When I reached my mid 30’s I noticed my face starting to change. Particularly my eyes when I tried to do “smokey eye” make-up one night. I looked at photos. OMG. I can’t do my eyeshadow like this anymore. It makes my eyes look sunken in!
Other things I’ve noticed:
– Bags under my eyes
– Losing fat in my face
– Less mass in my body in general (while some people gain weight as they age, I am shriveling up (queue Mr. Burns from the Simpsons).
– I look better when I wear foundation now.
– My skin is thinner.
I follow some plastic surgery clinics on Instagram that offer botox, fillers, and face lifts. They post a lot of before-and-after photos. (If you haven’t gone down this rabbit hole, I don’t recommend it).
I noticed a lot of the women getting work done at these clinics are young as hell. I’m talking teens, and I noticed the majority of them want the same look (ala the Kardashians): Lip filler, Face filler, nose jobs, and brow lifts. They all the look the same! I mean, growing up, we all wanted to look the same too, but the trend would be like a certain shade of lipstick.
My husband doesn’t know who the Kardashians are. I showed him a before and after photo of one of them and he said, “That’s the same person?!”
It made me start to think what an acceptable line is for harming yourself for the sake of vanity. And if anyone wants to argue with me, please tell me how cutting your skin open, injecting, and implanting foreign objects into your body isn’t harmful. Despite your body healing, it is causing unnatural harm. (Harm for a specific result, but still harm).
Arguments I’ve heard:
But what about make-up and clothes? That’s changing the way you look! Yes. True. But it’s not cutting your skin open, so the self-harm level is lower.
What about a pace maker? That requires surgery too! Sure. A pace maker is keeping a person alive to function. Silicon packets + cutting + stuffing a foreign object inside you is purely for vanity.
So my question is: At what point is plastic surgery + facial injections worth it?
The answer is different for everyone. I tend to be pretty judgemental about this when I feel it’s not necessary, especially when it’s a teen girl following a trend or someone I can tell is not in a healthy headspace, but the definition of “necessary” is different for everyone.
*(Ultimately, you do you. This blog post is to start a discussion – not to tell anyone what to do).
Btw, so I don’t sound completely hypocritical, I have had plastic surgery. I had my nose done when I was 19. In 7th grade a kid kicked open a door that hit me in my nose, causing a bump that never healed correctly. I wanted the bump removed, and at the same time the surgeon asked if I wanted to slightly lift my nostrils on the side since he was “going in” anyway. He created a Photoshop mockup and told me what is typically done for a “balanced” nose. I said ok to slightly lifting my side nostrils. What I said no to was making the bridge of my nose higher (the part between the eyes), because even if it was deemed more “attractive,” it didn’t look natural. That was my line. Most Asians don’t naturally have tall nose bridges, and I didn’t want to look like I “got a nose job.” The surgeon agreed this was a good decision.
Overall, I liked the look of my face growing up. Feel free to zoom in to see my nose before to see if you can see the difference. (All the photos below are pre-surgery).
But wait! There’s more!
To top it off, while I was at the plastic surgeons office, my mom suggested that I get my ears pinned back too because they stuck out (my dad’s side has big ears). I didn’t know myself well enough at that age to have a strong opinion about it. I remember I tended to wear my hair down more as a teen, but my ears weren’t something I felt the need to actively seek to go under the knife for to change. In the end I agreed to pulling my ears back. Otoplasty, they call it.
1. That shit hurt. To be honest my nose felt bruised and it was annoying not being able to breathe for a week, but the nose procedure wasn’t bad. The ears though, were super painful.
2. Do I regret it? No I don’t. I admit I do wear my hair up more often now. But if you ask me if I would get the ear job now, I would not.
Now that I’m more confident about who I am as a person, I often like quirky novel looks to a person that makes them a bit more relatable. It also shows confidence when they wear it well, like the people who can pull off a cute gap in the teeth. If something is REALLY unbalanced or looks unhealthy is when I consider these vanity “improvements” more understandable. Like lately, I think tired eyes on myself is not a good look because it doesn’t look healthy. Or like how women’s breasts can look different after they breastfeed. Rachel Hollis said her post-breastfeeding boobs looked like tube socks, so she was happy to get them done. Totally get it.
Conclusion:
Overall I think it’s the mindset when approaching plastic surgery that is most important. Does your decision come from a healthy place, or do you feel like you aren’t good enough and seek for validation? Is what you want to change one thing that you simply have a preference for, and genuinely feel good after changing it, or will you still feel not good enough after the procedure is done? Are you following a trend, or unrealistic beauty standards? Do you like yourself? Or do you want to look like someone else?
I definitely have more self-love for myself now than I did at 19.
Now that I’m officially in “I’m-aging-and-it’s-noticeable” phase, I’m figuring out where that line is for myself. I want to age gracefully while being healthy. I am for refreshing improvements, but don’t want to hold on for dear life for how I used to look. I got microneedling recently from an acupuncturist, and she was gentle enough for me to see a difference, but not beat my face up. I also am not against Botox in between my eyebrows because I can have angry furrowed-brow resting face. I got Botox once before our wedding and my husband said he couldn’t tell. I said good – that’s the point.
How do you feel about plastic surgery? About facial injections? About the lip filler + eyebrow lift trends we see? Where is your line?
Love this post! As a woman in my late 30’s I recently got Botox for that same furrowed brow and couldn’t be happier. Most ppl couldn’t notice but again that’s the point. I remember being so judgmental in my late teens and 20’s of older women doing Botox and different surgeries but as I’ve aged and grown I also realized there can be a balanced approach to aging gracefully and where each person falls on that spectrum is entirely up to them.
Dear Christine,
A few months ago I marveled at how good you looked in a picture ( I think it was promoting something new along the lines of teaching but I am not sure. At any rate it was between 2 and 4 months past.
At the time I thought to write and mention how lovely you looked but I reconsidered so as not to stray into the innapropriat.
But now you have raised the subject and I must give you my opinion.
You look great! Do not consider anything other than a pound or 2 one way or the other, more or less sun..a change in make up or more vegetables and juices. But surgery? Absolutely not. there is no need and it would be a foolish area to go into. People change with the years.
You have become more striking (I would even say exotic!) over the years.
When I saw that picture several months ago I even thought of showing
it to my wife for an example of striking good looks. (This too I thought the better of)
My point is that you are so lovely the way you are I that I counsel to not even consider surgery. My cousin in Italy was an eminent “Aesthetic Surgeon” (plastic surgeon here) who would make ears for kids that would grow with the head so that the child might need only 2 or 3 surgeries in their entire life. She felt so strongly that plastic surgery was for repair and serious needs (she did a lot of work on soldiers after WWll) not for our human vanity.
Our society does us such a disservice with the values of “beauty” so often represented by a money making enterprise.
Forgive my for being so strong in this note but I think you are very lovely right now …and that you should not consider toying with that beauty.
Regards,
Robin
Oh yea…it was the photo with the “Imposter syndrome” piece” L&R,
Robin
Great article. I read your blog post about plastic surgery botox fillers and was amazed by how well you handled the subject. Thank you for sharing it.
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