How This Girl Went From Skinny Fat to Lean

Susie is a girl that looks thin on the surface, with slender arms and legs. However, while she may look fit at first, when you look closer, you’ll see that she has a flabby belly and her arms and legs aren't too lean. Fitness experts call Susie’s body type “skinny fat”. It’s when your body looks thin and fits great in clothes, but is flabby underneath.

Urban Dictionary defines skinny fat as:

“A person who is not overweight and has a skinny look but still has a high fat percentage and low muscular mass. Usually those people have a low caloric diet, that's why they are skinny, but are not involved in any sports activities or trainings and that's why they don’t have any muscle. Since between the bone and the skin those people only have fat, the skin can be deformed easily because the skin layer is located on an unstable matter (fat).”

Eating More of the Right Things

To get out of her skinny fat body, Susie decided to eat healthier while working on some muscle-toning exercises. Instead of staying away from food, Susie ate MORE of the RIGHT things, such as lean meat, whole wheat products, protein rich items, and vegetables.

Susie made conscious choices when eating out or cooking at home. She made healthy substitutes and swapped food types with better options. Below is a glimpse of her healthier choices:

Chicken â€" Instead of getting the usual legs or thighs, Susie opted for breasts, because they were the leanest part of the chicken. She also stayed away from fried and deep fried chicken, and ordered grilled or baked instead.

Beef â€" She skipped the tenderloin cuts and opted for eye of round because it had the least amount of fat.

Rice â€" Instead of white rice, Susie cooked a lot of brown rice and quinoa. These types of foods have less carbs, and way more protein. Plus, they tasted very similar to rice anyway, so Susie didn't have a hard time with the switch.

Bread â€" When it came to sandwiches, Susie always chose wheat instead of white. Whole wheat is healthier, contains far less carbs, and is minimally processed.

She also learned how to read labels. She knew that if a product had too much fat, trans fat, sugar, or sodium, she shouldn't buy it.

Sit-Ups and Weights

Susie didn't do a lot of cardio and running, because she knew that she didn’t really need cardio in her workouts. Instead, she focused on the specific parts of her bodyâ€"arms, thighs, legs, and stomach.

Susie worked on toning her muscles. She lifted 5 â€" 10 pound weights to tone her arms. She did push ups to help sculpt the arms that she wanted. To flatten her belly and get rid of the flab, she combined various stomach exercises such as sit-ups and crunches. To tone her upper thighs and legs, Susie did numerous squats and standing calf raises.

After just 4 months, Susie and everyone around her noticed a big change. She was still skinny, but instead of being flabby on the inside, she was lean, toned, and physically fit.

Image credit: mikebaird on Flickr