Help My Pouch!!

Hi A.

Just to give you a little of my background: I am a certified Fitness Professional and have been training and instructing for over 20 years with certifications from several different highly accredited and internationally reknowned organizations. As a mother of 3 myself (and stepmother to 5 more!) I am fully aware of your position. Let me give you a little information on your abdominal and core area. The rectus abdominis runs down the front of your tummy from your sternum to your pubis. It is the only muscle in the body that works in 2 directions and made up of 8 segments of muscle (so it's an 8-pack not a 6-pack!). The most common movements people make to engage the abs and strengthen them are moves which bring the shoulders towards the hips, working mainly the top part of the abs. Your concern is probably with the lower abs and this will need you to make abdominal moves to bring the hips towards the shoulders. Here's a great little number you can try IF YOU ARE AN APPARENTLY HEALTHY FEMALE ADULT WITH NO KNOWN MEDICAL CONDITIONS OR LIMITATIONS. Lie on your back, place your hands under your tailbone and bring your knees towards your chest, keeping them bent. Try and lift your hips off your hands, bringing the knees diagonally towards your left shoulder. Release down, without letting the feet swing to the floor (keep them from swinging past your hips) and then turn the knees towards your right shoulder and lift the hips off your hands again, bring the knees towards your right shoulder. Do as many as you can and try and do it at least once every day, twice if you can.

Please feel free to visit my website at www.myfridayfitness.com where you can register as a client and I can send you free advice, exercises and tips. I would love to hear from you and I have many, many more exercise you may like to try.

Good luck. Take care

C.

2 moms found this helpful

I do my crunches on an exercise ball -- you get a much better extension so you're working the entire length of your abs. Have a trainer at your gym show you the proper set up if you can. If that's not an option, here's a link to a pretty good explanation:

http://www.shapefit.com/abs-exercises-exercise-ball-crunc...

Good luck!

1 mom found this helpful

Exercise will definitely help tone up your muscles which can help with the pouch and thighs. Yoga and pilates are great ones, but don't forget the cardio too - it takes both to get the best results.

The sad news is that your body really is never going to go back to the way it was in high school. You can reduce the pouch and tone the thighs, and the excercise will also help you feel good, but as we age, and especially as we have babies, our bodies re-proportion themselves. I used to look at the gals at the gym with the super-tight abs (and other "ideal" body parts) and wish that I could look like that again. But I've realized that it won't happen. I just reminds myself that this body grew 3 beautiful babies, who are my life (and now kids) and that I am beautiful still. My husband thinks I'm sexier than ever for my woman's body, and I'm sure your husband thinks the same about you.

Again, don't not exercise and eat well - you want a healthy body and you want to be in good shape. But we need to start ignoring society's definition of the perfect body and stop trying to get as close to that as possible!

1 mom found this helpful

Consistency is key! After I had my first son (c-section, delivery weight 155-lost 20 & gained 30) we simply walked our neighborhood. I really didn't do too much exercise-wise really, but our neighbhood was hilly & we'd walk a minimum of an hour each day. Hubby & I lived in an apt & I didn't know a soul-that's how I passed the time. Great exercise & baby loved to be outdoors. By my 6 week check, I'd put close to 100 mi on the stroller (guessing by my routes)& was down to 135!!
After 2nd baby (VBAC, deployed hubby & 2 YO @ home, gained 30 lbs, del weight 180), I was lazier. I didn't lose as fast, but I started working out, doing :08 abs & :08 buns (cheesy early 90s but soo effective!) & the basic Tae Bo workout daily. Not sure what my weights were but I looked GREAT when hubby came home 3 mos PP. I didn't do as much walking since the 2.5 YO didn't like riding in the stroller for too long.
Recently I bought the Tae Bo Billy's Favorite Moves or something like that (it's one of the bootcamp videos I guess). I've been alternating that w/the Beachbody's P90X level 3/4 sculpt (got just the one video for filling out a survey w/them) & the Turbo Jam videos (my treat to myself last year for my bday). I love the TJ videos! Tony Little, as annoying as he is, is also very effective too-any of his videos.
Just putting the baby in the stroller & walking the neighborhood-especially if you can work in a hill daily-will do you wonders! Since you're a SAHM you can probably easily work in an hour each day walking-or even an hour on weekdays

I love Jazzercise, it is a fun workout, but is a good, hard sweat and it has great strenghth training and toning songs!

HAve you thought about doing a colon cleanse? That helped get rid of my tummy and it was wonderful. It also helps to do a parasite cleanse at the same time. Might as well knock both out if you are going to do one. good luck with your goal and way to go getting down below high school wieght! I am getting ready to do a cleanse now since I am done nursing...we will be in it togther!

Prevention belly fat diet. It is awesome and helps you keep it off and make a better healthy eating plan.

I wasn't going to respond, but wow, what discouragement you got from the other posts!! Not that they're entirely wrong or ill-intended. But let me just tell you this: I'm 27 (28 next month) and have had 4 kids all very close together (3 pregnancies/deliveries - one was twins and a C-section) With twins, the stretching of the skin and weight gain is much worse than with a single baby. Now. Having said all that, let me get to my point: I have a bikini belly. Well... mostly. The other posters are not wrong when they say you'll have extra skin and stretching and other issues from pregnancy. It depends on the person as to how bad it will be. For me, I have the muscle tone and the flat look underneath my skin. And when I say "underneath my skin" what I mean is when I'm standing in a swimsuit, looking in the mirror, I look great. Flat tummy, no wrinkles of stretched skin, etc. The problem comes when I bend over or hunch my back over. Then I see the wrinkles in my skin around my belly button like others have said. So yes, you'll have that pregnancy badge of honor in your stretchy skin probably. But it's not impossible to have the flat bikini tummy too.

Okay... so how? sit-ups, leg lifts and crunches. That's how I did it. It also helps to keep your tummy muscles taut as you're going about your daily business. For example, when I'm sitting at the computer (right now) my muscles are sucked in a bit. When I'm walking through the grocery store, I'm tensing up my stomach muscles to "keep them in place." I know that sounds like a lot of work, but really, once you start doing it and it becomes a habit, it's actually uncomfortable to fully relax them and "let it all hang out" so to speak. But to get it all started in the right direction, do your normal exercise routine for cardio and whatever else you do, then as your cool down, lie on your back and do a set of crunches. Do the straight on, and diagonal ones to get the sides, too. Then I go one more step and lie flat on my back with my hands under my rear, and with my legs straight out, lift straight up (until they're at least a 45 degree angle from the ground) to work your lower abs and front of your legs.

So... don't be totally discouraged. It is possible. But they're right. you won't have your high school body with no flaws. You did have a beautiful baby, after all. Good luck!

I like Tracy Anderson's workout tapes. They are low key, and very toning. YOu must be religious about using them though.
The most aggressive way to tone - and very effective - that I have ever tried is CrossFit. I can't tell if this forum is Denver only or where it is... in Denver, there is Front Range Cross Fit. Nationwide, you can google Cross Fit & find one in your area. Cross Fit is economical and effective - if you don't want to join a local one due to cost, you can do it at home on crossfit.com - it's a low equipment rudamentary workout... but not for the weak! Having people there to encourage you is really critical in getting the most out of this workout.
If money is no object, then get a personal trainer.

Well here is what works for me. It takes a while but you will see results as you go along. I set some rules for myself and it just hasn't steered me wrong yet. First rule is EVERY DAY do some form of exercise, even 10 minutes is better than nothing. Also, as fabulous as Yoga is, you really do not get your heart rate up which is so important. Next, do Billy Blanks Tae Bo at least 3 times a week minimum half hour, great for your core strength and belly flattening. I also have the Total Gym that I do inclined sit ups - the best thing EVER! You don't need a Total Gym but you can do a make-shift incline and crunch, crunch, crunch! Good luck you already got over the hard part which is getting the diet under control, the rest is a cake walk.

Congrats on losing all of your baby weight! That is quite an accomplishment. I highly recommend pilates. There is a DVD set called Windsor Pilates that I have had a lot of success with, or you can check out your regular gym. Pilates focuses primarily on that region of your body - the core - and flattens the tummy and lifts the booty. Good luck!!

I didn't read all the other posts, so hopefully I am not being redundant. I do know that white flour and sugar are big culprits of belly fat. If you cut back on them or even cut them out, you will probably have some good results. Don't cut out carbs, just make them whole grain. 'The Flat Belly Diet' may be worth reading, it talks about eating more mono-unsaturated fats to help with belly fat and control your appetite in a healthy way. I hope you find a solution!

I would suggest a pilates or yoga class. These focus on core strength for everything that you do. They both contain a lot of exercises that work the entire body. Doing reverse crunches is great for that little pouch above your bikinni line. These are when you lay on the floor and actually put your feet over your head. I have heard that the Living Yoga classes are great. I don't know if they have them in your area though.

I would say 75% of all women end up with this skin after childbirth. It is skin that was streteched, has nothing or very little to do with fat. Heck I saw Julie Roberts on a cover of something at the store and she has it.
You being so young, your skin has a better chance of redeeming it's old self, however there is a good chance it won't. Once your skin stretches so much when it goes back down this is just excess skin. It sometimes needs surgery to get rid of it, however you can tone your muscles and kind of hide it but it won't go away either by itself.
I say, wear it proud, to be honest vanity and mommyhood have little in common, hee hee.
If you have any more children then there is no reason to do anything about it now.
I have very oily skin, managed to bypass all stretch marks and lost the baby weight I gained, however right around my belly button there is puckered skin and excess, I had to have a csection too with my second so that makes it harder to go back the way it was. Consult your Dr but I wouldn't worry too much!
Hugs, For thighs, run steps, do stair masters, walk a lot...pushing a baby in a stroller around the block a few times is a great workout, get a trailer for your bike and pull him in the trailer!

Pilates. Pilates, Pilates, Pilates!! After my sixth baby (born before my oldest turned 8), I turned to Pilates in hopes of recovering what I knew was hiding under there somewhere. It came back, with a vengeance. : ) I ended up lean and stronger than I had been in years, with the bikini body that I'd always wondered if I'd ever have again. It's not going to be a result you'll see in just a week or two of course, but after about 4 weeks I started noticing a striking difference, and within 3 months I had friends asking me constantly what I was doing.

Good Luck! You can do it!

nutrition and herbs, see my response to the girl who posted right after you about losing weight caused by medications.

Ah, the infamous stretched extra-skin on the belly. Mine still hasn't really gone away, it's been 3 years AND I train for triathlons. So far as I've learned, short of surgery, being LEAN is the only answer for the extra. There is no way to target certain areas, every part of the body gets leaner by degrees. And it takes TIME. The body is more elastic for twenty-somethings, just be patient.
Good job mommin'!