Is It Possible To Lose A Lot Of Weight Without Excess Skin

The aftermath of weight loss is often expected and welcomed: college free energy levels, smaller pants, and a more divers body. Merely in that location is one unexpected challenge: tightening your skin afterward losing weight. This unwanted modify can be uncomfortable, frustrating, and leave yous dislocated about what to do next.

Here's how to tighten your skin while losing weight, continue it tight, and find out what causes peel to stretch in the kickoff place.

Why does loose pare later weight loss happen?

According to Jordan Jacobs, M.D., an banana professor of plastic and reconstructive surgery at Mountain Sinai Infirmary in New York, loose skin is usually caused by the post-obit:

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Rapid weight loss

Usually seen in people who undergo bariatric surgery for massive weight loss (more than 100 pounds), about seventy percent of people who undergo the procedure are left with excess skin, some studies notice. "Losing weight rapidly doesn't requite our peel adequate time to gradually contract and this results in loose, hanging skin," says Dr. Jacobs.

And then who can wait loose skin later weight loss? While it varies, mild weight loss (remember: 20 pounds or less) typically doesn't lead to excess skin, Zuckerman says. Weight loss of xl to l pounds can seem equally massive as a weight loss of 100+ pounds.

Gradual weight gain

But loose skin post-weight loss is also a production of the weight gain itself. "Skin has a finite elasticity, and if pushed beyond the limit of that elasticity upon weight gain, the skin cannot fully contract back downwardly upon subsequent weight loss," explains Joshua Zuckerman, M.D., surgical managing director at New York City-based Zuckerman Plastic Surgery.

Aging pare

Also: It's not merely how much weight you lose, but your historic period and skin quality that determines whether or not you'll experience loose skin after weight loss, he says. "Younger patients accept a ameliorate hazard at avoiding backlog peel equally practice those with inherently high pare elasticity." (As y'all historic period, the elastic fibers and collagen molecules that give your skin its firmness lose their strength.)

Men also tend to do ameliorate in their artillery and legs than women do, notes Jeffrey Thou. Kenkel, Thousand.D., a professor and chair of the Betty and Warren Woodward Chair in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery at UT Southwestern Medical Heart.

How tin you go rid of loose pare afterwards weight loss?

According to Dr. Jacobs, here are some options for tightening your peel later weight loss:

Surgical removal

"Typically speaking, later bariatric surgery or massive weight loss, plastic surgery is required to remove excess skin," says Zuckerman. "These plastic surgery procedures are very effective and typically involve cutting away excess skin and lifting or reshaping the remaining tissue."

Liposuction

On top of surgical excision, options include liposuction (which uses a suction technique to remove fatty, and, for patients with mild skin (and fat) excess, non-invasive procedures usually in the form of ultrasound or radiofrequency procedures that heat up the skin and cause contraction by triggering collagen product, explains Jacobs. You might accept micro-needling with radio frequency energy washed, for example, which makes thousands of tiny punctures in your skin and delivers radiofrequency energy during treatment, explains Zuckerman.

Body contouring

Patients tin can also turn to contouring procedures such as BodyTite and FaceTite (which tin can exist used in conjunction with liposuction) to remove fat and tighten skin, merely for all just mild cases of excess skin, these treatments may not fully address the trouble, he notes.

Slower weight loss

While it's not always an choice (especially for those who have bariatric surgery done), gradual weight loss seems to be the best though for preventing loose skin in the first identify, notes Jacobs.

Practice

Edifice musculus—by fashion of a solid practice regimen with strength training work—is e'er a good idea. Plus, it can make your skin look tauter, says Holly Wyatt, Chiliad.D., professor of medicine at the Academy of Colorado.

In curt, surgical excision (though it comes with a longer recovery) remains the gold standard, says Jacobs (and produces "profound" furnishings) and the results from the more minimally-invasive treatments are what y'all would look: subtle, he says.

Tin can loose skin afterwards weight loss go away on its own?

Not really, docs say—though retrieve, how much excess skin you're left with and how well your pare responds to weight loss in the first place depends on everything from age and genetics to how much weight you lost and your skin quality. And so, depending on your circumstance, yous might exist able to await some changes.

"Patients who may meet improvement in their loose skin are those who exercise not accept stretch marks and younger patients who nevertheless accept reasonable skin quality despite weight gain," says Kenkel. "The quality of the skin is the key to comeback."

Jacobs also suggests that if you've lost weight gradually to give your skin a full yr to contract once you've reached your goal weight. "After this time, yous are not going to see whatsoever more than noticeable tightening."

Then, if you have loose pare you lot're concerned about—or if you accept loose peel later bariatric surgery—do your homework and go in touch with a plastic surgeon certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery to learn about your options, suggests Jacobs. "In that location are a lot of physicians that characterization themselves as 'plastic surgeons' and, every bit long as they have a valid medical license, they tin legally perform whatsoever procedure," he says. "But the American Board of Plastic Surgery denotes the proper grooming."

What is the best home remedy to tighten your skin?

Likewise the non-invasive and minimally-invasive options out there that are somewhat effective, (but, again, usually just for those with balmy cases) at that place'south no magic skin tightening cream or exercise that's going to tighten loose skin after weight loss on its own. That'south what makes excess skin a difficult problem for those with more moderate cases, says Zuckerman.

Rubbing cocoa butter on your skin might sound like a practiced idea, but while many topical products claim to tighten skin, doctors are skeptical. "There are no efficacious topical products or OTC remedies for excess skin," says Zuckerman. Jacobs adds that whatever product y'all're going to purchase for this issue ordinarily will have subtle results at best.

The all-time home remedy, then? "Taking care of your skin," says Jacobs. "This includes sun protection, avoiding smoking, limiting alcohol consumption, and eating a diet rich in fruits and vegetables and depression in sugar and saturated fats."