Is it Unhealthy if a Woman's Hip Bones Show?

Is it Unhealthy if a Woman’s Hip Bones Show?

By Lorra Garrick | Last updated 04/23

A woman does not have an eating disorder just because her hip bones show; visible bones should not be the gold standard for malnourishment.

Though the hip bones on all women with anorexia nervosa are quite prominent, this doesn’t mean that the converse is true:

That a woman whose hip bones are visible necessarily has this eating disorder or a less serious form of restricting caloric intake.

Over the past several years, however, many people have been zooming their eyes in on those hip bones when a celebrity woman is wearing a bikini or other attire that reveals this area.

But if she or a woman with a similar build were walking down the street in jeans and a T shirt or in a pantsuit or skirt and top, nobody would see the hip bones or even look there to see if they were visible — and hence, not think the woman has an eating disorder unless she weighed 97 pounds at 5’7.

The hip bones of the woman at the top of this article show. But look at her shoulders, arms and legs.

Those muscles look well-fed.

My hip bones show. I’m strong, fit, fast and have excellent blood work and naturally low blood pressure.

Visible hip bones do not necessarily equate to an eating disorder or malnourishment.

However…when hip bones show in a woman — along with spindly, weak-looking arms, lack of abdominal musculature and toneless “chicken” legs … it’s a safe bet that there’s some under-eating going on.

Shutterstock/Nomad_Soul

There’s a big difference between the physiques of Angelina Jolie and Leanne Rimes.

Both these women have been chastised by the media for being too thin.

When I look at Angelina Jolie, I see a woman who, at most, does minimal exercise (maybe a walk every evening or some light work with tiny dumbbells), and who simply does not eat enough; she’s undernourished.

Younger photos of Angelina Jolie are incriminating; they show a slightly fuller body, fewer visible bones, but still very slender.

But more contemporaneously, she is just too underweight and it looks awful. Even marathon runners don’t look like this. They at least have tone.

Leanne Rimes, take my word for it, is eating healthfully but with a lot of control, having finally decided to crack down on her weight and fitness by taking strength training very seriously—and practicing healthier, portion-controlled eating habits.

Just because you can see her hip bones and other bones doesn’t mean she’s in the same boat as Angelina Jolie. Unlike Angelina Jolie, Leanne Rimes has toned muscles.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the singer could knock off a set of pull-ups and then drop down to a set of men’s pushups, whereas the feeble looking Jolie, I’m sure, would struggle to complete just half a pushup, and a single pull-up is out of the question.

Rimes’ body composition is different than Jolie’s; Leanne is what I call skinny-toned, while Jolie is skinny-weak.

Many elite female athletes have visible hip bones.

This means a lot of muscle in the body keeping fat buildup at bay. This can be accomplished without underfeeding the body.

“Just because a woman’s hip-bones show, does not mean she is too thin,” says Kathryn Boling, MD, a board certified family medicine practitioner with Mercy Medical Center in Baltimore, MD.

“A normal BMI is between 20-25. That means a woman who is 5 feet 3 inches could weigh as little as 115 and have a BMI of 20.4 (low end of normal).

“The average woman in this country is 5 feet 4 inches and weighs 140 lbs.

“A woman of the same height can weigh as little as 118 lbs. and still be within a normal BMI at 20.3.

“The average woman has a BMI of 24.0 (also normal).

“However, it is not hard to imagine that hip bones might not be visible in the 140 lb. woman at this height — but would be visible on the 118 lb. woman.

“Both would not be considered too thin by medical definition.”