I always knew I have a weird line on the top of my abdomen going down to my belly button. And one thing I noticed is that, it is more prominent whenever I lose some weight. I was never curious about what it is, or why is it there. But I know that my sister has it, and most of my cousins also have it. Actually, I never ask for answers until recently.
There is too much body craze nowadays, there is a thigh gap, bikini bridge, hip bones, back dimples, and ab cracks. The ab crack is called the linea alba. It is a tendinous inscription between your ab muscles. This “ ab crack craze “ is pretty much determined by your genetics! Yup! That’s a fact! Though you can always train your abs and make them toned by working them hard. But the natural structure of your muscle will not change. So no matter how hard you exercise to gain an ab crack if your genes don’t have it, it will not show.
Many models like Bella Hadid and Emily Ratajkowski have been sporting ab cracks all over Instagram. That made many followers think that this is just a normal body goal that you can have if you work out. But what we should learn is, some are achievable and some need help from your genes. Hence, educating ourselves is very important for us to know what are realistic goals, and what are not. And that is exactly what I try to do.
The last time my husband and I went to the gym was way back in 2015 before I get pregnant. Where we exercise with the help of our gym instructor and nutritionist. But we just follow what they told us without fully knowing what our goals are.
But this time is different. Since the lockdown last year, I started to work out again without the help of an instructor. I made some research on how to work out from home. And I know that this has been what most of us is doing since the pandemic. Now, my husband is joining me for the second time in my workout sessions and that leads us to find answers about our body physique. Since we want to know first our body goals before we continue our workout, we watched a lot of videos of coaches/ instructors, testimonies, and even read articles and blogs. And here folks are the things we found out!
We All Have Abs
Yes, that’s right! Everyone has abs whether we can see them or not, it’s there! Though AGAIN! genetics has a big role that makes the shape, length, thickness, and built of the muscle different for each person. Also, our genes can determine our body fat distribution. Meaning, some people have more prominent abs than others because the percentage of their body fat is lower. And those who cannot see their abs are because of the fats that are covering them. In other words, your body will store its fats depending on your genes. However, the number of fats in each person’s body will vary on many factors like diet, health condition, lifestyle, and heredity.
Choose an achievable body goal that is best for your health
Who doesn’t want to have an oozing body? Believe me, I’ve been there! I wanted that! However, when you finally learn that we all have a different physiques. And achieving the body that you want will not just depend on what you imagined. You will start to realize that there are so many things you should consider to achieve your goal. For example, my husband what’s to lose weight but he has hypokalemia. Because of that, he needs to adjust his diet depending on what his body needs. Also, he can only do workouts that are not so extensive to avoid losing too much potassium in his system. While in my case, I always have a lower body fat percentage on my upper abdomen. I want to gain more muscle but don’t want to lose too much fat because I’m already happy with the amount of fat I have in my legs and arms. But here is the thing. Our waistline, butt, arms, and thighs are the common areas in which people usually store excess body fat.
Now, when we exercise, we lose fats in our whole body and not just in our targeted area. SPOT REDUCTION has been a practice that many people have tried doing but there is still not much evidence to support this. So I need to choose, lose more fat to show my muscles, or keep that fat because I don’t want to be so thin.
In a nutshell, being healthy is the most important thing. If you have 8, 6, or 4 packs, or buff muscles in your arms, then good for you! If you don’t, that’s okay as long as you know you are healthy and you are happy with what you have. Truly, we can’t really have it all! In the end, we all have our own body goals, and we should learn how to respect each other.
Dona Buenaseda 