A woman has revealed how she has "corset-trained" her body down to a minuscule 16-inch waist - and she's not stopping there!

Speaking to the Daily Star, 26-year-old Sammy - who also goes by the Instagram handle @curvaceous_sammm - says she has spent the last two years binding her stomach with waist trainers in an attempt to achieve the "perfect hourglass figure".

Without a corset, Sammy says that her waist now measures a tiny 22-inches - which is eight inches down from her 30-inch starting figure.

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However, despite being able to close her 16-inch corset, Sammy is still aiming to be able to fit into a 15-inch trainer.

Recording her progress for her 1.1K Instagram followers, Sammy says that corsets can achieve semi-permanent results by moving "floating" ribs and shifting organs.

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And despite the process sounding unpleasant, Sammy insists that "It's only painful if you rush and don’t purchase a proper fitting corset."

She added: "If there's any pinching, numbness, pain, raw skin, large gaps at the ribs or hips when the corset is closed then those are signs of an ill-fitting corset."

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And despite receiving support from her social media followers, Sammy revealed that her real-life partners can't stand her obsession.

"I have a husband that ran out on me, a boyfriend, and a man I s***w on the side on occasions, and neither of them like it," Sammy said.

The current world record for the smallest waist currently belongs to Cathie Jung, from the USA - who boasts a 21-inch unbound waist and can fit into a 15-inch corset.

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However, despite being popular with some fanatics, Healthline.com states that using waist-trainers comes with several risks, including difficulty breathing, a weakened core, a weakened pelvic floor, and even organ damage.

Speaking to USA Today, spinal surgeon Dr. Paul Jeffords says: "Just because a celebrity promotes it doesn't mean that it's safe or that it works or that it's proven."

Dr. Tasneem Bhatia, an Atlanta physician, adds: "It just crams all of your organs together. So over a long period of time, wearing it too much and too frequently, it can cause damage too."

Body dysmorphia is an extremely heavy topic. People with anorexia, bulimia and more torture themselves to achieve an impossible standard of beauty. Waists the size of wafers are the goal, and it's all too impossible - until someone actually goes through surgery to achieve it. But who could afford it? Who would want it, truly, to remove parts of their own skeleton just to look insanely thin? Well, Pixee Fox has done just that. In an incredibly difficult to watch interview on This Morning, the 27-year-old woman claims she has spent 500,000 pounds on surgeries to remove SIX of her ribs, a procedure that is destined to hurt her long-term health and makes her look, indeed, like a cartoon character. Fox explains: "I see myself as a science project. I am basically a pioneer in the beauty industry, I am pushing the beauty industry forward, I am the first person to remove six of my ribs." She says that she wears a 16" corset, which keeps her waist at 16 inches. The world record for the thinnest waist is 15 inches, which she says she wants to achieve. So she wants to get even skinnier, even after taking six ribs out of her body. Wow. She says that the corset is her 'external ribcage', an exoskeleton to protect her organs from damage without ribs to protect them. I feel squeamish just writing this. That sounds so insanely difficult. How could taking out six ribs not destroy your longterm health? I mean, SIX is a lot of them. I feel weak just thinking about losing literal bones. And spending half a million pounds is insane too. She says she used to be an electrician, but how does she have the money for this? "I've always been very artistic," she said. "To be honest I was against plastic surgery...for me it was never about I didn't like the way I look, it was this vision I had for myself inside my head...maybe the vision I have for myself in my head doesn't match the images." It just seems so, so extreme. Pixee Fox has become famous for it, so maybe she's pleased, but I know that surviving without ribs has to be damaging. I mean, what would the surgery be like? And living without that protection, just skin against your organs...like, how is this possible? I really don't understand. And she looked so great before the surgery as well. Why did she think she needs this?? It's a medical miracle that this is possible, though Pixee Fox admitted that it was 'difficult' to find a doctor willing to pick up the knife for this next-level surgery. All I can say is that this is rough, and makes me question my own mortality. My sides feel weak, like I've been taking my ribs for granted. No matter what, I'll always be grateful to have all my ribs...so I can thank Pixee Fox for that. I didn't realize I was taking my skeleton for granted...

Sophia Vegas, a 31-year-old woman from Germany, is often credited with having the smallest waist in the world. Measuring in at just 18.5 inches (47cm), her midriff is one of the smallest on the planet - and she's pretty much built her entire brand around it.

Vegas, whose real name is Sophia Wollersheim, is a reality TV star and DJ. She's amassed quite the social media following thanks to her outrageous proportions, and many were surprised to see her put those proportions at risk last year, when she announced that she was expecting a baby.

Talking about her life-changing moment of motherhood last year, Vegas announced that she had stopped wearing corsets for waist training purposes. due to the fact that she was pregnant.

Since the little one arrived, though, she's got straight back on her waist-training ways - and she's already looking astoundingly similar to how she did before.

This is her at the end of last year, when she was around seven and a half months pregnant:

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And this is what she looks like now, less than two months after giving birth to a baby girl:

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"I gained a total of 2st [during pregnancy] and have already lost 1.5st," the reality star told her fans. "I think that’s a good performance… but somehow I feel the last few pounds are very persistent."

This time around, it seems that Vegas has achieved the weight loss through diet and exercise - but the rest of her body has required a fair bit of surgical assistance.

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In 2017, she underwent surgery to have four of her ribs removed in order to allow for further corset training. She is also rumoured to have had a number of other cosmetic procedures on her nose, chest, and butt.

Vegas has received criticism for her decision to go under the knife in the past.

"It's my life and I will say what I want and do what I want, whether you like it or not," she wrote on her Instagram back in 2017. "I love my new body and have so many beautiful things coming my way before the sun sets on my life."

To her trolls, she added: "I wish you all that you can find your happiness as I do and stop you from caring about your shortcomings - be it the chest, the belly, or your lack of confidence."

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Vegas' body modifications may seem extreme - but she's got nothing on the likes of the Human Ken Doll, who has also had ribs removed in order to attain his iconic look.

Now that she's had a baby, the reality star may struggle to get her waist all the way back down to where it was before, but it doesn't look like she's giving up any time soon.

Inspirational fitness transformations have always been like catnip to the internet, but one woman’s story shows that that age isn’t a barrier when it comes to changing your lifestyle. 

At 74 years of age, fitness guru Joan has conquered social media with her incredible fitness journey, showcasing her transformation on Instagram. Having amassed over 800,000 followers, her message to others like her is a simple one - “You can’t turn back the clock but you can wind it up again.”

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Almost every day, Joan shares updates from her sessions with her daughter Michelle MacDonald, who also happens to be a professional fitness coach. A typical workout might include everything from weight training to running on a beach, proving that age really is just a number. 

In a recent Instagram update commemorating just how far she has come, Joan imparted several pearls of wisdom to her followers. Detailing how she came to start her journey, she wrote:

“When I first started out on my transformation journey, I hated trying on clothes, and in fact most of my clothes barely fit me any more so I had just a few bottoms and tops to choose from. Baggy shorts and over-sized t-shirts in boring colors were my go-to. I didn’t love myself back then and that’s how I dressed myself. I used to think 1) I didn’t deserve beautiful clothes and 2) nothing nice would fit me anyway, especially at my age.

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“It wasn’t until my daughter insisted that I buy some new workout clothes and took me shopping at @forever21 that I understood that that mindset wasn’t working for me. When I saw myself in flattering clothes in cute colors, I could see that my inner dialogue had to go. I actually had muscles! I actually had a good shape taking form! I felt so good inside to see that in those new clothes. 

“Even though it might seem like something superficial like clothing can’t have a big impact on how we see ourselves it absolutely can my dears! If I can learn that lesson in my seventies you can too.”

It just goes to show that it's never too late to make a change.

When it comes to judging appearances, a lot of us have this misguided idea that being skinny is the same as being healthy. We glorify celebrities with tiny waists and pencil-thin legs, and judge ourselves in comparison to people who are slimmer than us. But having a petite body doesn't always mean that a person is leading a healthy lifestyle. In fact, sometimes it's an indication of the complete opposite.

Johanna Sophia, a 23-year-old former bodybuilder from Toronto, Canada, used to have a figure that many would consider enviable. She was thin but muscular, and weighed just 117lb.

However, she achieved her look through obsessive exercise - sometimes working out three times a day - and, even worse, through purging herself of any food she'd eaten. At the time, she thought she looked great; but, after a while, her lifestyle started to take its toll, and Sophia realized that she wasn't actually being healthy at all.

"In my first year of competing, I knew I needed to eat a whole lot less and do cardio up to three times a day," she said. "I developed an eating disorder, bulimia. Eventually, I realized that I needed to stop but I was so deep in the competition world and the superficial bubble that it took a long time to figure it out."

She continued:

"At the worst of my eating disorder, I was super-light and was making myself sick at least once a day.

"I was consuming the low-calorie diet that my coach put me on but also was binge eating junk food - whatever sugary or fatty food I could get my hands on.

"The fixation caused me to constantly pick out the imperfections all over my body, I always felt like I wasn't enough or didn't measure up."

Thankfully, Sophia finally realized that - while she might have appeared healthy from the outside - her lifestyle was doing her far more damage than good. And so she decided to change.

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After quitting bodybuilding in 2014, Sophia made the first step towards achieving a healthier, more curvaceous body: the 100-day squat challenge. The challenge changed her figure substantially, but also helped her to feel more comfortable in herself.

"I ended up increasing my squat 1RM from 225lbs to 320lbs in just 70 days, and with that came an extra three inches on my butt," she said. "People would call my rear a 'Thanksgiving table' because it stuck out so much."

But she prefers it that way.

"When I used to compete people saw me as ripped and disciplined, but I felt awful and looking back now, all I see is how unhappy I was compared to how happy I am now."

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Sophia now weighs in at a much healthier 145lbs, and explains that her healthy lifestyle is now about balance rather than an extreme approach.

"For 80 per cent of the time, I'm eating healthy and working out, doing things that will keep my body alive and the 20 per cent is eating what I truly enjoy or while socializing, I'm not afraid to indulge anymore.

"What I am mindful of is keeping my protein high, healthy fats moderate and carbohydrates complex - meaning I get the majority of my carbs from foods like sweet potatoes, quinoa, rice and others.

"As a result of all these habits and this free way of living and eating, I can say that I pretty much never crave anything, and I feel more healthy and energized."

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Since changing her lifestyle, Sophia now works as a personal trainer, and uses her own experience in order to motivate others to sustain a healthy, productive attitude to fitness and body image.