Interview with Cathie Jung

By Scarlet Apron
There are gasps, stares, some want to put their hands around it. For most folks, a waist is a beautiful thing to mind, especially if it’s cinched and molded, reduced to resemble the ultimate female form. Meet Cathie Jung, 70 year-old wife, mother and holder of the 2008 Guinness Book of World Records for smallest waist on a living person.  Jung’s middle measures a scant fifteen inches. That’s once around a coffee can.  As an outsider fashion celebrity and example of extreme physical conditioning, she continues to amaze the public with her surreal shape in appearances on the Tyra Banks show and the British Sun online. Here, we keep time with a real hourglass figure.

 
Vital stats?
I was born in New York City, New York. Mom raised me. Dad was in World War II. He died shortly after. I have one sister who is younger.

 
Anything in your background to indicate you’d grow-up to have the world’s smallest waist?
Absolutely not.  It was when I met my husband, Bob. We were both undergraduate science majors at Tufts University.  Bob was pre-med.  He was very interested in Victorian costuming.  There were movies out then in the 1950s, like Gone with the Wind and Carousel that depicted women wearing those kinds of outfits.

 
How did you see yourself fitting into your husband’s idea of a perfect figure?
I enjoyed it.  I didn’t have any negative feelings.  We married after graduation and have been married for almost fifty.  Back then, we even found a costume corset maker – almost unheard of – and I wore a corset under my wedding gown.

 
When did you start wearing corsets 24/7?
About fifteen years ago.  Bob, being a surgeon, was in training when our kids were little, so there wasn’t time or money to pursue it.  In the mid to late 60s, some people in England were corseting, but it wasn’t until the 80s that we picked up some corsets from a theater shop in Manhattan and had them altered.  Then, we traveled to England and Germany where we met normal, everyday people who wore corsets as a lifestyle.  It was a revelation.

 
What was the process for tightlacing, whereby you reduce your waist size?
Initially, I found it constricting to wear a corset because I’m very active with yard work.  And once your hip spring, which is the difference (in inches) between your hips and your waist, gets to be more than 15”, then it’s a totally different ballgame in terms of construction and design.  If you’re serious about corseting, you need to find someone who can make a comfortable one.  It’s a lot of trial and error.  My waist was about 25” naturally and I was relatively small through the rib cage.

 
What did your kids say?
The boys didn’t mind, however our daughter, the youngest, she’s very outspoken and athletic.  She was pretty negative, but she tolerates it.

 
How could you be sure you weren’t deforming yourself?
You need to do this very slowly and comfortably.  Since Bob is an orthopedic surgeon, he was very interested in the aspect of back protection and what happens to your ribs and organs.  We had a standard chest x-ray done.  He took subsequent shots, in and out of corsets, so we have those for comparison.  We were invited to do a T.V. show in Japan.  They really wanted to ascertain that I didn’t have any ribs removed, so they did a CAT scan and more x-rays. It shows everything is fine.

 
How did Guinness get involved?
They started pursuing us for their T.V. show.  It took a year because we negotiated for control on how I would be presented.  We wanted it to be tasteful and they had people on the show who were diving into bathtubs full of cockroaches (laughs).  We finally came to a certain agreement.  They spent the whole day taping at our house and downtown.  That’s how people found out about it.  We went to a restaurant to show I could eat normally and the local newspaper got wind of it.

 
Corset low down: how many and most unusual?
We have one, supposedly belonged to Ethel Granger.  She didn’t have lots of money, so it isn’t beautiful, to be sure.  She had the smallest waist in the world before she passed away.  It’s all relative.  She was 4’9” and weighed 100 pounds.  For her to have a 13” waist is no big deal.  I’m a standard, average size 5’6”, 135 pounds.  The numbers are meaningless, it’s the proportions.

 
If you unlace for awhile, will everything move back into place?
Not terribly.  Your ribs are obviously malleable; the lower ones get sort of shaped a bit.

 
Will you continue to maintain your extreme figure?
I would think so.  I probably wouldn’t have anything to wear if I didn't.  It feels very normal to me.  I would notice if I weren’t wearing it.

 
Hobbies?
We live right here on the Mystic River, so we boat and fish. 

 
CD in your CD player?
German marching music.

 
Little-known fact about you?
Dolly Parton and I have the same shoemaker.

 
Food you can be seduced with?
Soft-shell crab.

 
Why the waist?
I think it’s the overall look of the shape.  The current silhouette of square and straight for women certainly isn’t very appealing. A woman just doesn’t look like a woman like that.

 
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