Belly fat, or stomYou can lose belly fatach fat, is something that a lot of people struggle with. That is especially true for people over the age of forty. If you're a woman, it can be even more of a challenge.

While many profess to have the belly fat cure, there is unfortunately no easy solution. But belly fat doesn't have to be an inevitable part of aging. There are things you can do to lose belly fat.

What causes belly fat?

Belly fat is just like any other kind of fat on your body. It just happens to accumulate around the middle. Some of that may be due to body type (apple body types, for example, tend to have more belly fat than pear types). Also, as we age, we tend to accumulate fat around our midsections. This is especially true for women.

How to lose belly fat.

The secret to losing belly fat is no different than losing fat anywhere else on your body: you must take in fewer calories than you use. There is no special diet or special foods that will direct that fat loss to your belly. But if you adjust your diet to decrease the number of calories you're taking in to below that that you're using, you will lose fat, including fat around your belly.

Exercise alone - particularly ab exercises - will not reduce your belly fat if you're still taking in too many calories. Still it's important to exercise and the following section will explain why.

Exercise to lose belly fat.

First let's look at ab exercises. If all you do is ab exercises, you're likely to build strong abs but they will still be hidden under a layer of belly fat. That's why ab exercises alone are rarely the answer.

Still, ab exercises (and strength exercises of other kinds as well) can help and here's why: building more muscle through strength exercise helps to make your metabolism run more quickly. This, in turn, burns more calories, helping you with your weight loss efforts. And stomach fat will be part of that weight loss. Muscle requires more calories to maintain than fat, so if you build muscle anywhere on your body, you will burn more calories, even when at rest.

Cardio exercise (walking, running, swimming, etc.) is helpful for the reasons outlined at the beginning of this article: cardio will help you burn calories, helping you to tip the balance of the calories in/calories used equation.

Be realistic.

Most people are interested in losing belly fat fast. That's understandable, but it's important to realize that it didn't go on fast and it's probably not going to come off that way either. A slower, more moderate weight loss will be more sustainable in the long run. Being realistic with your efforts to get rid of belly fat will help you stay in the for the long haul and that is where the greatest rewards can be found!