Why there was no cellulite in the USSR. The beauty secret of Soviet women

If you look closely at old photos of our mothers and grandmothers, you can see that they look great. They are happy, young, beautiful, and some of them are in great physical shape. Yes, those times cannot be called simple. They say that in the USSR there was a lot of things, including cellulite.

Now modern women will probably grab their heads: did their relatives not pass on the unique gene of slimness to them by inheritance? In fact, everything is much more prosaic.

Why there was no cellulite in the USSR

After the deficit, many spheres began to undergo changes, including the sphere of beauty. Women stopped going to unfashionable “hairdressing salons”, now they visited “beauty salons”. There were plastic surgeons who were ready to turn the Queen into Snow White in a few hours, though not for free. And also – along with the abundance of various cosmetic services, women found more and more flaws in their appearance, which had to be corrected immediately.

The answer to the question of why there was no cellulite in the USSR is as simple as three pennies – they simply did not know about the “orange peel”. But glossy magazines tried to enlighten the fair sex as much as possible and told them that the new-fashioned word is called small bumps on the hips, buttocks and abdomen. And what no one paid attention to before, has now become a problem of universal scale.

In fact, cellulite, which women are still looking for today, is nothing more than a clever trick of Frenchwoman Nicole Ronsard – the head of a cosmetic salon in New York. In 1973, in the American magazine Vogue, she reported that bumps on the body – a serious disease that simply must be fought. Ronsard offered women various diets, programs and means to combat the “orange peel” and not badly enriched on this.

What is cellulite really

Nutriciologist, Ph.D. in microbiology and immunology.

Cellulitis is an acute soft tissue infection characterized by diffuse inflammation with hyperemia, swelling, and localized soreness.

But gynoid lipodystrophy (GLD) or “orange peel” syndrome is a non-inflammatory structural change of subcutaneous fatty tissue in women, the key link in the development of which is local hypertrophy of adipocytes (adipose tissue cells). It is one of the most common syndromes of lipodystrophy, which affects up to 85% of women over 20 years of age.

The modern classification of cellulite includes a four-stage scale relating to the clinical degree of the disease:

1. There are no changes in skin topography. The skin of the affected area is smooth when standing or lying down, but changes on the surface of the skin can be seen when you pinch the skin or contract the muscles.
2. The skin around the affected area is smooth when standing or lying down. Changes can be seen when the skin is pinched.
3. The skin is smooth when lying down, but changes are seen when standing.
4. The changes described in stage 3 are present along with raised areas and nodules. The changes are accompanied by pain.

Why lipodystrophy appears

There is no doubt that improper lifestyle is an important trigger. Excessive consumption of foods rich in trans fats, high in salt and preservatives is associated with the development of various metabolic disorders, including hyperinsulinemia, a condition that can exacerbate lipodystrophy.

A sedentary lifestyle plays a similar role. Lack of physical activity increases the severity of cellulite. Alcohol consumption stimulates lipogenesis and causes dehydration in the body, leading to excessive and inappropriate fat accumulation. Smoking leads to a significant increase in free radicals in the body and constriction of small blood vessels responsible for local microcirculatory disturbances. This may contribute to the development of lipodystrophy, leading to clinical progression.

Female sex hormones play a significant role in the development of lipodystrophy. The first symptoms of adipose tissue topography abnormalities appear during puberty. The exacerbation and progression of skin lesions correlate with hyperestrogenemia associated with pregnancy, use of birth control pills, or hormone replacement therapy in postmenopausal women.

Some authors indicate that estrogen is the main factor causing the occurrence of lipodystrophy. There is excessive relaxation of veins causing blood stasis, which leads to edema, ischemia and hypoxia in the subcutaneous tissue. The effect of estrogen on blood vessel walls is also manifested by increased wall permeability, which can lead to swelling of surrounding tissues. It puts pressure on small veins and arterioles, which leads to impaired blood flow in the skin and adipose tissue. The process is exacerbated by a combination of progesterone deficiency and hyperestrogenism, leading to metabolic disturbances and impaired adipocyte function. These phenomena aggravate fibrosis and nodule formation in the subcutaneous tissue, which inevitably leads to the progression of the “orange peel”.

Other studies support the thesis that the endocrine function of subcutaneous adipose tissue may functionally influence subcutaneous vascular and lymphatic circulation as well as cellulite formation.

Thus, the appearance of gynoid lipodystrophy may accompany the following conditions: obesity, hypothyroidism, varicose veins, polycystic ovary syndrome, etc.

Therefore, it is not enough to eliminate only a cosmetic defect, it is necessary to identify the pathology that led to the development of cellulite, and begin its treatment. In complex therapy use:

• B vitamins, antioxidants, lipoic acid, green tea extract;
• methods of medical cosmetology: massage, electrical stimulation, mesotherapy, hydrotherapy (shower Charcot, hydromassage, salt baths), microcurrents, electrolypolysis (splitting fat through electrical impulses), shock wave and ultrasound therapy, radiofrequency, cryo- and ozone therapy.

These methods have contraindications, so independently decide on the application of the type of correction of lipodystrophy is not worth it.