Why Big Buttocks Can Be Bad for your Health!!

The demand for bigger buttocks in Venezuela means some women will even have banned injections to achieve them, putting their health at risk.

It is with tears in her eyes that Denny recounts how she woke up one day to find a bump the size of a football in her lower back.

She could not walk or bend down, and the pain was intense.

Even before she saw a doctor, Denny, a 35-year-old Venezuelan lawyer, knew the bump must be a side-effect of liquid silicone that had been injected in her buttocks.

It had moved into her back and was putting pressure on her spine.

"It was a terrible shock. I couldn't walk. That's how my agony started," she says.

 "No Barriers"

Buttock injections are one of many common cosmetic procedures Venezuelan women undergo to achieve what society deems to be beautiful.

The injections were banned by the government in 2012, six years after Denny had them.

The injections are made using a biopolymer silicone. The fact that this is injected freely into the body makes it more dangerous than implants, where silicone gel is contained within a shell.

The big attraction is that they are much cheaper than implants. An injection can cost as little as 2000 bolivares (£191, $318) and the whole procedure doesn't take more than 20 minutes.

''Perfect Measurements"
 
Hours before the delicate surgery, Denny explains that she prefers to withhold her full name because some of her family members don't know why she got ill.

They think she has a back problem - which is also what she thought for years, before the bump appeared.


She says she would have not taken the same decision if she had been aware of the risks.

She describes the peer pressure that pushed her to get injected.

"There was a boom. In the office all the women had such nice buttocks. The last straw was when a judge I work with walked in, looking good. Her buttocks looked like two balloons, they were so beautiful," she says.

"I was never obsessed with perfect measurements, but then I let myself be dragged along by the idea that Venezuelan women should look like Barbie dolls."

Venezuelans have won Miss Universe seven times, giving the country a reputation as a factory of beauty queens.