The Corset Diet: The Unfortunate Fad Diet That’s Making a Comeback

Woman wearing corset

Introducing the fad diet that won’t go away: The Corset Diet.

From eating tapeworms to cayenne pepper ‘master cleanses’, women have tried fad diet after fad diet in an attempt to lose weight. Among them is the Corset Diet, where you wear a corset to reshape your body into an hourglass figure (in other words, industrial-strength Spanx).

The fad diet was first made popular by Jessica Alba, who revealed she wore a double corset day and night for three months to get her pre-baby body back after each of her pregnancies. The Corset Diet is now making a comeback, thanks to – drumroll please – Penny Brown, otherwise known as “Human Jessica Rabbit.”

No, I haven’t been dabbling in Walter White’s meth stash – this shit is for real: Penny’s life goal is to emulate the cartoon character’s famous figure. Not only did she get breast implants to take her cup size from a 34H to a 36O, she wears a corset for 23 hours a day to shrink her already 26-inch waist to half the size of her hips. (Oh. Em. Effing. Gee.) Thanks to her shenanigans, the Corset Diet is making its way back into the lives of (starving) women everywhere.

Also known as “waist training,” this fad diet is… well, insane in the membrane. According to TheCorsetDiet.com, you can shed up to six pounds a week from wearing a corset – um, yeah, because the rib-crushing garment makes it so uncomfortable to eat. And breathe. And sit. And do anything that involves using your body for, you know, being alive.

Apparently, not only can you reduce inches over time through the use of high compression tight-lacing techniques, but readjust your lower ribs for a more defined waist. (Just make sure to build a tolerance for wearing the corset first so you don’t end up cracking in half.)

So basically, you put on the corset which restricts your appetite. Many corset-wearers go from three large meals a day to six smaller ones and practice core muscle training in order to make wearing the corset as tolerable as possible. Though, what makes the experience tolerable is subjective: You’re essentially squeezing your insides like a toothpaste tube until all of your organs are rearranged and you can’t take a crap anymore because your colon’s been misplaced.

I’ll take the fat, thankyouverymuch.

While I’m completely exaggerating (sort of), I have to ask: If you take the corset out of the equation while still adjusting your meal intake and exercising regularly, do you not then have yourself a diet? You know, one where you’re not forcing your body to play musical organs and never breathe out? While this fad diet is strange, I suppose it could be worse: It’s not like you’re eating cotton or air, but still – you’re probably not that far off from people thinking you’re a “Girl, Interrupted” sequel.

How do you feel about this fad diet? Would you ever give it a try?

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Image: Michelle B.

Krissy Brady

Krissy Brady is a women’s health + lifestyle writer who’s so out of shape, it’s like she has the innards of an 80-year-old. Instead of learning how to crochet, she decided to turn her emotional baggage into a writing career (genius, no?). You can follow her shenanigans on Twitter (you know, if you want).