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Jacksonville women turn to waist trainers for hourglass figures

Jacksonville women who want an hourglass figure fast are turning to latex waist trainers.

“I always had a decent waist, but a smaller waist was always like something that kind of eluded me,” said Navy veteran Kira Thorne.

Similar to corsets, waist trainers squeeze your waist to give the appearance of a shapely figure.

But doctors say there are serious health risks when women take their pursuit of a tiny waist too far.

“Everybody wants a tight body,” said Thorne. “And I’m a victim of that too.”

Thorne said celebrities like Kim Kardashian and Amber Rose posting photos of themselves in waist trainers caught her interest.

“When I ordered my first corset, I ordered it too small, and that was unhealthy. Because I was in, like, total pain when I first got my first one and I said, 'OK, I need to step back.' And I ordered the right size and from there, waist training was really easy for me,” said Thorne.

Thorne loved it so much that she started a business on Jacksonville’s Northside selling waist trainers.

Three years later, Thorne has 700 regular customers ranging from 16 years old to 55.

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Day care owner Kia Dennis bought her first waist trainer from Thorne two years ago.

“It makes me feel really confident, like, OK, you know, my waist is cinched. My body is good. You know, I’m looking good. It gives me that extra boost of confidence,” said Dennis.

Dennis wears one all day every day and said they’ve sculpted her body into more of an hourglass, even when she’s not wearing one.

“Like a wedding ring, when you take it off, you’ll see a change in your finger. That indentation will never go away because I consistently wear my wedding ring on that finger. Same idea with your waist trainer,” said Thorne.

The idea is that you can train your waist to be smaller by tightening it or going to a smaller size. But Thorne said she sees some customers who want to take it too far.

“It gives you immediate gratification,” said bariatric surgeon Dr. Sunil Sharma.

Sharma said waist trainers won't resculpt your body in the long term.

“If you use it as a tool to change the body shape, it’s not going to work for that and you may end up with many medical problems,” said Sharma.

He said women who wear them too tightly are putting themselves at risk for acid reflux and compressed organs.

“It affects mainly the lungs, because they cannot expand. The lower portion of the lungs gets collapsed. You can get pneumonia or many other things,” said Sharma.

While many celebrities claim that they get a better workout when they exercise in their waist trainers, Sharma said compressing the lungs during a workout can be dangerous.

“Some ladies do take anything too far,” said Thorne.

Thorne said that if your waist trainer rolls up when you sit down or if it hurts, it’s too small.

“I don’t put anybody in a garment that they don’t fit into. And I tell ladies, ‘If you want something smaller than this, you’re going to have to buy it from somebody else,’” said Thorne.

Thorne said some of her best customers are women who are in the Navy trying to slim down before their waists get measured for their physical fitness tests.