Hello, world!

It’s a simple truth that when we look good, we feel good. Putting it quite bluntly, the pretty kids in high school are the popular ones. Everyone likes you when you’re pretty. Psychologically, people will judge an attractive person as being nicer than an unattractive person without knowing anything else about them. So, it’s not surprising that there is an entire field dedicated to making people more beautiful.

Plastic surgery has been around for centuries, and included procedures including hand surgery, burn treatments, rhinoplasties, and cleft lip reconstructions. Today, the term plastic surgery has become synonymous with cosmetic surgery – surgery done specifically to modify or improve a physical feature.

The amount of aesthetic treatments currently available is astounding. From general liposuction, to face lifts, to butt implants, the plastic surgery industry has exponentially increased over the past 25 years, with the constant technological advancements made in the field. Plastic surgery offices now include many skin treatments as well, such as laser hair removals, micro-dermabrasion, and chemical peels. Doctors can literally fix, change, and enhance anything about you. Want to look like Angelina Jolie? No problem (as long as you have the income to pay for it, of course).

My mother is a registered nurse, and after 18 years as a stay-at-home mom, re-entered the world of medicine as the nurse to our plastic surgeon friend. She gives Botox injections and fillers, and provides treatments using the “AWT” machine (acoustic wave therapy, which is supposed to eliminate unwanted cellulite), and the Zerona machine, one of the newest and most talked about technologies. Zerona is a non-invasive laser machine, which essentially melts your fat without liposuction. My father is an anesthesiologist, and so less involved in the plastic surgery world, but still does a significant amount of related cases. Just the other day he was called in for an “emergency liposuction”. Really? Emergency liposuction? I was not aware that needing to have your fat sucked out could be an emergency, but okay.

Being my parents’ daughter, I’ve gained a different perspective and insight to the cosmetic surgery practices. I have seen the “before” and “after” pictures of some AWT patients. They don’t look that different to me – they have just as much cottage cheese before spending their $500 to have a machine roll over their thighs as before. But, my opinion does not count. As long as the patient thinks there is a difference, that’s all that matters, right? As long as they feel better about themselves in some way, then it is worth it. And, if they still don’t feel beautiful enough, they will surely find another procedure to fix it. Joan Rivers, queen of plastic surgery in Hollywood, put it best: “Money can’t buy you happiness, but it can pay for the plastic surgery”.

I would like to make it clear that I am not against plastic surgery (let’s face it, I’ll probably have some procedure or treatment done in the next 10 years). Instead, I strive to provide a commentary on different aspects of the industry: the controversial treatments, celebrities and their surgeries, trends of 2010, teens and cosmetic surgeries, plastic surgery and socioeconomics, males and cosmetic surgeries, plastic surgery addictions, and the lesser known cutting edge reconstructive surgeries.