Wearing skinny jeans too tight can cause health problems

It's a fashion trend that we're seeing everywhere, at the mall, at work, and at school. We're talking about skinny jeans.

They can be flattering, but if you're not careful, they can also be harmful to your health.

Christine Barnabic is a fan of skinny jeans. She has a collection with various colors, various fabrics, but they all have a simliar look. She loves how skinny jeans can spice up her wardrobe.

Barnabic says, "You can wear the boots over them. It's really nice in the winter and even during the daytime you can wear them with flats or jazz them up at night."

But the one thing Barnabic doesn't love is how difficult they can be to put on. She says, "They can be hard to get on because you're trying to obviously pull them up."

Doctors say you have to be careful and really weigh the price of looking good, to the price of good health. If they're too tight, they can cause nerve damage.

Dr. Karen Boyle with GBMC says, "This disorder is called meralgia paresthetica and it's a disorder that occurs when one of the nerves that runs in the outer part of a thigh gets compressed. The pressure on it causes symptoms of tingling, numbness and pain in the outer part of the thigh."

Dr. Boyle says one woman described it as a floating sensation. She says that when she was walking. She felt weak and got pain in her thighs. The problem can be made even worse if your jeans are too tight, and you're wearing high heels.

Dr. Boyle says, "When you wear high heels the axis of your pelvis changes and what happens is your pelvis tilts and your buttocks kind of kick out a little bit and your legs are longer looking. This is why women like to wear stilettos. But because the pelvis tilts some, it further accentuates the pressure that's caused on those nerves. It can make the symptoms worse."

To alleviate the pain, doctors suggest you wear jeggings or skinny jeans that have some stretch in them.

Barnabic says, "I feel like if you try something on, try it in different sizes up or down to see the best kind of fit and how the looks is. Then, also take into consideration the whole stretch idea to make it look comfortable and feel great."

Dr. Boyle says if you feel tingling and numbness in your leg, stop wearing skinny jeans and the symptoms should go away. If you ignore the pain and continue to wear tight jeans, it could lead to more permanent nerve damage.