One of my guilty pleasures is watching ‘Botched’.  It’s one of my favourite TV shows and I record it every week.  In fact, it’s the only thing like it I watch.  I find the overdone plastic surgery obsessed type ‘celebs’ on it a bit ridiculous, but still very entertaining.  What I like to watch are the normal people who have had a botched surgery or something terrible has happened to them, and then the surgeons really can improve their quality of life and happiness.  These are the stories I resonate with most.

The decision to have plastic surgery should not be taken lightly.

I actually went under the knife myself this year.  The full story is for another time and I’ve not yet decided if I want to share it all on my blog, but it has made me question whether plastic surgery is seen as a quick fix and the seriousness of the surgery has been forgotten. 

Don’t get me wrong, thanks to the internet there is now a huge source of plastic surgery info out there which makes research and finding a surgeon a whole lot better nowadays, hopefully reducing the number of botched surgeries.  Though I’m sure there are still those who will go for the cheapest which is quite absurd, but when you’re young you may not make the best decision.

Is plastic surgery becoming normalised?

I’m glad I waited until my 30s to make this huge decision.  I know if I’d have gone ahead in my early twenties I really would have gone for the cheapest surgery and probably one of those plastic surgery holiday deals.  Money would have been my driving factor and I would have gone for what I thought was the best deal.  This could have turned out to be a huge mistake. 

By waiting until I was in my 30s I had a different mind-set and wanted to pick the best surgeon, no matter if it cost a small fortune.  I now realise the cheapest deal isn’t always the best deal.  If I’d chosen the cheapest it could well have been a mistake and I’d have ended up spending more to fix it anyway.  I took my time and did my research.  I didn’t rush (like I would have when younger) and I knew it was the right decision for me.  It was a part of me I’d hated for over 20 years and it upset me every day.  It wasn’t something I just disliked a bit, but could live with.  It affected me mentally and emotionally for over twenty years, every single day.

I worry that there are too many young people making rash decisions about surgery nowadays.  It's as though surgery has become the norm to correct our imperfections, even if they're miniscule.  This might sound like I’m contradicting myself as I’ve had a procedure, but after doing so much research I can see how most people really don’t need anything done! 

One of the websites I looked at daily whilst making my decision was RealSelf.  It's real people posting their experiences of plastic surgery as well as before and after photos.  I was getting daily emails and started to see how so many of these (mostly) females really didn’t need anything done at all.  I’d have been a billion times happier with their feature, rather than mine!  The worst was if it didn’t go as they expected and they realised they were actually happier with their original look anyway.  For me it was a gamble worth taking.  I knew the risks.  I knew it could turn out worse.  But I hated it so much that it was worth this gamble.  I couldn’t imagine it looking any worse!

When I went for my consultation the same thing was true.  I was asked on a scale of 1-10 how much I hated this feature.  I think I said 9 as I said everything could always be worse so I won’t say 10.  I was a little shocked the surgeon was surprised by my answer!  He said most people say 5 or 6.   There’s no way I’d have had surgery if it only bothered me 5/6 out of 10.  I said I was shocked at this!  Why would you even consider having risky surgery if you’re not that bothered by it?  I found this insane!  If I hated something a bit, but it didn’t affect me every day, then there’s no way I would consider having surgery which has a risk of making it look even worse or having severe complications!

This is why I worry surgery has become normalised.  There are people going under the knife to have the tiniest of improvements as if it’s an in and out job with no danger.  Plastic surgery is surgery.  It’s serious stuff.  Yes they do it all the time now, but it still has its risks and it can still go wrong.  Not only is it a huge amount of money if you’re not that bothered by something, it could look worse or it could go seriously wrong.  After my surgery I was actually more petrified of getting an infection than I was of the big reveal! 

Most people are lucky and surgery goes well, but you could always be that one unlucky person.  That’s something to consider before taking the serious plunge and going under the knife.  How would you feel if you were the one it went wrong to?  Could you afford to try and fix it?  Would you be happy to go under the knife again?

I think this is why I like Botched.  It gave me hope that if my surgery went wrong, it could be fixed.  But perhaps that was quite a blasé attitude to have about a serious operation.   I hope young people will give serious consideration to all the ins and outs of surgery before going ahead.  Perhaps even wait a few years and see if you still feel the same.  If you are 100% it is the right decision then don’t cut corners – do your research and pick the best of the best!