She wore an itsy bitsy, teeny weeny waist trainer
Waist trainers are everywhere. Fitness models and celebrities alike are posting pictures sporting these athletic corsets all over social media, and they’re swearing by them. Kim Kardashian and Jessica Alba are two advocates for these restricting corsets. Both will try to convince you that to achieve an hourglass figure, you need a waist trainer. However, there’s a lot you need to know before you slip into the stylish organ-crusher. It shouldn’t take a rocket scientist to tell you that maybe, perhaps waist trainers are a little more than sketchy.
What is waist training?
Waist training is the gradual reduction of the waist through consistent corset-wearing. This waist-trimming method has become extremely popular as our society is increasingly promoting women with voluptuous bodies and tiny waists.
Where did waist training originate?
Perhaps you’ve heard of the 19th century myth of women removing the lower part of their ribs to get a smaller waist. Fortunately, that’s only a myth. However, what the women of the Victorian and Edwardian Era did practice was tight-lacing. Sound familiar? That’s because it is. Tight-lacing is the exact same practice as waist training.
So, while this has become a recent fad, the practice has been around for centuries.
Does it work?
Well, yes and no. Waist trainers redistribute the fat around your torso to other areas of your body, giving you the temporary appearance that your cinched waist is much smaller than it once was. When the waist trainers come off and the effects wear off, your waist is back to its original shape. Adios, hourglass figure. It’s like I almost knew you.
However, for record-holder Ethel Granger (Google her), who achieved a 13-inch waist through tight-lacing nearly most her life, the practice seemed to be super effective.
Seems legit – so what’s the big deal?
In a dictatorial and superficial society, we must look good or make exhaustive efforts to do so – or the alternative, give the impression that we do. Waist trainers offer us the illusion of an hourglass figure, and with that, comes health risks.
It’s like those commercials advertising the newest pill to relieve illnesses. The relief sounds great, but then comes the string of horrible symptoms you also may experience while on this pill, and if you do, you should contact your physician immediately.
Waist trainers guarantee to help shrink your waistline; however, you may experience difficulty breathing, restriction of muscular core development, particularly while exercising, heart burn, indigestion, displaced organs, potential harm to those internal organs, excessive sweating and back-acne from all that sweating as well as bigger and gassier moments while eating. Awkward.
How well do you think you can truly move around with such a tight apparatus fastened around your poor unfortunate waist? It’s certainly not something I’d want to work out in although I’ve seen many women prancing around gyms attempting it. I’d prefer full functionality over feeling like a boa constrictor is squeezing the life out of me for the sake of a teeny weeny waist.
The only real thing corsets or waist trainers are good for is the occasional fashionable costumes and ensembles, forcing you to eat less during meal time and correcting posture. There is no evidentiary support that waist trainers trigger any kind of weight loss or will permanently reshape your figure.
What are my personal thoughts?
I’ve read way too much commentary online ,and Internet users seem to align waist trainers with braces, believing the idea behind them is the same. I’m not sure how I feel about comparing the skeletal system to the structure and functions of internal organs. Together, they are components of human anatomy, but they’re just not the same. Neither are braces and waist trainers. Bones and organs work differently from one another, bottom line.
Whenever medical professionals are interviewed online about waist trainers, there seems to be a general consensus by commentators that the doctorate holder is unqualified to make expert medical opinions about waist trainers. (Insert long-winded laugh here). I do agree that more research needs to be done on waist trainers since there seems to be a lack of it, but I also believe that medical professionals’ opinions should be regarded and trusted.
Waist training is like crash-dieting. You go on a diet for a week, lose 15 pounds and then find that the weight comes back on as soon as you stop the diet. Waist trainers have their good qualities such as being cute and fashionable, but they are just temporary fixes. They do not last unless you’re cinching your waist for the rest of your life. Is the vanity really worth it?
For some, the answer may be a resound affirmative. To those people I say, enjoy squished up internal organs and indigestion. I’d rather live my life comfortably and without self-inflicted health risks. My midsection would prefer its freedom. I place this trend under the fitness gimmick category, giving it two thumbs down.
