Does anything cure cellulite? Answer: Yes and No

I am about four inches taller than my younger sister, but, other than this, we have very similar bodies. We're both mostly thin women with curvy hips and ample bottoms and, even though we both eat healthy foods and are relatively fit, as we entered our late 20s and early 30s, we both developed cellulite.

I don't know that I can accurately express the horror and disbelief of our initial cellulite conversation, but it involved lots of "Ugh!" "No!" "Why?!" "How did this happen?" and a slew of words that cannot be printed in a family blog.

From there, my sister, who's a scientist, tackled this puckered skin devil with the kind of pragmatism she applies to everything; she calmly resolved to start drinking more water and take up running.

I, on the other hand, felt frustrated and sorry for myself, decided cellulite meant the death of my youth and attractiveness, studied pictures of celebrities' dimpled thighs with rueful glee, haphazardly smeared $65 cream on the suspect areas, perhaps cried and punched the bed, and prayed for it all to just go away.

It's three years later, and neither of our situations has really changed. This is because cellulite, regardless of your fighting-back strategy, really, really wants to stick around.

Cellulite is, in the most simple terms, fat formed under a person’s skin which causes the surface to look lumpy. Contrary to common belief, it is not obesity related (lots of skinny people have it), but instead caused by factors such as age, hormonal changes, genetics, increased water retention, and poor circulation. Even though most of us are incredibly self-conscious and embarrassed about it, cellulite affects 90 percent of women at some point in their lives (but it rarely develops in men, lucky jerks). Our thighs, buttocks and stomachs are the most common areas for cellulite, though it can also develop on upper arms and calves. Oh, joy.

So, back to getting rid of it.

No matter what the cosmetics companies try to tell you, no matter how persuasive they are in their beautiful-skin-can-be-yours ads, there is no lotion, gel, or bottled potion in all the land that is proven to work against cellulite. It's all a big dream-in-a-cream scam. This is important to remember, not only so we stop wasting our money on laughably ineffective products (seriously, those "firming" and "lifting" balms are expensive!), but so we can cease allowing beauty executives to think we're total suckers who will buy any old bunk.

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