Muffin Tops

[acw]

This is a very risky question, but here goes...

 

Does anyone know of any lifestyle/dietary reasons for the (seemingly) sudden and (seemingly) VERY common figure change that the Australians call muffin tops?  This is where girls get "beer" bellies and it hangs over the top of tight trousers, rather like the top of a muffin cake. 

 

What I don't understand, is why people who are otherwise slim/average on the rest of their bodies, seem to have disproportionately large guts. 

 

I really don't mean this as a criticism.  I just don't get why people aren't thin all over, medium all over, or bigger all over like they "used" to be.  Or is it just that lots of women/girls persist in wearing fashions that don't suit them rather than clothes that fit, and so we are now seeing what before remained covered up?

[jno]

people eat more. I have carried out a painstaking 20-year programme of overeating to see if it makes me fat, and it has. Real obesity is a health problem; but personally, I think girls with curves look healthier than ones with washboard stomachs. And yes, the fashion for crop tops and showing your midriff means that we see a lot more stomachs - mostly female so far, but some men do it too - than we used to.

[5029]

its also due to the hipster style becoming more popular.  what used to be held in by higher waists now spills over low ones

[GucciGal]

5029 you beat me to it! Yes I think hipster jeans, trousers etc make it much harder to disguise the overhang.

[ALLO]

i guess you would call me a muffin top. but... i just had a baby. so that might explain how girls are skinny all over but the belly. if you never had kids you wouldn't understand

[maximo]

It might also come from the fact that girls drink alot more alcohol than they used to. Beer especially gives you a big stomach if drunk in large quantities ( the infamous beer belly ! ). Not that I am speaking from experience, of course....*embarrassed cough*...

[Scarlett]

None of us are thin all over! Or fat all over! Bodies come in all peculiar shapes and sizes. Women have more fat on their stomachs and hips because of child rearing (protection/curves) so any bit of fat goes straight there. With men it tends to go just to their paunch. I agree, the hipsters tend to show this nice fat off! Normal jeans would be just above that area, and would pull it all in!!

[Lillabet]

I think it is also about the type of jobs we all do. I used to be emloyed in a job where i walked about loads and was out of the office all the time.

Now I work in an office at a desk and have noticed my tummy noticably softening - probably from sitting down all day even though I haven't put on weight.

It's the same lifestyle factors that mean we are all rounder than our grandmothers who got enormous amounts of exercise just doing the cleaning with no labour saving devices and walking rather than driving - whereas we have to go to the gym

[acw]

ALLO - I can understand I just can't empathise.

And Scarlett, I AM thin all over - no boobs, no hips, no bum.  I think they call it a "boyish" figure.  :-( And there ARE people who are big all over too.  What I'm referring to specifically is the girls with slim arms, slim legs, "good" bums, and yet a larger stomach that overhangs the jeans or skirts.   

I always thought curves were meant to be hourglass ones going out and in as you look square on, not side on. 

My mum reckons it's the beer too maximo.  I think you both might have a point.  That and the hipsters 5029 and GucciGal referred to. 

[magicdice]

acw, i like your definition of curves the best!

i guess some of the time it's because we want to wear what's fashionable. like those floaty tops that make the vast majority of women look pregnant. i for one wear what i like, and i do tend to choose things that suit my body shape but if i were to acquire a 'muffin top' or if my figure changed in some other way, i would probably not adjust my wardrobe to it very quickly. (un?)fortunately my body never ever ever changes shape in any way, so i don't have to think about that!

[acw]

My friend suggested "wheat intolerance" today.  I suppose she may be right.  It would explain the "slim all over with a swollen, yet not pregnant, belly".  Perhaps if there are girls who have TRIED to lose the weight but couldn't, this may be their answer. 

[Laura-sakura]

This is down to a fashion of wearing jeans that are too tight.  Girls do this because they see icons such as Britney Spears doing it, personally I think it looks horrible, a tiny skinny size 8 girl spilling over a size 6 pair of jeans...but thats fashion.