Young Brides of Frankenstein?

I saw something in our paper today that kind of set me off. Not enough to draw my sword, this is not something to be directed at one person, but enough to just sit there and eat at me a bit. The article in our paper was talking about young women and plastic surgery, in particular breast augmentation. I’m talking women who have not yet had children. Some of them as young as 18, as if their parents were saying, “Happy High School Graduation! Here are some new breasts!”

I’m sorry, but there is just something inherently wrong with that. On.oh.so.many.levels.

***Note- This post is strictly about teenagers and elective plastic surgery. This is not aimed at women in general and it is definitely not aimed at anyone who is having these surgeries due to cancer or anything else that could cause disfigurement.***

What has happened to our society that young women who should still have young beautiful firm bodies are thinking they are not good enough? What has happened that their self image is so wrapped up in their bodies that they are willing to undergo the knife? Why at this age are girls not more wrapped up in their brain power? I just don’t get it.

OK, maybe I am an oddball. Maybe my whole “ME” was not wrapped up in my body image when I was 18 because 1) I knew I was smart and there was no doubt in my mind that my brain would get me where I needed to be and 2) I wasn’t having sex yet. Yes, it is true, at 18 I wasn’t sleeping with boys. I just hadn’t met anyone I cared that much about and honestly, the girls I hung out with, we weren’t like that. We all had big brains and we all had big plans and accidentally getting pregnant or spending THAT much time with a boy, were not on our agendas. At all.

I just don’t know who to be pissed at. The media for portraying to us on all platforms that the ultimate woman is thin as a rail with big boobs? Their parents for not instilling what is important? The kids for being a bunch of materialistic sheep? Here’s a newsflash folks, breasts are body fat, so if a girl has no body fat, she isn’t going to be busty. When I see a stick thin girl/woman with size C or D cups… it’s a giveaway. Do these girls not understand they may never be able to breastfeed? Do they not understand that most men, while they all notice breasts, don’t have a fetish for fake ones? Most of them like them au natural and most of the men I know feel that ‘more than a mouthful’ is really not necessary.

So in this article they are interviewing girls and this 18 year old said she wasn’t happy being a 34A and, get this, HER MOM AND SHE had been talking about it for awhile. She didn’t like how she looked in clothes. Hello? Has she never heard of Victoria's Secret? I've bought bras there that make my 32Bs look like they're busting out of a t-shirt. She is much happier in her 36C. Holy crap. 36C. I don’t know how tall this chicky girl is, but I assure you, as a 36C at 5’2”, I would be VERY WELL endowed. BIG. Perhaps she doesn’t realize that her perky fake 36C‘s will not be so perky, but just fake, when she is my age… especially if she has children. They’ll hang down to her knees. Huh. That’s attractive.

This whole thing blows me away. I was at a dinner about a year ago and this plastic surgeon was at our table. I was listening the entire night to the various conversations and then I actually brought up this thing about teenagers and breast implants. Of course he had a great rationalization for it. I listened. He asked me some question and I said, “I would never have breast implants” and he laughed. He then said, “Oh yes you would. My #1 client is 40 year old divorcees. If your husband left you right now, you’d be one of the first to walk through my door.”

My husband is staring at him, knowing what this guy has probably just walked into. I stared him straight down and said quietly but firmly, “No. You are wrong. I would be the last person through your door. See, my sexuality and ‘ME’ is not caught up in my breasts.” My husband followed with, “I assure you, you are talking to the wrong person and have made the wrong assumption. She would be the last person you would see.”

There was much back pedaling then and he said, “Well, look at you. You don’t understand. There is nothing not average about you. Your butt is not too big. Your thighs are not too big. Your tummy is not too big. Your breasts are neither too small or too big. You are properly proportioned so YOU would not be the type of person to want for anything. Your body is just right.”

Nice try. In a way he does have a point, I’m not skewed out of proportion really other than my way overstretched abs. Any time a group of women get together they talk about what they would change. 99% of the time I am partaking in the talk, the answer is breast implants. Invariably the talk turns to me and I always say, “Nope. Pass on those. I’d take a tummy tuck.”

Trust me, in any given day, I can sit down just as easily as the next woman and tear myself apart to the point that my last thought is I look like a troll. There are way too many mornings when I step out of the shower and just as soon see all the mirrors in my house draped in black cloth… some symbol of mourning for what my body was but is no longer.

But I’ve accepted it and I try not to dwell. But it is hard. It is damn hard. Everywhere I turn, the perfect woman is thin, busty, and young. The models, the actresses, movies, TV, magazines… they all exude the same. I find it exceedingly annoying, but I’m glad I’m a 39 year old confident woman combating self doubt and not some 18 year old girl. I have what it takes to throw such rubbish out of my head. I know what I am capable of intellectually and I know what my body can do and what it can do for the opposite sex, regardless of the fact I don’t look like Barbie.

My being is not wrapped up in my breasts or stomach. Thankfully. Perhaps large amount of credit goes to my folks in teaching me how to think for myself and to like me for me.

I don’t see this coming to an end. I see it getting worse. It is very sad. It is very annoying. And I must wonder… if these girls are getting lipo, breast implants and tummy tucks (yes, my friends, these young women are getting tummy tucks) at 18, 19, and 20 what in the hell are they going to be doing at 30, 35, and 40? And I hope to teach my boys to stay far far away from the girls who have had breast implants or a tummy tuck at that young age… for they are going to be high maintenance basket cases when they are my age.