Welcome again to Studying Curve, a column the place we unpack the difficult expertise of accepting your personal physique in a world that does not appear to need you to. On this version, Nicola examines her combative relationship with cosmetic surgery—which modified drastically after she went beneath the knife herself.
Cosmetic surgery and I’ve by no means actually gotten alongside. Even at my job right here at Attract, the place we cowl beauty procedures extensively, she and I’ve saved our distance, smiling stiffly at one another from throughout the room after we make unintended eye contact however by no means bothering to truly discuss to one another. What’s there to say? I simply all the time thought she was a bit of faux, you understand?
In truth, I’ve just about all the time held the assumption that cosmetic surgery is a cheat code folks use to love their very own our bodies, and that it’s unfeminist to make use of that cheat code beneath circumstances that aren’t medically obligatory. Present process elective surgical procedure is dear and painful, but it surely’s simpler than embracing your so-called flaws, isn’t it? The cosmetic surgery industrial advanced solely serves to implement the unrealistic magnificence commonplace that makes the overall lots really feel like our our bodies are unattractive or unworthy.
That’s what I believed, anyway, till I wound up tits out on an working desk, sinking into anesthesia-induced sleep so a plastic surgeon may make my breasts smaller and perkier. That’s proper: I, a body-image columnist who preaches self-acceptance for a residing, simply bought a boob job. Did I “cheat,” by my very own commonplace? Sure. However I can’t deny how a lot it’s modified my physique picture—and extra importantly, my day-to-day life—for the higher.
By getting a process I by no means thought I’d need or want, I’ve come to comprehend I wasn’t anti-plastic surgical procedure as a result of I had labored at having a very good physique picture and wished others would do the identical. Seems, a lot of my angle was truly coming from deep-seated insecurity, not nearly what I seem like however who I’m and what I’ve been by way of.
Traditionally, I’d by no means spared a lot thought to my breasts. They’d been a bit of uneven since puberty, one thing I’ve in widespread with the overwhelming majority of individuals with boobs. Although I didn’t like their lack of perkiness, they had been comparatively small in a approach I appreciated. By my late teenagers and most of my 20s, they finally remained the identical… however by the point I hit 30, that delicate asymmetry had taken a flip for the acute—as in a two-cup-difference excessive.