Fitness influencer who struggled with ‘fat arms’ reveals how she achieved slender, toned limbs WITHOUT lifting heavy weights – as she hails method the ‘best thing she’s ever done’

A fitness influencer has detailed her journey to slim and toned arms after struggling to see any changes while lifting heavy weights and following a calorie deficit diet.

In a TikTok video, Sivi said she struggled with her insecurities about having ‘too much fat’ on her arms.

She explained that she had tried lifting heavy weights and being in a calorie deficit, but had bigger arms instead of thin ones.

After failing to reach her fitness goal, she claims that returning to Pilates was a game changer for her and she finally got the results she wanted.

Sivi started her video by saying: ‘My journey to getting thin and “toned” arms wasn’t easy, but I’m going to show you what you did.

“My breasts used to hold a lot of fat in there. So it was really hard for me to know what to do.’

She explained that while scrolling through social media, she picked up fitness tips to “gain weight in the upper body and eat more.”

Fitness gurus would say, ‘It’s very difficult for women to gain mass up there.’

She said that during her training journey she “had to do pretty much the opposite” of what the “gym rats” said to get this look of slim, toned arms.

“(These are) my results and it worked for me and it can work for many people.

“I really believe that one of the biggest factors in getting my arms smaller was doing high reps with low weight, and I really feel like just lifting weights wasn’t doing it for me.”

Siva said she hit her upper body at the gym but replaced it with Pilates.

“When I tell you, it’s the best thing I’ve ever done for myself to get smaller somewhere,” she said.

“You have to have a good diet, but I felt like lifting weights made me hungry all the time, so lifting lighter made a difference for me.

“Not only in my appearance, but also in my appetite. That’s why I saw that lifting a lighter can definitely help your super large appetite.

‘That came from the heavy lifting at the end. I’m not trying to discourage people who have different golds or who lift weights.

“This is just my experience and I hope it helps some of you too.”

The fitness influencer’s video received 581,200 views and 118,900 likes on TikTok.

After sharing her personal fitness journey, she was inundated with comments from people who also faced the same hurdle of wanting slimmer, not bigger, arms.

One person wrote: ‘Yes, you are 100 percent right!!! Less weight, higher reps!’

‘That is definitely true. I was top heavy for so long and just got heavier instead of thin. I had to go away and do upper body cardio with low weights and high reps,” added another.

A third follower was already a fan of the workout, writing: ‘I only do Pilates for upper body. So glad to see other fit girls open to this!!!’

‘THANKS OMFG I NEEDED THIS,’ said one grateful fan.

One person shared: ‘This is exactly what happened to me and when I told people about it at the gym they were triggered…’

After receiving several comments from people arguing that “just being in a calorie deficit would give her slimmer results,” Siva posted a follow-up video to explain that “that wasn’t the case” for her.

“I think a lot of people are failing to understand my results,” she said.

The fitness influencer said that she used to lift weights and hit the gym hard constantly.

Siva learned over time that her ‘female cortisol levels’ increased and she was hungrier due to her intense workouts, which caused her to eat more.

As a result, she got bigger arms that led her to desperately try Pilates, hoping to achieve a slimmer look.

“I needed to be able to help my cortisol levels, lose some of this muscle and be able to stay in a calorie deficit without it being so hard on me,” she said.

“If you’re really trying to get your arms thin as quickly as possible, the fastest way to do it is to lift a lighter weight or barely train your arms like that and be in a calorie deficit.

“I feel like with any diet you go on, if you don’t want your arm to grow, just don’t gain weight. This is just the end of it.

“Even when I was in a calorie deficit and gained weight, it was still difficult to contract the arms. That’s what I’m trying to get at with this.’

Siva’s conclusion is supported by science. Pilates focuses on building lean muscle rather than getting heavy.

“The difference lies mainly in the fat content around the muscles. When you compare lean to bulk, the former contains less fat around the muscle tissue,’ according to HealthKart.

So the body looks slimmer and the muscles look strong.

“When you do weight training and lift, your many muscles add to your overall body mass, giving you a bigger look.”

Pilates guru Keri O’Meara believes that “Pilates is a great way to achieve toned arms and shoulders because it helps create long, lean, lean muscles.”

“It focuses on using specific muscle fibers and working them in a shortened and lengthened position,” she said. HuffPost.

“While you’re working on the biomechanics of the body, it also helps lubricate the shoulder joint and helps relieve neck and shoulder tension.”

In Siva’s other videos she documents her Pilates fitness routines.

One of the videos shows her sweating through an hour of exercise with her caption: ‘Reminder: If you start Pilates today, you’ll feel the difference in six sessions.

“You will see a change in 10 sessions and have a completely new body in 30 sessions.

‘There are no excuses. Start today and have a new body by the New Year.’

For one of her “what I eat in a day” videos she documented her meals.

For breakfast she had an egg omelette on toast with avocado and a side of kiwi.

Her drink of choice was matcha with almond milk.

Siva had ground beef with vegetables and cauliflower for lunch.

She had a tablespoon of almond butter and a handful of carrots dipped in tahini for dinner.

Last but not least, she has a Mexican watermelon salad, known as sandia, with camo dressing as an end-of-day snack.