It is usually easier to lose weight as a teenager than as an adult due in part to metabolic differences. It is beneficial to achieve and maintain a healthy weight as a teen and carry it forward into adulthood.
The finding of the study suggests that people in middle age certainly gain weight and it is harder for them to lose it, but slow metabolism is not the real reason behind it. It was revealed that from the 20s to the 50s the energy expenditure is the most stable.
Losing weight is easier as a teen than as an adult. This is due to fast metabolisms and changing, growing bodies. It's important to take advantage of this time in a teen's life by building healthy habits for long term health.
It is estimated that your metabolism slows down 5% every decade after you turn 40. This can occur because of the loss of muscle (or sarcopenia) which plays a crucial part in maintaining your metabolism. Consequently, as you age you may not be able to maintain the same dietary behaviors without gaining weight.
Research shows that children who lose weight are less likely to gain it back than teenagers or adults. “As hard as it is to make a change at age 10, it's that much easier than at 30 or 40.” As hard as it is to make a change at age 10, it's that much easier than at 30 or 40.
It's Harder for Women to Lose Weight — Really
By nature, women tend to have a lower metabolic rate than men. This means your body uses fewer calories (units of energy) to fuel normal body functions like breathing, thinking, and circulating your blood. The leftover calories are stored as fat.
Randy Turner, the manager of the Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital Fort Worth Fitness Center, said that men tend to lose weight faster than women primarily due to a key physical difference. “In most cases, men have more lean muscle than women, so it's easier for them to lose weight more quickly,” he explained.
Your body shape changes naturally as you age. You cannot avoid some of these changes, but your lifestyle choices may slow or speed the process. The human body is made up of fat tissue, lean tissue (muscles and organs), bones, and water. After age 30, people tend to lose lean tissue.
Epidemiologists have observed that the average person typically puts on 1 to 2 pounds a year from early adulthood through middle age. The CDC's numbers show that much of the increase is concentrated in the 20s, for men and women.
As a result, losing belly fat often takes hard work, especially if you're in your 40s or older. That's because your hormones and your belly fat affect each other, and as your hormone levels change during middle age, fat around your midsection tends to accumulate faster than it does in other areas.
A BMI between 25 to 29.9 is considered overweight. Anything over 30 is considered obese. Normal BMI is between 18.5 and 24.9. BMI cut-offs for people of South Asian descent are different.
“Obesity incidence starts increasing in one's twenties and peaks at 40 to 59, and then decreases slightly after age 60,” says Craig Primack, MD, an obesity medicine physician at the Scottsdale Weight Loss Center in Arizona.
Muscle is denser than fat, and as it is more compact within your body, as you gain muscle mass, you end up looking thinner, no matter your physical weight. So, if you've been doing a lot of strength training lately, it's likely this is the reason that you're looking fantastic but not dropping those numbers.
Summary: Have you ever noticed that people have thinner arms and legs as they get older? As we age it becomes harder to keep our muscles healthy. They get smaller, which decreases strength and increases the likelihood of falls and fractures.
Physical and lifestyle changes
Puberty – Increased hormones in a child's body during puberty (between the ages of 10 and 14 for girls and between the ages of 12 and 16 for boys) leads to growth and possible expansion of “baby fat” areas. This typically takes place in girls' belly, breast area and hips.
A 15-30# weight gain in a couple of years can be shocking, especially if you're used to looking at a lean child, but it is normal. (Even if weight gain is beyond these “norms,” it can still be normal for your teenager, depending on the historical growth pattern. Remember: Take a look at the growth charts.)
The changes that come with puberty include weight gain and, in guys, broader shoulders and increased muscle mass. Because everyone is on a different schedule, some of your friends may have started puberty when they were as young as 8 (if they're girls) or 9 (if they're guys).
Lean body mass in girls diminishes from approximately 80 percent to 75 percent by the end of puberty, while the amount of body fat increases. In comparison, the percentage of lean muscle mass in boys increases from about 80 percent to 90 percent by the time they reach adulthood.
As a child's entire body size increases, the amount of body fat stays relatively stable, giving her a thinner look. Also during this stage of life, a child's legs are longer in proportion to the body than they were before.
Results. Body Mass Index (BMI) based-obesity is more prevalent among older women than men (26.3% vs. 17.6%). Similarly, higher proportion of older women was at high-risk waist circumference (37.1% vs 8.9%) and waist-hip ratio (78.5 vs 75.4%) than men respectively.
Mostly, losing weight is an internal process. You will first lose hard fat that surrounds your organs like liver, kidneys and then you will start to lose soft fat like waistline and thigh fat. The fat loss from around the organs makes you leaner and stronger.