Possible for Middle-Aged Men to Not Have "Muffin Tops" Around Waist?
November 5, 2019 1:12 PM   Subscribe

I'm in my 50's and have a very ectomorphy body and have always been skinny. I had a year of gaining some weight (maybe 7 pounds above normal) and now I've lost it but still have those gross bulges protruding over my swimsuit. Is it ever possible for us old people to naturally lose them?

I feel like I have all the basic bases covered: I eat a zone diet that I know works for me, I do intermittent fasting and fasted interval workouts. I'm actually within a pound or two of the lowest weight I've ever been as an adult. (And I've convinced myself that my motivation is not vanity--I'm thinking I actually enjoy working out more without feeling those things jiggling about....)
Very frustrating....
posted by Jon44 to Health & Fitness (8 answers total) 3 users marked this as a favorite
 
More weightlifting/bodyweight exercise like pushups and chinups? I'd advise this in general because it works well for me, but specifically for skinny guys with patches of pudge, that's my ex husband. And when he was in his late forties, at least (haven't seen him much since then) doing a bunch of pushups and chinups for a while wouldn't exactly bulk him up, but even a little extra muscle bulk seemed to kind of pull the lumpiness into a more appealing shape. I wouldn't think of it as trying to get big, but adding a bit of muscle mass might resolve your issue.
posted by LizardBreath at 1:56 PM on November 5, 2019


Have you recently lost the weight? It can take some time for loose skin to bounce back.
posted by burntflowers at 2:34 PM on November 5, 2019 [5 favorites]


Cool sculpting works, in my experience. It takes a few months to notice and generally needs two applications per area
posted by waving at 4:39 PM on November 5, 2019


Turns out that fat can produce a lot of different hormones.

I think it's clear that the body can and will lay down deposits of fat to augment sex hormone production from testes and ovaries which naturally declines with age.

There are bunches of clinics out there which offer to treat 'low T' with replacement hormones, and all the testimonials I've heard seem to talk about losing "belly fat".

But there are side effects which don't make it into testimonials, and those often include worsening decline of hormone production from the testes that can be irreversible.
posted by jamjam at 7:40 PM on November 5, 2019


it's possible that while you're at your desired weight, the proportions of muscle vs fat that give you that weight have shifted, and you might want to try things that allow for you to shift it back, for example continuing to stay in caloric debt while also making sure you get enough protein, and then incorporate a mass building weight routine into your exercise (eg a 5x5 type exercise plan or similar progressive, efficient, multiple muscle group workout) 2-3 times a week.
posted by zippy at 8:14 PM on November 5, 2019 [1 favorite]


Yeah, weight isn’t an actual concrete number that tells you much. Your body is bone, fat, muscle and water. The same height/weight can look vastly different in composition. Losing weight without building muscle will leave you what’s known as “skinny fat” where you’ll be shapely in clothes but not without. Muscles are what gives the body shape.

Anyway, bodies often deposit fat there and you can’t spot target fat removal via exercise. Build muscle and lose fat and your body will get rid of those. They may be the last excessive parts to go though if that’s where your body wants to deposit fat. So whether or not that’s worth it is up to you.
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 8:33 PM on November 5, 2019 [3 favorites]


Yup, it's a build muscle/lose fat problem. Harder as you get older, but due to inertia as much as anything else. FWIW I know a dude in his sixties who now has a full-on six-pack after getting alarmed about his dad bod - his trick is to do a little core work every single day, and a real workout a couple times a week.
posted by aspersioncast at 7:12 AM on November 6, 2019 [1 favorite]


Going along with what others are saying about body composition, around age 40, the body starts to lose muscle mass. Past 35, the average human will lose 3-5% of their muscle mass per decade. At 35, you might have been 42% muscle, but at 55, that might have become 36% muscle. If you're 160 lbs, that means that 67 pounds of muscle turned into 57 lbs of muscle. That means that even if your entire body is the same weight at age 35, at 55 you're likely carrying 10 extra pounds of fat at that weight.

I know that in my mid-40's skin sack, at 180 I don't have much muffin top on my lower back, but even at 185 I definitely notice it, and generally my body is really good at evenly distributing my weight.

Stregth programs can limit the amount of muscle mass you lose, and as LizardBreath mentioned, additional muscle tone generally makes one look better. If you try to shift your fat composition down, make sure you're getting a lot of protein and doing some strength work to limit muscle loss. Without strength work and protein, your body will shed muscle along with fat if you're losing weight.
posted by nobeagle at 7:13 AM on November 6, 2019 [2 favorites]


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