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Plastic surgery after the baby

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 22:00:00 +0000

The sign on the wall pointed east to the Plastic Surgery wing, tucked like a secret in the far end of the hospital. I opened the door into the waiting room; a fountain bubbled in the background and Kenny G played from the speakers. Everything about the room was soothing: Relax. Your private affairs are safe with us.

The table next to my waiting room chair was littered with pamphlets—Botox, chemical peels, implants, liposuction, procedures that would either suck matter out or pump matter in. I picked up one entitled “The New You” and flipped through glossy pages detailing breast implants. I dropped it, face down on the table, disgusted with myself.

I was called back by a nurse named Linda, a middle-aged woman whose facelift had left her eyes pulled into an expression of wonderment, as though she held permanent interest in nearly everything I said. She asked me a few questions and then popped in a DVD.

“Just watch this, jot down any questions, and the doctor will be in shortly.”

Buxom blondes rode bicycles with—by the looks on their faces—orgasmic delight. Women played tennis in short skirts and bulging sweater-vest tops. They all confided how happy they were, how confident they felt, now that they were “fixed.”

Dear famous actresses: Your looks scare me

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 20:04:00 +0000

Hey, lady. You, lady. Beloved celebrity of my generation, icon with a career spanning decades. I saw a story about you today and I was excited, because I've always been your fan. Then I looked at it. And I just want to know one thing. Girl, what the eff have you done to your face?

I've tried to ignore it. I've tried not to say anything. Not just to you, today, but to lots of female celebrities, for years. I want to believe that if you were to go out and get a tattoo that said "I LOVE CHEESE" across your forehead, I would support your right to do whatever makes you happy. And as someone who keeps a stock of hair color in her closet in case there's ever a Feriapocalypse, and who doesn't own an item of makeup or moisturizer that doesn't boldly feature the word "youth" on the packaging, I'm not one to espouse growing older gracefully. I'd never sell anybody on the nobility of looking like you just stepped out of a Dorothea Lange photograph.

Redefining the perfect woman

Tue, 25 Sep 2012 20:37:00 +0000

According to Los Angeles Magazine, 91 percent of all cosmetic procedures in the U.S. are performed on women. In L.A., this used to mean more big-busted, classic blonde pin-ups walking around--but that's changing. The current issue reports that "the demand for cosmetic procedures now crosses every ethnic group, altering the de rigueur body shape." In other words, Pamela Anderson might not be the ideal body type anymore.

A spread in the magazine outlines some of the common procedures, including breast augmentations and rhinoplasty:

Augmentation has been one of the most frequently requestesd cosmetic procedures in the country since 2006, but the preference in L.A., surgeons say, is a more natural looking breast size that balances an hourglass shape.

Rhinoplasty is one of the top five most popular cosmetic procedures in the United States. According to L.A. surgeons, the trend in Hispanic, Middle Eastern, and African American patients is to refine, not alter, overall shape.

As the entertainment industry has become more diverse, so have the trends in plastic surgery. But it's also true that this new image, a cross between Sofia Vergara, Angelina Jolie, and Kim Kardashian, is a hardly a less impossible standard --just a different one.