TL;DR
In my 20's at 220 to 250, I was curvy and solid hourglass. At my max of 325 (30's), i was still hourglass, just a very large version and not as deep of a waist definition. Now, at 40, I've lost about 40lbs in 6 months and am no longer a solid hourglass. At 235, my shape is now soft hourglass (barely). My hip to waist ratio is crap and I wish I would have stayed at 250, or 245. I can weight train, but it will not get that soft curve back.
DETAILED STORY:
I've always been very solid, very statuesque, and very curvy. In my early 20s, I gained a few pounds and I lost it. At 25, I was curvy, ideal size, busty hips, hourglass shape.
Early 30s, I gained weight, lost, gained, but for the most part, I stayed heavy, with intermittent parts of being slimmer. I'm 6 feet tall, I went up to 320 pounds. I stayed there for maybe a year. then lost it. But I ranged around 260 for a while, and then 300 for a while.
In my late 30s, I finally lost a significant amount of weight. I went from the 3 somethings to 260. I maintained 260 for over a year and a half and I was still curvy/voluptuous/hourglass. I went down to 250, 248. At that point, I was jogging a few times a week, no weight training, nothing else. I was still curvy. I was nice, actually. I think that was my ideal for me. My hip to waist ratio was very nice. My stomach wasn't flat, but it wasn't big, especially compared to the rest of my body. My boobs were still busty, and I still had a lot of cleavage.
At that point, and this was like a year and a half ago, I gained 30 pounds and went up to 280. I stayed at 280 for about six months. Then from this Feb until now, I went doen to 233. Now, while going down to 233, I enjoyed it. I saw the changes, and I loved it. However, once I got to 240, 233, I noticed significant changes. I was back to my weight of when I was in my early 20s, but I didn't have the same body. I know my muscle mass is different. I don't have the same amount of muscle as in my 20s. However, I lost a lot of cleavage, and cleavage is really what makes your breasts look bigger. Although you can have a large size of breasts, but if you don't have enough cleavage, it won't look as big. It won't have that oomph.
So I lost a lot of cleavage. There's that. My hips are starting to go down now, but my belly is not going down to match my hips. I don't know if eventually the belly will catch up, but I've already lost a lot of belly, but now I'm losing hip, and it's not looking right. I'm looking more square. Not fully square, but I'm looking more square. My hip-to-waist ratio is not as deep, not as defined, and I'm hating it, honestly.
I don't like it, and I'm at a point where I wish I would have stayed at 250 and just weight trained. Now I'm like 236, and I don't like it one bit. People are saying weight train, weight train, but when you weight train, you can build the muscle in your hips, but that fat that gives you the nice curve, you can't add that back in. So it's kind of crummy. It makes me feel like I should have stayed at 250 and just had lipo for the stomach and maintained everything else.
So at this point...People are telling me, just weight train and it'll get better. Weight train your butt, weight train your hips. And it sucks because my waist was 35 and my hips were 48. Now, my waist is still 35 and my hips are 45. And here's the thing, I've always been curvy since about 13. I've always been busty and curvy. Even in my slim weight, I still had an hourglass curve. When I gained weight, my curve became much more pronounced, significant. When I gained weight, I was still solid hourglass, but I was just a bigger version of my older self.
Now, I'm slimmer. I'm at the weight when I was in my early 20s. I am not hourglass anymore. I'm a soft hourglass as opposed to a solid hourglass. And that makes a difference and it's really hurting my feelings.What hurts the most is that I can't really, it's hard to get advice or talk to anybody about it because they don't get it. Either some people are like, you lost weight, shut up. Or those people are like, oh, you're fine, you're still shapely. And other people are like, oh, so what? You know, everyone has their own thing, but you're the one dealing with it. And so what matters most is how you feel, how the individual feels.
I'm hoping, I'm trying to find someone who experienced something similar so I can see what I can do or how I can approach this. People are always like, if you're curvy, you're curvy forever. That's not true. And as you get older, your body redistributes weight a little bit differently. So you could have been curvy all your life and then suddenly, guess what? You're a different shape. That is very possible.You may not go from hourglass to an inverted triangle, but unfortunately, your shape can change significantly.
Right now, I don't know what to do to increase my hip size. I don't know. So let me know what you find out. I'm still going to research and see what I can find.
TL;DR
In my 20's at 220 to 250, I was curvy and solid hourglass. At my max of 325 (30's), i was still hourglass, just a very large version and not as deep of a waist definition. Now, at 40, I've lost about 40lbs in 6 months and am no longer a solid hourglass. At 235, my shape is now soft hourglass (barely). My hip to waist ratio is crap and I wish I would have stayed at 250, or 245. I can weight train, but it will not get that soft curve back.
