How To Naturally Tighten Skin After Weight Loss

If you have lost weight recently, then you may have noticed that your skin is loose.

This can happen when people lose weight quickly. You may see skin under your arms, on your chin, or around your stomach. But it can happen anywhere on the body if someone loses weight fast.

loose skin after weight loss

The skin is the biggest organ of our body and covers everything. Under it, there is fat. Under that, there are muscles.

When you lose weight quickly and get to a lower weight, your skin does not fit you anymore because it has been stretched out by your fat and muscles before.

Then your skin can look like a loose wrapper that doesn’t cover anything right when you have lost weight quickly or went from higher weight to lower ones in a short time period.

Why Does Skin Get Loose After Weight Loss?

Your skin is a very elastic tissue. It can stretch when you move and grow, but it also has to shrink if you lose fat or muscle.

But your skin isn’t just one big piece of rubber covering your body; it is an organ. All of the other organs in your body are made up of cells too.

The outer part of your skin is called the epidermis. The cells there are always being replaced with new ones. But the other layers of skin – the dermis and sub-dermis, are a bit more permanent.

These parts of your skin are made up of elastic connective tissues, fibers, blood vessels, and all sorts of things that can stretch or contract depending on what you do to them.

When you lose weight, the elasticity in your skin might change. The elasticity in your skin might not be as flexible to fit with the new shape of your body because it is losing layers of fat and has little time to adapt.

In general, when you lose weight, the first thing that goes is excess pounds. But then your skin might not shrink enough because of the leftover fat under it. So even if you have reached your goal weight, some of this fat may still be hanging around.

Our body has fat on it that is full of beta-2 and alpha-2 receptors. Beta-2 and Alpha-2 interact with catecholamines to cause stored fat to be set free. B-2 receptors are the ones that make us lose weight or ‘easy’ fat. A-2 receptors are the ones that make it hard to lose weight or stubborn fat.

If your loose skin is more than a few millimetres thick, that means it is actually fat. This means that if you keep up with your new lifestyle of weighing less, your skin will continue to shrink and tighten. Eventually, there will not be any loose skin left.

How To Prevent Loose Skin?

Crash diets and excessive exercise can cause your body to lose muscle and fat, which is bad for your skin. The muscles will no longer support the skin and will not have enough fat to keep it stretched tight.

Loose Skin After Weight Loss

Even those that say they can help you lose weight slowly, most weight loss programs only cause 1-2 pounds of fat to be lost per week. You can only lose 2-3 pounds of body fat per month. Any weight loss beyond that is probably from muscle and not fat.

In a 2008 study, researchers found that small changes in diet and activity can lead to slow but sustainable weight loss.

This type of slow, steady weight loss also avoids problems like loose skin. You can lose weight slowly. You should also do some exercise when you are losing weight.

Best 4 Ways To Tighten Skin After Weight Loss Naturally

1. Stay hydrated

Drink water. This will make your skin healthy and strong. Your body needs water to function well, and one of the places it gets that water is through your skin cells.

Skin cells need a lot of water to do their job. If you don’t drink enough water, your skin will be less elastic and less healthy-looking because it won’t have as many cells that work well together to make up a big organ.

2. Eat Protein Rich Food

Two things that keep skin plump and elastic are collagen and elastin. You need to eat protein-rich foods, such as cheese, milk, beans, nuts, and fish, for these important things.

These foods also contain oils to help maintain healthy skin.

3. Exfoliation

Nourish and care for your skin each day. You can do this by removing dead skin cells through exfoliation.

When you take a bath, add salts and minerals to increase your skin’s tone. Skin tightening creams with herbal formulas can help the skin get hydrated and increase collagen.

4. Increase Your Body’s Muscle Mass

When people lose weight, their skin becomes loose because the fat holding it in place has been removed. But you can fix this by building muscle.

Muscle takes up more space than fat, so it will help make your skin look tighter. You can do this by doing exercises like push-ups and squats for your arms and legs.

About Jessica J, M.D

Written & reviewed by Dr. Jessica J. Follow me on Pinterest & LinkedIn.