Body Wraps?

I've been seriously noticing some skin loose-ness issues lately. My upper arms (which have always had "bat wings" since I can remember losing weight 4yrs ago) and a bit on my tummy (like right above belly button) and definitely lots on my thighs.. I've always hated my thighs because they've been big since I was a little kid (even before I was technically "overewight") and now there's loose skin around the top and especially above my knees.. it kinda grosses me out and I dont like the way it looks. I'm meeting with my doctor on the 17th and he does plastic surgery to correct these kind of things (when exercise on its own doesnt work, like it doesnt for me!), but I've also been reading about body wraps lately.

Has anyone tried them? Did they help? Do they really help tighten skin/lose some inches? Would you recommend them?

Body Wraps? I would recommend lettuce wraps from PF Changs instead! Neither will do much for your loose skin, but the lettuce wraps taste awesome and will cost a lot less....  As for excercise not working, that's impossible. I could not imagine that excercise would NOT work, but wrapping your body up in material that makes you sweat, while gaining no muscular or cardiovascular benefit would. At best, the wraps will make you sweat, which will just make you lose water weight, and will dehydrate you, oh yeah and cost alot of money to do. Stick with a healthy diet and excercise, you will NEVER go wrong with that, I promise....

Also, loose skin is just part of the whole journey, most all  of us have it. I have 10% body fat right now and have a lot of skin around my belly and legs as well, plastic surgery is the ONLY way to correct this. No excercise will rid you of loose skin.

Nothing is going to make loose skin go away.
Not exercise or body wraps.  Exercise will help tone the muscles under the skin which will take up some of that looseness.
Either your body will take in the extra skin or it won't
The only other choice if your body doesn't naturally take in the extra skin is surgery.

I have seen people at our support meeting that were huge before weight loss and their body just assimilated all that extra skin, they have very little hanging skin at all.  Then there are people on the opposite end, it looks like their skin is sluffing off their body.  It has to do with Genetics, how long you were overweigh, how much you were overweight etc.

But that being said, if you want to try the wrap go ahead, you may like the process and may find benefits for you.  You will never know for sure until you try it.  Take some body measurements, see if you really get any benefit from it.  Is it worth the cost, etc.

Good luck, let us know how it turns out for you.

Scott

Irina,

I'm over 5.5 year out and what I noticed is that the loose skin was more pronounced during the first year and a half.  I exercise regularly (and have for the past 5 years) and it isn't as pronounced now, but it's still there.  I don't wear anything that shows the midriff at all because that's where the bulk of my loose skin is.  I still have some on the arms, legs, and behind but it isn't nearly as noticeable.   I'd still like some PS, but the cost is prohibitive at this point so I deal with it.

Linn

I had a body wrap....the promise of inches is in my opinion a con. First of all, it's way too expensive for what they actually do. They measure everything on your body. Your arms, thighs, calves, breasts, stomach, waist...etc. Then they soak used (washed in the laundry) ace bandages in a solution, then after you shed your clothes, you are wrapped with the ace bandages. then they put a plastic suit on you for an hour or so, while you listen to music reclined in a chair. Afterwards, they take everything off and measure you again.

For example,

Lost 1/2 inch in my waist
lost 1/4 inch in my thigh
lost 2/4 inch in my arm
lost 1/4 inch in my breast

then total.....they will tell me I lost 2 inches that day. (just an example)

They will give you a sheet breaking down all the areas you lost. But I didnt need to lose inches in my arms or my neck.....i wanted the inches in my waist, which is the way they advertise it.