Now, Meet My New Best Friend

As you may or may not be aware, I'm mildly obsessed with shapewear. (My philosophy is a little bit along the lines of "why go to the gym when there's lycra?") As my friend Tina pointed out, if I were to try and find supporters to fit my blog's "niche," it would most likely be pet care companies, red wine makers and Spanx.

Also, to quote two of my favorite women from Steel Magnolias. (Oh, who are we kidding? They're all my favorite women if they're in Steel Magnolias.):

Olympia Dukakis, commenting on the legs of a woman dancing at Shelby's wedding: "Looks like two pigs fighting under a blanket."

Dolly Parton: "Well, these thighs haven't gone out of the house without lycra on them since I was 14."

Olympia Dukakis: "You were brought up right."

Discovering Spanx changed my world, and I own everything from control top underwear to the full-on bodysuit that makes me look much thinner, but also a little like Marilyn Manson from that odd androgynous album cover underneath my clothes. (It's not full-on Silence of the Lambs skin suit, but it's kind of close.)

It took a while to grow my collection from foot-less hoses to the 15+ shaping garments that now line the bottoms of my drawers, but it happened. In the age-old debate so well articulated by Bridget Jones as to whether or not to wear the sexy lingerie that bares it all or the sucking-in, holding-in place, strange-nude-colored undies that create the illusion of a smooth body with no lumps, I long ago chose the world's ugliest underwear. (Hey, that's how Sarah Blakely herself, creator of Spanx and one of my heroes, describes them.)

*The part of this post that is not for my parents or young children*: For those of you wondering about how to hide one's Spanx in "delicate" moments, if you so choose, I've always used the excuse of needing to change out of "my work underwear." (After all, the underwear is working even if I'm not.) This ruse can only last so long, but it usually gets you over the hump. Cook some hearty homemade meals in the meantime -- lasagna, chicken pot pie, cobbler -- and the actual reveal should be far less traumatizing.

(Sadly, over time, if you stop cooking it will become far more of an issue than what your underwear looks like.)

Even since I came to love shapewear, I've continually flirted with the idea of whether or not I want an actual girdle. My stomach has always been my problem area, and even as a size 2-4 high school student that did 250 crunches after soccer practice each day, my stomach has never been flat -- let alone concave as some extremely lucky people I've heard of the existence of. Feel free to be appalled, but I'm guessing that ever since the phrase "muffin top" made it into the common vernacular, a lot of you have considered the same purchase.  My internal debate of the last few years goes a lot like this:

"Women of the '50s were so lucky that girdles were everywhere. How small could I make my waist? Do you think that thing Scarlett O'Hara had to be laced into is still available? The Internet seems to have everything."

"A girdle? What was I thinking? I'm not 70, for God's sake. I should probably get a life -- and some sort of civic or political concern to rally behind. Wondering about girdles can't be the best use of my time."

But, as you've probably guessed by now, last week I broke when I discovered the Hanes Waist Cincher. While it may not be a full-on girdle, I feel like I have finally crossed the line. (There's tight boning holding my torso in, and I don't think I can go back.)

While we had a difficult adjustment period at first. "Ugh," I complained while laying on the couch Monday night, "it hurts so much." (In fairness, I had just consumed a Five Guys hamburger and fries, so it was not exactly a girdle-friendly meal (and I do see the irony here), but oh, it was not pleasant.)

In the days since, though, we've become quite close. (I wanted to leave the "literally" part unsaid on that last one, but then I did it anyway.) I don't ever want to leave the house without a waist cincher again. (If I wanted to make another bad pun, I'd say we were tied at the hip.) Tight t-shirts with jeans? I don't even worry. Clingy fabrics? Not a problem. I can even pretend I'm a delicate Victorian lady rather than someone who spends all of her time hauling tile at Lowe's if I want to.

A delicate Victorian lady in ragged jeans and a resin-stained Old Navy t-shirt, but still. If nothing else, fantasy has always been my other best friend.