Motivation for Cosmetic Surgery

I feel that if I tackle what bothers me about my looks I would be shallow and superficial. I don’t like the absence of a hairline, the skin that hangs from my chin, or the rolls of fat (love handles is a poor name for it). IS there something wrong with me for wanting to look younger? What drives people to get cosmetic surgery?

Aging is not easy and not a graceful process as we might think it is. Often, some precipitating factor motivates a person to seek a return of his/her youthful look. With the many wonderful techniques that are employed for cosmetic surgery, change is easier than most people realize. It is not unusual for men and women to seek cosmetic surgery consultations as they approach a decade birthday, when they anticipate divorce or after discovering that they are being divorced, when they look in the mirror and see their body fat distribution has changed with or without weight gain, or even for women following menopause complaining that their face and neck skin has dropped. In effect, the person in the mirror is not who they think it is and they may not like what they see. You are not a freak and provided that you are not afraid of change, you can empower yourself to look further into how to get that younger look.

This piece was answered in part by Jon Perlman, M.D.