Is waist-training really worth the health risks?

Elissa McCool
Staff Writer

While scrolling down your timeline on Instagram or Facebook, you are bound to see a voluptuous woman with thousands of likes under her picture coupled with pairs of heart-eyed emojis.  Curvaceous women are all over social media and television.  Instead of stick thin models, we now see women with ‘Coke bottle’ figures.  The standard of beauty is once again changing and women across the nation are doing anything to achieve their ideal figure.  One of the latest crazes is waist-training.

Waist-training is far from a new practice.  Corsets began gaining popularity in the 16th century.  Waist-training, also known as tight-lacing, is the practice of wearing a tightly-fitted corset for hours at a time to shrink your waist line.  Corsets in the Victorian era were popular for emphasizing the curves and hourglass figure of a woman.  Corsets were also worn to straighten the posture of women.  At the end of the Victorian era, the trend of sporting corsets died due to rumors of dangerous affects to a woman’s body.

In today’s society, more women are starting to follow this celebrity-promoted craze.  Various celebrities have posted pictures of themselves promoting their corset.  Kim Kardashian sported her corset on Instagram and gives credit to waist-training for her popular shape.  While these corsets do cinch your waist and make it appear that you have a flat stomach, maybe the practice of wearing a corset all day fell off from the Victorian era for a reason.

According to weight loss experts like Dr. Jyotindra Shah, the lack of oxygenation that can result from waist-training can contribute to metabolic syndrome, which can ironically cause weight gain.  These are huge risks for a temporary look.

Not only can the corset bruise your skin, it can also bruise your internal organs and restrict your breathing.  Wearing the corset puts your ribs, liver, spleen, and kidney at risk.

Some Jackson State University students feel waist-training is not worth the risk.

“I feel as if it is unnecessary, because your waist will only be small for a short period of time and you can eventually damage your ribs.  I feel that it is a waste of time and money.  Waist-trainers are typically around $50.  No, thank you!” said Aerial Simmons, sophomore biology major from Jackson, Miss.

Christian Marshall, a sophomore finance major from Columbus, Ohio, offered a male’s perspective on the matter.

“I believe that waist-training is fine in order to achieve a better figure.  It is a woman’s personal choice if she wants to use waist-trainers and I respect that.  However, I believe if a woman uses a waist-trainer and doesn’t tell her significant other, it is wrong,” said Marshall.

Most weight loss experts agree that the best way to achieve the ideal figure is to practice healthy eating and frequent workouts to obtaining your fitness goals.