How to eat and exercise according to your body type?

[Sleepwalker]

First, hello to everyone.. I'm just so glad that this forum is finally been made  I really needed this right now.
I'm 18, female and pear shaped. I've been unhappy with my body type for a long time and I've been working to make it more proportional. In fact, in the last few weeks I was so obsessed with this idea that I have to slim down my legs that I did only cardio, but only for the lower body (running, jumping, combinations of various squats, lunges etc). Yesterday I checked the results, and the extent of my thighs INCREASED up to 2 centimeters :'''D My legs are a little more toned, though. They are less fatty, more muscular but very bulky and not feminine at all. This is very frustrating, because I emphasized my pear shape even more. I've got a very bony and skinny upper body, but huge hips and legs.. It looks very misshapen and unattractive. 
If anybody can share some high-quality advice on how to exercise properly and how to set your diet according to this body type, please respond to this. Just tell me what to do. But don't bullshit me, promise me that it will work, if I apply it of course  Just tell me and I will do it. Thanks in advance!

[InternetPoints]

Did you possibly check the size of your thighs while you were still warm from the exercise? They may temporarily grow in size from all the bloodflow to support doing the exercise.

The other thing about exercise is you can't direct where you lose fat, or body mass from, generally it will be done evenly. If you are focusing on your legs a lot, you will gain muscle there and possible make them bigger depending upon how much fat lost compared to muscle gained. You may be much happier with the results if you do a full body exercise and not just specific parts. I'm a guy who is a big fan of kickboxing classes, they are a more full body workout than what you were doing and is something else you can try.

(Also thought I'd add that muscular women legs as being unattractive is just your interpretation of the scenario, I don't find them unattractive)

 

[Chaitali M]

Hi..to start with.. this shows that your body has a tendancy to save fats in  your lower body...and every women has a tendancy to save body fats in the lower region...however i would like to share something i did to lose my body fat after i delivered a baby ...all i did was intermittent fasting...it helped me to shed fats purley ..it shows u immediate results...all you have to do is stop eating for 13 to 15 hrs at stretch and then eat normally keeping the eating window of 8 hrs...it will also curb ur hunger pangs in 4/5days time..and will put your body in fat burning mode...do some research..on intnet and your good to go..it wrk wonders 

[MartinFinnholm]

Great advice on switching to full body exercise, kettlebell is an easy and effective way of getting that full body workout. Be sure you're mastering technique before adding intesity or complexity to your workouts. 

Be careful on that intermittent fasting, it works wonders for some, but some just get sluggish  and no results, try it out for a week and assess if it works for you.

Edited February 7, 2016 by MartinFinnholm

[Sleepwalker]

45 minutes ago, InternetPoints said:

Did you possibly check the size of your thighs while you were still warm from the exercise? They may temporarily grow in size from all the bloodflow to support doing the exercise.

The other thing about exercise is you can't direct where you lose fat, or body mass from, generally it will be done evenly. If you are focusing on your legs a lot, you will gain muscle there and possible make them bigger depending upon how much fat lost compared to muscle gained. You may be much happier with the results if you do a full body exercise and not just specific parts. I'm a guy who is a big fan of kickboxing classes, they are a more full body workout than what you were doing and is something else you can try.

(Also thought I'd add that muscular women legs as being unattractive is just your interpretation of the scenario, I don't find them unattractive)

 

So, you recommend doing a full body workout? It surely is more healthy than focusing only on one part of the body, but I'm still skeptical about the result that I could get  My core absolutely doesn't need any cardio, I'm afraid that it may look like a skeleton in the end. But I've been thinking of shifting my focus to my upper body, instead of the lower. maybe lifting weights and doing only strength workouts for my upper body could help make me grow the muscles in that area and look more proportional. 
Thanks for the response, I'll keep it on my mind

[Sleepwalker]

1 hour ago, Chaitali M said:

Hi..to start with.. this shows that your body has a tendancy to save fats in  your lower body...and every women has a tendancy to save body fats in the lower region...however i would like to share something i did to lose my body fat after i delivered a baby ...all i did was intermittent fasting...it helped me to shed fats purley ..it shows u immediate results...all you have to do is stop eating for 13 to 15 hrs at stretch and then eat normally keeping the eating window of 8 hrs...it will also curb ur hunger pangs in 4/5days time..and will put your body in fat burning mode...do some research..on intnet and your good to go..it wrk wonders 

I will absolutely try this. Thank you, much needed

[Sleepwalker]

8 minutes ago, MartinFinnholm said:

Great advice on switching to full body exercise, kettlebell is an easy and effective way of getting that full body workout. Be sure you're mastering technique before adding intesity or complexity to your workouts. 

Be careful on that intermittent fasting, it works wonders for some, but some just get sluggish  and no results, try it out for a week and assess if it works for you.

I'll keep this in mind. Thank you

[InternetPoints]

Cardio like kickboxing can make you gain weight on the upper body too, it just won't be as much as weight lifting. I've gained around 20 lbs from kickboxing for 3 years. Went from 5' 11" 130lbs to 150lbs. Nobody will mistake me for someone who lifts a lot of weight, but I find that terribly boring and stick with something I enjoy instead. The lifting weights is a good idea too as long as you enjoy it, go for it, I didn't think to even suggest that because few women are into that.

 

 

[clytaemnestra]

My problem is reversed: I have thin legs but I'm broad-shouldered. Also, I have big boobs and my upper part looks huge. My body type is reversed triangle. I'm not overweight. 

I do cardio and aerobic exercises for all muscles. 

Which one you suggest me to do the most? For legs or for arms and shoulders? 

[Sleepwalker]

I'm not a professionalist but in my opinion, you should really do both. maybe focus just a bit more on your legs. do some cardio that includes your upper body and strength workouts for your lower body. If you want to grow the muscles in your legs, you have to lift heavy. Squats and similar exercises should be great for you, and do them with some weights if you can  

[Maria M]

Hello Melanie. Search for Dr. Eric Berg's recommendation (on YouTube) on nutrition and exercise according to body type. In fact your body type is "ovary" and you will soon learn why. Good luck!

[thortho]

On 2/7/2016 at 7:25 PM, MelanieWalker said:

In fact, in the last few weeks I was so obsessed with this idea that I have to slim down my legs that I did only cardio, but only for the lower body (running, jumping, combinations of various squats, lunges etc). Yesterday I checked the results, and the extent of my thighs INCREASED up to 2 centimeters

Yes, well. I think the thing is you can't reduce the amount of fat in a particular part of your body. The body gets rid of excess fat fairly evenly, so the idea of doing lots of exercises focusing on the legs in the hopes of making them smaller isn't that different from a guy with a bit of a belly doing a few hundred crunches or situps a day in the hopes of getting a sixpack (as I did when I was what, 16 or 17) - it just doesn't work that way. I suppose that the muscles will atrophy if you don't use them very much, but that's a terribly unsensible solution that'll come with a whole bunch of other problems of its own.

So, if you're concerned about becoming more proportional, I'd suggest the same as others (including you) here - rather than trying to get your lower body smaller, which won't really happen unless you decide to let your leg muscles shrink from disuse, you'd be better off trying to increase your upper body. Weights if you can get them - but there's plenty of other stuff that could be available (swimming, bodyweight exercises, various sports that involve throwing, shovelling snow, etc.). But I guess a possible downside of that (if you're bothered about that kind of thing) is that your upper body gets bigger. It just seems that if you focus on fat/weight loss, your lower body will remain larger than your upper, so for more proportionality it'd probably give better results to focus on upper body mass increase. This would also be good for strength overall - and more strength is pretty much always better, or how often have you (or anyone else, for that matter) thought "Oh man, I wish I weren't so strong"?

Possibly, if you go for gaining upper-body mass, you'd be better off just skipping the cardio, or at least reducing it, so that it won't get in the way of any increasing.

For diet - sorry, no idea. Well, I don't know your dietary habits anyway, but apart from the generic, sensible stuff - fairly clean foods (or whatever it's called - I mean the stuff made from scratch, rather than pre-made or fast food), balanced meals (a bit of fat, some protein, some carbohydrates), plenty of water (rather than juice, soda and so on) - I don't think that dieting works like that.

On 2/7/2016 at 9:00 PM, MelanieWalker said:

My core absolutely doesn't need any cardio, I'm afraid that it may look like a skeleton in the end

Well, then you could do some core exercises (well, if you're working out at all, then you should anyway - having a strong core is fairly important for everything else), increase the muscles there.

Of course, a final thing could be that your view is a bit skewed. It's not uncommon for people to find some "faults" with their own bodies that absolutely nobody else even notices, let alone considers a fault. It sounds weird, I know, but if you have friends you consider better proportional than yourself, rather than just stand side by side in front of a mirror and comparing you to them that way (or worse, standing alone in front of a mirror and comparing yourself to your mental image of them - our mental images of people can be really deceptive, I've a friend who's two or three inches shorter than me, but in my mind he's at least my height, so I'm always a bit surprised when I see a picture of us standing side by side), you could (friend willing, of course) bring out the measuring tape, to see just what the difference is.

On 2/7/2016 at 10:48 PM, clytaemnestra said:

I do cardio and aerobic exercises for all muscles. 

Which one you suggest me to do the most? For legs or for arms and shoulders? 

Yeah, pretty much the same, except reversed - go for exercises that strengthen and build the legs (but don't skip strengthening the upper body - as I said, being stronger is pretty much always better than being weaker). I'd possibly skip the cardio/aerobic for the most part.

I'm sure that a little googling could help out for finding the right kinds of exercise, too. Especially if you go for weight training, there's a little difference in just how to go about lifting, based on the end goal. From what I remember, for size increase it was recommended to go for a high amount of repetitions per set (something like ten to fifteen reps) with a relatively light weight, for a few sets. Not so light that after the set you won't even notice it, of course, but maybe not so much that you feel like crying once you're done. And for more strength - five or six repetitions per set with a relatively heavy weight.

But I'm not an expert on these things, I just lift for fun (and strength). I think you'd both be better off googling something like "bodybuilding for women". I'm pretty sure neither of you need to worry about looking like some of the professional female bodybuilders out there (if that worries you at all), even if you adopt some of the routines you could come across - well, pretty much like most men won't need to worry about looking like the professional male bodybuilders even if they start to follow their routines - since achieving that sort of look takes years of pretty hardcore dedication, supplementation, and lifestyle changes.

[Markus]

@MelanieWalker
Alright. First of all, you can not do cardio in a way that would target slimming down a specific area of the body. The reason cardio can make a person lose weight is because it increases their caloric expenditure to the point where they burn more calories than they consume. When you burn more calories than you consume, your body uses its fat reserves to provide you with energy. You have no control over where the fat will come off. That is purely genetic (and hormonal but that's only significant if a person has a hormonal disorder). 

Secondly, you should work out your whole body. Otherwise you end up creating muscular imbalances and exacerbating those that already exist. You can put a little more emphasis on lacking areas, as well as stretch the muscles that are tight (which tend to be the ones that are naturally more developed). 

Thirdly, if you're at a healthy weight (and judging by your profile picture you absolutely are), you have to come to accept that your body type is as it is. If you store more fat on your lower body, or or are bulkier in your lower body, that's how it is. Remember that you judge your own body way more than others do, others probably don't think there's anything wrong with your body. What you really need to do is learn to love yourself.

[Sleepwalker]

@thortho @Markus

Thanks both of you, that was incredibly helpful!  I really appreciate  the great advice. just needed this.