Women has the world's biggest hips (8ft)

 Bootylicious takes on a whole new meaning in relation to Mikel Ruffinelli – the mum-of-four has the biggest hips in the world, measuring a staggering 8ft in circumference.

Mikel – who tips the scales at 30st – insists she’s proud of her shape, scoffing 3,000 calories a day to keep her “booty” in perfect condition.

Vowing she’ll never diet, Mikel says her husband of 10 years, Reggie Brooks, 40, a computer technician, adores her figure.

Mikel, 39, says: “I love my shape and I see no reason to diet because I don’t have health problems. I love Mexican food, English breakfasts and chips. My husband finds my shape sexy and we have an amazing time in bed – there’s no position we can’t do! He tells me I’m beautiful every day. Men don’t fancy skinny girls, they like an hourglass figure.”

Mikel, who’s 5ft 4, shuffles through doors sideways, has steel supported chairs at home and drives a truck as she can’t fit into a car. She even sleeps in a 7ft-wide bed.

 Slim as a teenager, she started gaining weight aged 22 after the birth of her first child, Andrew, now 19, from a previous relationship.

She says: “I was an athletic teenager and weighed 10st. I never had problems with my weight, although big hips do run in the family. My mum, gran and great gran all have them – but theirs aren’t as big as mine.

“After having Andrew in 1994, I went from 13st and a size 16 to 17st and a size 20 and couldn’t shift it.”

And, as three more children – Destynee, 13, Autumn, nine, and Justyce, seven – followed over the next decade with Reggie, her hips ballooned, and she reached 30st and a size 32.

She says: “I put it down to my pregnancies. I don’t see why else the weight would go to my hips, although, I do eat lots.”

She adds: “It sounds like a lot to have 3,000 calories, but for someone my size, it’s not really. I might have a breakfast of two eggs with sausage and bacon and a handful of potatoes. Lunch is fried fish and French fries, but dinner’s my big meal. I like to make barbecue chicken with rice or mash. I have a big portion – but I’m not greedy. I snack on peanuts, granola bars and crisps.”

And Mikel, who has a proportionally small 40-inch waist and 42D bust, insists she is happy with her figure, saying: “In the past, I was self-conscious about my hips and tried milkshake diets, but they didn’t work.

As I got older, I learned to love my body and now I’m not afraid to show it off. Being healthy is the main thing. I do water aerobics to keep fit – I can’t run on land! I struggle to buy sexy underwear, though. I get most of my knickers custom made.”

In fact, Mikel, who lives in LA where she’s studying for a psychology degree, is so confident, for the past five years she’s modelled for a Big Beautiful Women website, earning up to £600 per shoot. She says: “I mostly wear lingerie. I have two seamstresses who make my outfits, although I can easily find clothes for my top half, it’s the bottoms that are a problem.”

But Mikel says she gets laughed at, revealing: “When I walk down the street I can hear people using cameras and saying: ‘Look at her fat ass.’ Fortunately, I rise above it. I don’t want to get bigger, but I don’t want to lose my curves. I look great. I hope I inspire women to think, ‘She’s happy with her body and I can be too!’”

Dr Sarah Jarvis, a clinical consultant for Patient.co.uk, says: “Some people are genetically predisposed to gain weight around their abdomen or hips. However, being obese can cause diabetes, high-blood pressure, arthritis, a stroke or heart attack and puts a huge amount of stress on joints.”