More going under the knife after baby
Pressured: Nurse Sharlotte Birkland (above) had breast implant surgery, a tummy tuck and liposuction some 20 years after giving birth. Such surgeries are now being called "mommy makeovers" and are a big business, as can be seen in the screenshot of a plastic surgery website, featuring success stories. Narrowing beauty norms are recasting the transformations of motherhood as stigma, not helped by celebrities like Catherine Zeta-Jones, Heidi Klum and Victoria Beckham, who seem to shed the baby weight right after their pregnancies. Pictures: NYT, stlcosmeticsurgeries.com, tv.yahoo.com, www.wallpaperbase.com
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
DAVID STOKER, a plastic surgeon in California, has a surgical cure for the ravages of motherhood. He, like many plastic surgeons nationwide, calls it a "mommy makeover".
Aimed at mothers, it usually involves a trifecta: a breast lift with or without breast implants, a tummy tuck and liposuction. The procedures are intended to hoist slackened skin as well as reduce stretch marks and pregnancy fat.
"The severe physical trauma of pregnancy, childbirth and breast-feeding can have profound negative effects that cause women to lose their hourglass figures," he says.
"Twenty years ago, a woman did not think she could do something about it and she covered up with discreet clothing," Stoker says. "But now women don't have to go on feeling self-conscious or resentful about their appearance."
The cosmetic changes that can happen during and after pregnancy used to be simply a phenomena. But now narrowing beauty norms are recasting the transformations of motherhood as stigma.
These unforgiving standards are the offspring of pop culture and technology, a union that treats biological changes as if they were as optional as hair colour. Gossip magazines excoriate celebrity moms who don't immediately lose their "baby weight", a parenting magazine even described post-pregnancy breasts as "the ultimate indignity".
Many women struggle with the impact of ageing and pregnancy on their bodies. But the marketing of the "mommy makeover" seeks to pathologise the postpartum body, characterising pregnancy and childbirth as maladies with disfiguring after-effects that can be repaired with the help of scalpels and cannulae.
"The message is that, after having children, women's bodies change for the worse," says Diana Zuckerman, president of the non-profit National Research Centre for Women and Families. She says if marketing could turn the postpregnancy body "into a socially unacceptable thing, think of how big your audience would be and how many surgeries you could sell them".
Pregnancy affects each woman differently, with age and genetics playing a role in how the body recovers. While many plastic surgeons argue that pregnancy both "deforms" breasts and redistributes fat so that it becomes difficult to exercise away, some obstetricians disagree.
"Some women have stretch marks from pregnancy or weight gain," says Erin Tracy, an assistant professor in obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive biology at the Harvard Medical School. "But there is no intrinsic abnormality to the breasts or the abdomen."
Mommy surgery appeals both as a quick fix for stubborn postpregnancy weight and as a way to control ageing itself.
After the birth of her second son in 2000, Katie Helein, a saleswoman for a human resources company, worked out with a personal trainer three times a week for eight months. But she didn't like her shape.
"I had really badly stretched skin, I lost fullness up top, nothing was where it was supposed to be even though I was doing sit-ups 'til the cows came home," the 37-year-old says. "I just wanted my body back."
In 2001, she had a tummy tuck and liposuction, followed by breast augmentation in 2004. Now her smiling face, and those of her sons, is featured in the "mommy makeover" section of the website of her plastic surgeon, William Huffaker.
Huffaker says several years ago he noticed an increase in mothers who came to his office with concerns about stretched skin and postpregnancy fat that they could not exercise away. Now he operates on three to four mothers a week who have breast procedures, tummy tucks and liposuction in one go at a cost of about US$12,000 to US$15,000 .
"Women do have trouble getting back together," he says. "You don't just do a couple of exercises and get skinny again."
Mothers of college-age children are also opting for the procedures.
Sharlotte Birkland, a nurse in Sacramento, has a 20-year-old son. This March, she went to Stoker for breast implant surgery, a tummy tuck on her lower abdomen and liposuction of her upper abdomen.
"I had been thin all my life until I had my son and then I got this pooch of overhanging fat on my abdomen that you can't get rid of," Birkland, 39, says. "And your breasts become deflated sacks."
There is more pressure on mothers today to look young and sexy than on previous generations, she adds. "I don't think it was an issue for my mother; your husband loved you no matter what."
Stoker says he performs combination surgeries on mothers at least once a week, at a cost of US$10,000 to US$30,000.
"It's comforting to women to know that there are many other mothers out there with a similar cluster of physical issues that are bothering them."
But other surgeons worry that packaging multiple procedures under a cutesy nickname could induce women to have additional operations, potentially increasing their risk of everything from infections to death. Various studies have reported death rates from liposuction at one in 5,000 procedures to one in 50,000 procedures.
In Dallas, a father and son who are plastic surgeons, Harlan Pollock and Todd Pollock, use their website to expose the "mommy makeover" as a sales tactic.
"Clever marketing may encourage correction of a deformity that was previously of little concern," the doctors write.
"In other words, a woman seeking a tummy tuck, although not particularly concerned about the appearance of her breasts, may be influenced to have breast surgery just because it is part of 'the package'."
Some health advocates aren't buying the idea that cosmetic changes from pregnancy merit medical management.
"Some women go back to a pretty flat stomach and some don't, some go back to their pre-baby weight and some don't," says Judy Norsigian, the executive director of Our Bodies Ourselves, a health group in Boston, and an author of the book of the same name.
"The question is, does that need to be treated with a surgical makeover?"
On the blog StrollerDerby, Karen Murphy, a mother of four, lambasts mommy surgery.
"Those badges of motherhood have turned into badges of shame and, if you're the one caught without a tummy tuck, then you won't get invited to the party," she writes.
"It peeves me no end that something as drastic as surgery, as this blatant nonacceptance of one's own body in whatever shape it happens to be in, has become so pervasive."
New York Times
Aimed at mothers, it usually involves a trifecta: a breast lift with or without breast implants, a tummy tuck and liposuction. The procedures are intended to hoist slackened skin as well as reduce stretch marks and pregnancy fat.
"The severe physical trauma of pregnancy, childbirth and breast-feeding can have profound negative effects that cause women to lose their hourglass figures," he says.
"Twenty years ago, a woman did not think she could do something about it and she covered up with discreet clothing," Stoker says. "But now women don't have to go on feeling self-conscious or resentful about their appearance."
The cosmetic changes that can happen during and after pregnancy used to be simply a phenomena. But now narrowing beauty norms are recasting the transformations of motherhood as stigma.
These unforgiving standards are the offspring of pop culture and technology, a union that treats biological changes as if they were as optional as hair colour. Gossip magazines excoriate celebrity moms who don't immediately lose their "baby weight", a parenting magazine even described post-pregnancy breasts as "the ultimate indignity".
Many women struggle with the impact of ageing and pregnancy on their bodies. But the marketing of the "mommy makeover" seeks to pathologise the postpartum body, characterising pregnancy and childbirth as maladies with disfiguring after-effects that can be repaired with the help of scalpels and cannulae.
"The message is that, after having children, women's bodies change for the worse," says Diana Zuckerman, president of the non-profit National Research Centre for Women and Families. She says if marketing could turn the postpregnancy body "into a socially unacceptable thing, think of how big your audience would be and how many surgeries you could sell them".
Pregnancy affects each woman differently, with age and genetics playing a role in how the body recovers. While many plastic surgeons argue that pregnancy both "deforms" breasts and redistributes fat so that it becomes difficult to exercise away, some obstetricians disagree.
"Some women have stretch marks from pregnancy or weight gain," says Erin Tracy, an assistant professor in obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive biology at the Harvard Medical School. "But there is no intrinsic abnormality to the breasts or the abdomen."
Mommy surgery appeals both as a quick fix for stubborn postpregnancy weight and as a way to control ageing itself.
After the birth of her second son in 2000, Katie Helein, a saleswoman for a human resources company, worked out with a personal trainer three times a week for eight months. But she didn't like her shape.
"I had really badly stretched skin, I lost fullness up top, nothing was where it was supposed to be even though I was doing sit-ups 'til the cows came home," the 37-year-old says. "I just wanted my body back."
In 2001, she had a tummy tuck and liposuction, followed by breast augmentation in 2004. Now her smiling face, and those of her sons, is featured in the "mommy makeover" section of the website of her plastic surgeon, William Huffaker.
Huffaker says several years ago he noticed an increase in mothers who came to his office with concerns about stretched skin and postpregnancy fat that they could not exercise away. Now he operates on three to four mothers a week who have breast procedures, tummy tucks and liposuction in one go at a cost of about US$12,000 to US$15,000 .
"Women do have trouble getting back together," he says. "You don't just do a couple of exercises and get skinny again."
Mothers of college-age children are also opting for the procedures.
Sharlotte Birkland, a nurse in Sacramento, has a 20-year-old son. This March, she went to Stoker for breast implant surgery, a tummy tuck on her lower abdomen and liposuction of her upper abdomen.
"I had been thin all my life until I had my son and then I got this pooch of overhanging fat on my abdomen that you can't get rid of," Birkland, 39, says. "And your breasts become deflated sacks."
There is more pressure on mothers today to look young and sexy than on previous generations, she adds. "I don't think it was an issue for my mother; your husband loved you no matter what."
Stoker says he performs combination surgeries on mothers at least once a week, at a cost of US$10,000 to US$30,000.
"It's comforting to women to know that there are many other mothers out there with a similar cluster of physical issues that are bothering them."
But other surgeons worry that packaging multiple procedures under a cutesy nickname could induce women to have additional operations, potentially increasing their risk of everything from infections to death. Various studies have reported death rates from liposuction at one in 5,000 procedures to one in 50,000 procedures.
In Dallas, a father and son who are plastic surgeons, Harlan Pollock and Todd Pollock, use their website to expose the "mommy makeover" as a sales tactic.
"Clever marketing may encourage correction of a deformity that was previously of little concern," the doctors write.
"In other words, a woman seeking a tummy tuck, although not particularly concerned about the appearance of her breasts, may be influenced to have breast surgery just because it is part of 'the package'."
Some health advocates aren't buying the idea that cosmetic changes from pregnancy merit medical management.
"Some women go back to a pretty flat stomach and some don't, some go back to their pre-baby weight and some don't," says Judy Norsigian, the executive director of Our Bodies Ourselves, a health group in Boston, and an author of the book of the same name.
"The question is, does that need to be treated with a surgical makeover?"
On the blog StrollerDerby, Karen Murphy, a mother of four, lambasts mommy surgery.
"Those badges of motherhood have turned into badges of shame and, if you're the one caught without a tummy tuck, then you won't get invited to the party," she writes.
"It peeves me no end that something as drastic as surgery, as this blatant nonacceptance of one's own body in whatever shape it happens to be in, has become so pervasive."
New York Times
Business Besides Oil
