Skinny BBL Overview
A skinny BBL is a specialized Brazilian butt lift designed for leaner individuals with less body fat. Less body fat overall means having less where it counts - especially in the rear. While many patients are easily able to put more junk in their trunk with a BBL, trimmer patients may require a more strategic skinny BBL to get the job done.
What is a Skinny BBL?
The term skinny BBL once referred only to Brazilian butt lifts performed on small, thin patients. It has since evolved to include any BBL designed to create an impactful but subtle change in the buttocks. While it can mean small changes, we use the term here to refer to BBLs performed on trim patients.
As is true of a more traditional BBL, your plastic surgeon extracts donor fat using gentle liposuction to damage as few fat cells as possible during harvest. They then meticulously inject the healthiest cells into the buttocks, creating a more pleasing and desirable shape. The procedure enhances the buttocks while maintaining a natural look that complements the patient’s slender frame.
What Makes a Skinny BBL Different?
We just told you that a skinny BBL is largely the same as a traditional one, so you’re probably wondering what makes the procedure different. Here is the skinny. (See what we did there!)
Trim patients have less extra body fat, which means enhancing their buttocks requires some strategic planning. We can generally take donor fat from anywhere there is enough to pinch. This often means taking fat from the belly, and skinny BBL patients often have thigh lipo. The thighs tend to be a good donor site for almost everyone, and skinny girls who get lipo there can walk away with the much-coveted thigh gap.
But sometimes getting enough fat means thinking outside the box a bit. Your surgeon may need to take fat from several areas of your body, including your upper arms, bra roll, or inner knees. Skinny BBL patients are more likely to need multiple liposuction sites in order to harvest enough fat.
Am I a Good Candidate?
Alas, it takes more than a slim figure to qualify for a skinny BBL. Underweight patients, for example, typically aren’t good candidates. Although there are exceptions, most surgical candidates have a BMI between 25 and 19. Other requirements include being:
- Generally healthy overall
- In control of chronic conditions like high blood pressure and diabetes
- A nonsmoker or willing to quit for surgery
- Able to maintain a stable weight
- In possession of realistic expectations (a skinny BBL won’t turn you into Kim Kardashian)
Don’t Gain Weight for a Skinny BBL!
Please know that we’re begging you when we say this: never, ever intentionally gain weight to qualify for a skinny BBL. Some plastic surgeons advise their patients to significantly increase their calorie intake before a skinny BBL to ensure ample donor fat. If a plastic surgeon ever advises you to do this, leave their office and don’t look back. This is horrible advice.
Overeating to bulk up will result in more fat. But it is far more likely to be visceral fat than subcutaneous fat. Visceral fat is the fat deep within your body that surrounds your internal organs. It is very difficult to get rid of, and liposuction does not touch it! Liposuction only removes the subcutaneous fat just beneath the skin, and packing on the calories doesn’t usually yield this type of fat.
Besides being hard to get rid of and impossible to remove surgically, visceral fat is the bad fat that leads to heart disease, diabetes, and other health problems. If you don’t have enough excess body fat to qualify for a skinny BBL, you may have other options, such as dermal fillers. But please don’t try to gain weight for surgery. Doing so is potentially detrimental to your health and unlikely to get you the type of fat you need anyway.