Are you fond of an hourglass figure of women? Do the proportionate curves of an hourglass figure attract your eyes? Then, like most people, you might be wrong to think that such a figure of a person is due to hourglass syndrome. But it might not be so.
The truth is that hourglass syndrome can cause lower belly pooch in women, which is unhealthy. However, it’s not always necessary that a person with an hourglass figure is suffering from hourglass syndrome. But what exactly is hourglass syndrome?
Well! This dreaded syndrome is the main culprit of a person’s (especially women’s) lower belly pooch. When your upper abdominal muscles get overdeveloped and your lower abdominal muscles get underdeveloped, you likely suffer from this syndrome.
It was probably your biggest mistake if you have once performed thousands of situps and repetitive trunk flexion workouts to strengthen your upper abdominals. And, due to this mistake of yours, you are now suffering from this syndrome.
Want to know more about hourglass syndrome? Come! We are demonstrating to you everything about it:
What Is Hourglass Syndrome?
It’s a kind of disorder in which a person sucks in his abdomen habitually. The diaphragm’s pulling of your upper abdominal muscles toward the opposing direction inflates your lungs, resulting in the upper abdominal muscles’ activation. Thus, the abdominal sucking pulls your diaphragm inward. As a result, it also tries to pull your lower ribs inward.
Doing this over a long period leads to a smaller waist, a horizontal crease situated across/over the belly button, and an upturned belly button. All these occur due to an imbalance of your abdominal muscles, which leaves the upper abdominal muscles in continual constriction. On the other hand, it also causes your lower back and abdominal muscles to go lax, resulting in the upward pulling of the abdomen.
Hourglass syndrome inflicts fake core strength, and with it, your upper abdomen looks ripped. However, the core musculature remains weak, leaving your lower back and pelvis susceptible to injury.
The abdominals are not the only thing included in one’s core musculature. It also encompasses one’s diaphragm, his/her obliques, the musculature of his/her pelvic floor, and last but not least, his or her transversus abdominis. These muscles are responsible for assisting the structure of your body, standing straight against gravity.
Several patients recognize the significance of their strong core strength. However, the majority of those patients don’t understand that not engaging those muscle groups will cause hourglass syndrome. As a result, they have to deal with postural compromise and injury in their lower back.
Is Sucking In Your Stomach Bad?
Yes, sucking in your stomach can result in pelvic floor issues such as incontinence, pelvic organ prolapse, etc. Contracting the upper abdominal muscles of your body regularly can exert excess force on your pelvic floor muscles, thus making them strained or overworked.
Does Sucking In Your Stomach Help Lose Weight?
No, your stomach sucking will never help you lose weight. While you suck your stomach in, no abdominal muscles are used in the process. The process only involves the use of a vacuum, and you can’t expect the burning of your body’s calories with the creation of a vacuum.
Also, no strength is generated in the process. You will get LESS TONED as a result of your midsection. So, just stop doing it to lose weight. It will be of no help.
However, though performing stomach vacuums can’t trim your waistline or give you abs, it helps to cultivate some thick internal ab muscles, thus helping with your core strength, posture, and lower back pain. Yoga practitioners or bodybuilders practice the process of stomach vacuuming, which has been going on for many years.
Research says that the Tra/EO muscle thickness has shown significant improvement in the abdominal drawing-in maneuver. The additional thickness of these muscles helps people who suffer from lower back pain or poor posture.
With stomach gripping, you will get some benefits of a flat stomach by stopping your transverse abdominis from turning slack. Also, with better posture, your body will have a slightly protruding belly. Nevertheless, the exercise will never help you burn fat or train your rectus abdominis (your abs’ visible part).
To burn fat, you must burn several calories through exercise and a less-calorie diet. Exercise, intermittent fasting, and a ketogenic diet will help you reduce your excess calories. Don’t go for yo-yo dieting. It is considered to be an unhealthy way of losing weight.
3 Hourglass Syndrome Causes
Primarily, there are 3 causes of Hourglass Syndrome, and they are:
1. Poor Habits And Social Anxiety:
Many people desire a flat and polished abdomen. But holding it in for an extended time is not a good idea. If they continue it for an extensive period, their brain can be rewired from the normal habit of adjustment to a transformed form like this.
2. Non-Ideal Growth During Childhood Times:
Among all infants, nearly thirty percent of them suffer from hourglass syndrome stomach gripping as a typical compensation process in response to their poor muscle development. This problem also continues into their adulthood.
3. Shielding Patterns:
If you are wondering – “does sucking in your stomach help?”, then know that stomach gripping sometimes develops for muscle protection after going through an injury. However, it persists even long after the complete healing of the injury.
After a person goes through an accident, his injured tissues heal with the help of this stomach gripping but muscles learn. After forming a shielding pattern once, they instantly develop an addiction to protection even after the recovery of the injured area.
Some Consequences Of An Hourglass Syndrome
Lower Back Pain
Your lower back is always critically stabilized by your diaphragm. So, when the diaphragm works inaccurately, your lower back becomes weak. Thus, your other muscles (especially your lower back’s extensors) are required to function more efficiently thus making up for the diaphragm’s dysfunction. As a result, the muscles’ consistent overworking may lead to prompt tightness with pain.
Neck Pain
The abnormal descending of your diaphragm not only affects your stabilization but also your breathing. As a result, your neck will have to bear a huge strain.
In our body (in a normal person), the diaphragm’s central part ought to descend in the downward direction, with an extension of your abdomen as well as an expansion of your lungs.
However, a person suffering from Hourglass syndrome experiences a disturbance in this normal contour of motion. Besides, this syndrome makes his chest and shoulders raise instead of compensating, while he inhales.
As a result, your neck’s muscles have to bear a great quantity of stress, and you may suffer from migraines or neck pain.
Acid Reflux
The diaphragm, other than its functions of breathing as well as balancing, further functions as a sphincter. It helps prevent your stomach’s contents from moving back upwards into the throat. Your damaged diaphragm may result in an increased chance of acid reflux.
How To Fix Hourglass Syndrome?
Hourglass Syndrome treatment is mainly done through physiotherapy. The physiotherapists’ main objective, in this case, must be to induce the proper diaphragm activation and strain release in your overloaded abdominal and back muscles.
When an individual stretches his abdomen, he has to inhale in the cobra/seal position for not less than 15 seconds. Besides, for stretching your back muscles, the ideal posture is the child’s posture.
To fix Hour Glass Syndrome, you can also follow the below exercise:
First, relax your muscles in the upper abdomen. It will be very difficult to do it initially in a seated or standing position, especially when performing the exercise for an extended period. Thus, all four positions are a good place to start. Adopt this position by relaxing your stomach. Now, think about dropping the stomach of your body to the floor.
Now, have a soothed and relaxed breath as you expand your stomach and your ribs’ sides. Feel your stomach moving into your thighs as you keep the shoulder lifted upwards. Now, breathe out and again focus on loosening up your stomach. Try repeating the breathing cycle for at least three to five minutes as well as three to five times per day.
After mastering it, you can incorporate this pattern within your daily postures cum movements like sitting, standing, walking, and driving. Once you have done all these things, you can progress toward more advanced exercises.
Wrapping Up
Avoid the mistakes that lead to this syndrome. If you are already affected, try the previously mentioned exercise or consult a physiotherapist. Remember, nothing is beyond reach, including overcoming the Hourglass syndrome.
Frequently Asked Questions
Answer: Hourglass syndrome may be defined as a sort of ailment in which an individual sucks in his/her abdomen habitually. Your diaphragm’s hauling of your abdominal muscles, located in the upward part of your body, in the contrasting path magnifies your lungs, stemming in your upper part’s abdominal muscles’ activation. Therefore, the abdominal sucking yanks your diaphragm in the inward direction. So, your lower ribs will also get an inward tug from it.
As you do this for a long duration, it brings in an elegant-looking waist for you, a flat furrow placed across/over your stomach’s belly button as well as an upturned variety of belly buttons. This occurs because of the unevenness of the muscles of your abdomen as it prevents the upper abdominal muscles from doing continual constriction.
Again, it affects your lower back or the abdominal muscle strength of your torso to go lax, developing the upward yanking of the abdomen.
Answer: Yes, Hourglass syndrome can be corrected by doing some exercises, as mentioned above. Also, you can take the help of a physiotherapist to solve this problem. Physiotherapy works wonders for Hourglass syndrome and helps you to correct it.
Answer: Basically, there are 3 spurs of Hourglass Syndrome. They are:
1. Bad habits as well as social anxiety: There are several individuals whose longing is for a flat as well as polished abdomen. Nevertheless, their holding it in for an extended time may not be a healthy idea. Their continuation of this over an extended period may pressure their brain to get rewired from the typical habit of adjustment to an altered pattern like this.
2. Childhood suffering: About thirty percent of infants in the world go through hourglass syndrome stomach gripping after they are born. It is a basic restitution system as a reaction to their impoverished muscle development. Also, the crisis doesn’t remain confined there. It proceeds even when they become adults.
3. Safeguarding patterns:
Stomach gripping also occasionally ensues for muscle safety after the muscles in an area pass through trauma and pain. Nonetheless, it lasts even after the perfect recovery from the trauma. As an individual meets an accident, his traumatized tissues get recovered with the assistance of this abdomen gripping. However, the muscles learn in the process. As they form a protective pattern for the first time, they rapidly acquire an obsession for defense, irrespective of whether the trauma is recovered or not.
