I was “Stick” from second grade to 27. Then I grew real hips by accident.
Twenty years of “girl, you need to eat,” and every pound I ever gained went to my belly. Then I kept a 30-day diary, tape measure and all, until the day my cousin asked who did my BBL.
The first time somebody called me Stick, I was seven. A boy named Marcus said it at recess, and by Friday the whole second grade was saying it.
I'm 27 now. The kids grew out of it, but the aunties never did. Every cookout, every Thanksgiving, somebody looks at my plate, then at me, and says it: “Girl, you need to eat.”
So when I say I grew real hips this year, by accident, I need you to know how long I waited.
Thirty days ago I opened a little bottle I almost didn't buy. I started a diary in my Notes app because I didn't trust myself to notice anything. By Day 7 my jeans were tight at the hip bone. By Day 21 the tape measure said three more inches. And on Day 30, my cousin pulled me into my aunt's kitchen and asked me, dead serious, who did my BBL.
Nobody did. And my stomach measured the same on Day 30 as it did on Day 1.
I'm putting the whole diary below, numbers included. I'm also sharing what a stranger told me online at 2 AM. It finally explained why everything I'd tried since I was 19 only ever grew my belly.
And no, it's not another shake or gummy. If you've always been the skinny one, read this before you buy another tub of anything.
Twenty years of being “the skinny one”
Sixth grade was when it really hit. Every girl in my class came back from summer break with hips. I came back with the same pancake booty, and fifteen years later I still had it.
My jeans sagged in the back. I'd tug them up all day and the back pockets just hung there, like nobody was home. Dresses were worse. I owned three pairs of hip-pad shorts so I could wear anything fitted without feeling like a hanger.
In group photos I always held the phone, so I never had to be in them. When my sister posted a video of us walking to the car, I saw myself from behind and asked her to delete it that night.
My family meant well. My mom texted me smoothie recipes. My Aunt Cheryl told me the only way I'd ever get hips was to have a baby.
So from 19 to 27, I tried everything I could think of:
- Weight-gain shakes, three a day. I held my nose to get them down.
- “Just eat more.” I forced second plates until I felt sick, then skipped breakfast because I was still full.
- Booty gummies, two whole bags. Mostly sugar, and my jeans never noticed.
- Squats and hip thrusts five days a week, plus more clamshells than I can count. Still no hips.
The shakes were the only thing that ever put weight on me. Six pounds in two months, and every one of them went to my stomach. My jeans got tight at the waist and stayed empty in the back.
The Fourth of July picture
Four months into the shakes, my aunt threw her Fourth of July cookout. I wore a fitted sundress for the first time in years, because I thought, finally, I've gained something.
Aunt Cheryl hugged me, patted my stomach and said, “Well, it's going somewhere, baby.” Everybody laughed. I laughed too.
That night my cousin posted the family picture. It was a side view: a little pouch in front, pancake booty in back. I sat in my car and cried.
Then I looked up BBL prices. The surgeon's fee alone averages $7,264. Getting put to sleep, the operating room and everything else cost extra. I closed the tab, too scared of the surgery anyway.
I stopped the shakes that week. Then at 2 AM one night, I typed the question I'd never asked out loud. Why does all my weight go to my stomach and not my butt?
I ended up in a thread on r/blackladies full of girls like me, and one reply made me sit straight up in bed.
“It's not your genetics, sis. You're never actually hungry, so you never really eat enough. Then when you force it with shakes while you're stressed out, your body parks it on your stomach first. Fix the appetite AND the stress, and it finally goes somewhere else.”
I read it maybe ten times. Never hungry? That was me: coffee and nothing else until 3 PM, then full after four bites at dinner. Stressed? I'd been stressed about my body since the second grade.
So I went down the rabbit hole.
It was never my genetics. I'd been filling the wrong tank.
Everybody knows the basic rule. To gain weight, you have to eat more than your body burns. That extra is what builds curves.
But I was never hungry, so I never had real extra. And when I did force it, I was stressed out of my mind. When you're stressed, your body holds on to weight around your belly first.
Think of it like two gas tanks. One is your belly. The other is your hips, thighs and booty. When you're stressed and underfed, the nozzle gets stuck in the belly tank. You can pump all day (the shakes were just me pumping harder), and it still goes in the wrong tank.
Squats couldn't fix it either. With no extra fuel going down there, there's nothing to fill out (and I have the clamshell count to prove it).
That's the real reason the shakes grew my stomach and left my jeans empty in the back. My body was never broken. It was underfed and stressed, and it had never been given a reason to send anything to my hips.
The shake brands sell you more fuel and never ask where it goes, and everybody else just blames genetics. None of that was my fault, and if you're built like me, it isn't yours either.
Where I'd be if I'd kept going
I did the math in bed that night, and I didn't like it.
Another year of shakes meant another ten pounds, and I knew exactly where they'd land. I'd be buying jeans a size up for my waist while the back still hung loose. And I'd still be in the back row of every family picture.
Sooner or later I'd be saving up $7,264 for a surgeon's fee and waiting to get brave enough. It would be more out of being tired than wanting surgery.
So the real question was how to move the nozzle.
How to move the nozzle
Once I understood the two tanks, the fix felt kind of obvious. Three things have to happen at the same time:
- Appetite ON. You get real hunger back, so you eat enough without forcing it down.
- Belly OFF. The stress calms down, so your belly tank stops grabbing everything first.
- Curves FED. Your body sends more to your hips, thighs and booty, so the extra has somewhere better to go.
Later I found out this has a name: the Curve-First Method. And it explained everything I'd tried. Shakes only forced the fuel in, squats did a little of the third, and nothing I'd bought ever touched the second.
Could I do all three myself? I tried for two weeks. Cheap capsules from the drugstore made me hungry, and my stomach grew right along with my thighs. Juggling five things every morning was never going to happen.
What I wanted was one thing that did all three, and that was harder to find than I expected.
Finding one thing that did all three
The “booty drops” I found had red flags, like subscriptions hidden at checkout or reviews that only praised the customer service. A couple of girls in the comments said their orders took a month to show up.
So I messaged the woman from the thread and asked what she used.
I'll be real: I bought it for the appetite part, so I could finish a plate at Thanksgiving without anyone watching. I didn't believe the hips part for a second. So the hips were the accident.
Before I ordered, I read every review from women built like me. These two got me:
5'8 and 117 pounds my whole adult life, and my whole family is built like me. I didn't believe the hips part. Week 3 my jeans got tight across the hips and my waist is still a 25.
Day 3 I was starving, which was the point for me. By week 4 my mom asked if I'd been working out. I have not seen a gym since August.
I ordered on a Sunday night. It showed up that Friday, with tracking the whole way.
It's called Kynova Curve Drops
It's a little amber glass bottle with a yellow label, smaller than my hand. You take one full dropper a day, and it takes about two seconds.
Remember the three switches? The five ingredients line up with them like this:
- Fenugreek and maca for Appetite ON. They wake your hunger back up.
- Ashwagandha for Belly OFF. It calms your stress, so your body stops parking weight on your stomach.
- Beet root and L-arginine for Curves FED. They send more to your hips, thighs and booty.
You put the dropper under your tongue, or stir it into coffee or juice. It tastes light and a little sweet, kind of like honey. There's nothing to mix, and every order is a one-time purchase, so nobody signs you up for anything.
One thing before you go further: the first plant on that list can make you smell a little like maple syrup. My boyfriend said I smelled like pancakes, and I've been called worse.
If you're pregnant or breastfeeding, skip it. And if you don't want to eat more, it won't work, because the whole point is that you finally eat enough.
If you've been flat forever and you're ready to give it a real 30 days, keep reading.
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My diary, Day 1 to Day 30
These are copied straight from my Notes app. I fixed the typos and nothing else.
First dropper in my coffee at 7:10. Tastes like weak honey. Felt nothing. Measured before bed so I'd have proof either way: hips 33, waist 25.
I was hungry at 10 AM. I am never hungry at 10 AM. Ate a whole breakfast sandwich, then went back for seconds at Mom's. She almost dropped her fork.
Put on my good jeans for work and they were tight at the hip bone, while the waist fit exactly the same. I stood sideways in the bathroom mirror for way too long.
Still waking up hungry. Brianna at work asked if I'd started doing hip thrusts. I said no and took the long way to the copier.
Two weeks. My jeans fill out in the back now, and I didn't tug them up once all day. Belly looks the same. I keep checking anyway.
Got the tape out. Hips: 36 inches. That's three more inches in 21 days, and my waist is still 25. I measured twice, then texted my sister a picture. She wrote back “girl, a no-knife BBL??”
Aunt Cheryl's birthday, same sundress as the Fourth of July. My cousin Kiara pulled me into the kitchen and whispered, “Okay, who did your BBL?” I laughed so hard I had to sit down, and then Aunt Cheryl made me spin around.
My numbers, Day 1 vs Day 30
| Day 1 | Day 30 | Change | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hips (at hip bone) | 33 in | 36.5 in | +3.5 in |
| Booty (fullest point) | 35 in | 37 in | +2 in |
| Upper thigh | 19 in | 21 in | +2 in |
| Waist | 25 in | 25 in | same |
| Belly (at navel) | 27 in | 27 in | same |
| Jeans size | 2 | 4 | +1 size |
The part I still can't get over is the bottom of that table. For eight years every pound I gained went to my belly. This time, none of it did.
I figured maybe I was a fluke, so I looked for other women who'd tried it.
It wasn't just me
9 out of 10 women who tried it saw fuller hips within 30 days.
More than 12,000 women have started their own 30 days. These sounded the most like me:
I've been hit with a surprise “subscription” before, so I read the checkout three times. Charged once, tracking the same day, box in six days. By week 3 my jeans were tighter in the hips.
One star off because the drops had me smelling like a waffle house the first week lol. More water fixed it. My hips are coming in, and my sister noticed before I did.
“My grandma grabbed my hips after church and said ‘there she is.’ I'm 29. I cried in the parking lot, the good kind.”Shanice B., 29, Durham, NCSend it to my hips
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It's not just me: day 1 vs day 30 from the girls in my DMs
After I shared my diary, girls started sending me their own side-by-sides. Left is day 1, right is day 30. Same waist on every single one.
Picture your next cookout
I think a lot about the girl in that Fourth of July picture.
If that's you right now, picture the next one. The jeans that used to hang off you fit in the back without a belt. You go back for seconds and nobody says a word. Somebody calls for a picture and you don't volunteer to hold the phone, and some auntie makes you spin around.
That's what Day 30 felt like for me.
What it costs (and what I stopped comparing it to)
Before the price, remember what's in the bottle: five ingredients that each have a job, in a glass bottle that ships with tracking. That costs a lot more to make than a tub of gainer powder.
When I ordered, they were running a Buy 2 Get 1 FREE deal. It's still on today, , but I don't know for how long. Every month you wait is another month with the nozzle stuck in the wrong tank.
Please don't compare it to drugstore gummies or another tub of gainer, the stuff that put my weight on my belly or nowhere. Compare it to what I'd already wasted on shakes and gummies. Or to the BBL I almost saved for, where the surgeon's fee alone averages $7,264.
One bottle is normally $79.99, and right now it's $29.99. But the full shape takes 90 days, so the one I'd tell my best friend to get is the 90-day pack. That's Buy 2 Get 1 FREE, three bottles for $59.99 instead of $239.97.
That's $0.67 a day, less than a cup of coffee. Next to a $7,264 surgeon's fee, it's not even close.
Or you can do what I did for eight years. Buy another tub, and stand in the back of another picture waiting for your genes to change their mind.
back
Love your curves in 90 days, or get every penny back.
Take it every day for 90 days. If you don't love what you see in the mirror, email Kynova and they refund your order. There's no form to fill out, and it doesn't matter which pack you bought.
Start your own 30 days
- 3 bottles, a full 90-day supply
- Free shipping on every order, with tracking the whole way
- 90-Day Money-Back Guarantee on every order
- One-time purchase, no subscription
Questions I had too
Will it make me gain in my belly?
That was my biggest fear too. Belly OFF is built for exactly that: it calms your stress, so your body stops parking weight on your stomach. My waist measured 25 inches on Day 1 and on Day 30.
How fast will I notice something?
You feel hungrier within the first 3 days. Your jeans get tighter at the hips between week 1 and week 3, and the mirror changes by Day 30. The full shape comes at 90 days. Take it every day and eat your meals.
How do I take it?
Fill the dropper all the way (that's 2 mL). Put it under your tongue or stir it into coffee, juice or a smoothie. Once a day, every day.
What does it taste and smell like?
Light and a little sweet, like honey. One of the plants can give you a light maple-syrup smell, mostly in your sweat. It's harmless, and drinking more water helps it fade.
Is this a subscription?
No. Every order is a one-time purchase. You're charged once, and never again unless you place a new order.
What if it doesn't work for me?
Every order comes with the 90-Day Money-Back Guarantee. Email Kynova and they refund you. No forms, and any pack counts.
What happens when I stop?
Your appetite goes back to how it was before, so stopping early stops the progress too. That's why I went with the 90-day pack.
Is it safe for me?
It's five simple ingredients, and four of them are plants. Don't take it if you're pregnant or breastfeeding. Talk to your doctor first if you have a thyroid condition, diabetes, or take prescription medication.
How long does shipping take?
Shipping is free on every order. It's tracked and arrives in 5 to 8 business days.
This was never about a bigger butt
If you take one thing from my diary, take this: my body was never broken. It was underfed and stressed, and nobody ever told me where the weight was going.
What I wanted was simple: jeans that fit in the back, and to stop being “the skinny one” at my own family's table. Thirty days gave me that.
Your Day 1 can be tomorrow morning.
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