{"id":87211,"date":"2025-10-20T18:44:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-20T18:44:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/87211\/"},"modified":"2025-10-20T18:44:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-20T18:44:07","slug":"cortisol-face-and-the-lies-about-muscly-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/87211\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Cortisol face\u2019 and the lies about muscly women"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201dEver since I stopped lifting super heavy and incorporated more low-intensity workouts, not only did I feel so much less bloated throughout the day, but I\u2019m in such a better shape now,\u201d \u2013 that\u2019s how Mandana Zarghami says she got rid of what\u2019s being called \u201ccortisol face\u201d<\/a> in a TikTok video<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Zarghami is not the only wellness influencer encouraging women to ditch lifting weights in favour of low-intensity exercises like walking and pilates.<\/a> Other women on #GymTok have claimed that walking instead of running avoids facial puffiness associated with \u201crunner\u2019s face<\/a>\u201d, stopping lifting is what \u201csnatched\u201d their body<\/a>\u00a0and quitting HIIT workouts helped them lose weight<\/a>.\u00a0While the buzz around \u201clowering your cortisol\u201d \u2013 your body\u2019s stress hormone \u2013 is fairly new, the idea that women shouldn\u2019t be engaging in high-intensity or high-impact exercise isn\u2019t. After decades of women fighting for their right to exercise and play sports, why are we still so afraid of becoming swole, puffy, muscly women?<\/p>\n

The history of women\u2019s fitness culture is complicated. For much of the 20th century, women were discouraged from engaging in vigorous exercise, being told they were physically limited<\/a>. Until 1972, women were prohibited from running marathons in the US because they were considered \u201cphysiologically incapable\u201d<\/a>.\u00a0In America, the 70s changed women\u2019s approach to exercise forever<\/a>: feminists urged women to embrace their physical strength, women\u2019s magazines promoted exercise to trim your figure, New York City hosted the first all-women\u2019s road race in Central Park and Jane Fonda opened her first workout studio in Beverly Hills. <\/p>\n

For a long time, cardio was king and women\u2019s exercise was focused around burning calories, instead of building muscle \u2013 \u201cbulky\u201d women being considered \u201cunfeminine\u201d. Until recently, when we reached the point where more people know that strength training is important not only to maintain muscle mass, but also for building bone density<\/a> (something that becomes even more important with age). \u201cThe shift I have seen take hold in a very deep way in popular culture is this move towards women lifting heavy weights,\u201d says Danielle Friedman, author of Let’s Get Physical<\/a>. \u201cEven some of the big gym chains have had to replace cardio equipment with lifting equipment because of this shift.\u201d <\/p>\n

But with this shift towards strength training has come a return to the age-old portrayal of women as fragile beings with bodies that can\u2019t handle intense exercise; the latest in the re-purposed myths to keep women focused on maintaining a small, tradionally \u201cfeminine\u201d figure. This time, the fear is centred around cortisol. Younger women online have started increasingly worrying about getting cortisol face<\/a> or even \u201ccortisol belly\u201d<\/a> from doing the \u201cwrong\u201d workouts. These people encourage low-impact workouts like Pilates was a way\u00a0to lower your cortisol and tone your body<\/a>. But this current focus on low-cortisol workouts is, for most people, largely unnecessary.<\/p>\n

Alex Rothstein, assistant professor of exercise science at New York Institute of Technology\u2019s School of Health Professions, calls cortisol a \u201cvery good hormone\u201d when it\u2019s doing its job properly, with a lot of negative associations. \u201cCortisol is not inherently a bad thing, but it gets a bad reputation when people live chronically stressful lives,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen it comes to cortisol and exercise, when you are taking part in an exercise programme that you are trained for, it\u2019s pretty difficult to exercise yourself into negative cortisol levels.\u201d <\/p>\n

It\u2019s not bad for your body to produce cortisol; it can be a good thing, but too much stress is what\u2019s bad for you. And that\u2019s not even the exercise itself, but not resting and failing to eat enough food after you work out in order to recover appropriately.<\/p>\n

Most often, high cortisol is correlated to the stressors people encounter during the course of an ordinary day<\/a> (including lack of sleep or being overworked). This means stress-management techniques will lower cortisol levels and regular exercise can actually reduce stress and lower baseline cortisol levels over time<\/a>. \u201cA controlled cortisol spike [while working out] is actually healthy,\u201d says Rothstein. \u201cIt can help build resilience and tolerance, as your body becomes better at handling stress.\u201d (The \u201cstress\u201d being progressive overload.)<\/p>\n

As with all things exercise-related, there\u2019s no one-size-fits-all approach. Much of the low-intensity discussion is taking place alongside conversations around women\u2019s hormones, and women\u2019s health is chronically understudied<\/a>. For people with PCOS, like 26-year-old Jannat, shifting to low-intensity exercise has been beneficial. \u201cI used to run because everyone did that, so I did too,\u201d she says. \u201cI felt awful after, but still booked a boxfit or a Zumba class and even played badminton.\u201d <\/p>\n

Over the years, Jannat says her PCOS symptoms worsened, and she became tempted by the idea of a slower, more consistent workout routine after learning about low-cortisol and low-impact workouts in 2019, when she first came across PCOS-friendly trainers on TikTok. \u201cOver time, I think I\u2019ve taken the slowness all the way down and don\u2019t work out anywhere near as much as I used to, but my PCOS symptoms are significantly better,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Many women, however, feel the best after lifting heavy weights. Casey Johnston, author of A Physical Education<\/a> and otherwise known as \u201ca swole woman\u201d to her newsletter subscribers, cautions anyone who comes across any one way of exercise being the \u201canswer\u201d for women. \u201cThere\u2019s no trick, and the more specific it is, the more likely it\u2019s empty marketing,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s not bad for your body to produce cortisol; it can be a good thing, but too much stress is what\u2019s bad for you. And that\u2019s not even the exercise itself, but not resting and failing to eat enough food after you work out in order to recover appropriately.\u201d <\/p>\n

It also feels unsurprising that the idea that women should exercise in a dainty and delicate manner is resurfacing during the current resurgence of ultra-thin ideals, conservative aesthetics<\/a> and regressive socio-political attitudes. As Naomi Wolf wrote in The Beauty Myth, \u201cA culture fixated on female thinness is not an obsession about female beauty, but an obsession about female obedience.\u201d In the 19th century, the made-up \u201cbicycle face\u201d<\/a> was used to try to scare off women from cycling and having an independent mode of transportation.<\/p>\n

For those who want to start lifting, Johnston recommends starting with the basics: lifting weights that feel a comfortable and appropriate amount of difficult for you, and then building steadily from where you are at.\u00a0\u201cWhat makes exercise good for us is the appropriately designed challenge of it, teaching our muscles how to work together,\u201d she says. \u201cYour body is designed for it.\u201d<\/p>\n