pelvic floor so this should help.

Thank you MemyselfandI also!!
I hear what you are saying. Congrats on your weight loss results btw!! Where I may differ from you is 'I love to eat' and whilst I am reasonably healthy, I do enjoy cheese, cream and carbs (not so much excessive sweets). I try to reduce 'overeating' through sensible meal portions and balance my diet.
It fights against my cause a little and that's where I need my exercise to pay off and then some to make up for my enjoyment of cooking and eating. I am not overweight so I am talking maintaining a further loss of 3-4 kg (currenlty 60kg although 55kg pre-baby weight would be perfect). My stomach is not my main focus, I think I can reduce bloating which will correct that area by giving up some foods.

What I leaning towards is being able to get the most out of exercises wholisticaly by placing extra emphasis e.g. tightening buttocks or stomach at the most critical point of each exercise.

Bring on the curves and the strong muscles that support them. You guys are really helping to motivate me. THANKS A MILLION!! have a great day!

FMH

Hi All,
Fascinating discussions... Just throwing in a couple more spoonfuls of thoughts:
I found it a little difficult to follow the descriptions of certain exercises. It just is hard to describe exercises in writing!
I think the WW exercises tends to think in whole body holistic terms, rather than isolating and focusing on a particular part of the body, as everything interacts with everything at some level. The WW dvd's help to explain the fundamental principles behind the WW posture and exercises and also offer WW exercise/yoga sessions which will help to tone the whole body. I think once you've got the hang of the WW exercises/yoga it becomes easier to know and feel what's ok and what isn't in all areas of life.
Love to all, wholewomanukx