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Myrl Jeffcoat myrlj@jps.net

26 mars, 2005 10:27

 

 

Beautiful Stranger:
A Memoir of an Obsession with Perfections

 

By Hope Donahue

From the show Hooked on Plastic Surgery at Age 28

 

Jenny is only 28 years old and has already had 26 plastic surgeries. Jenny says she first became a slave to the scalpel after one critical comment from her then husband. "My ex-husband told me that my nose was too big, that my boobs were too small, so eventually I got a boob job to stop the comments," Jenny says. "I just moved from a bad relationship with him to a bad relationship between me and my reflection. After the divorce, plastic surgery became an obsession for me."

 

Jenny was just 25 years old when she had a brow lift. She's also had Botox, cheek implants, three nose jobs, veneers on her teeth, three lip implants, two boob jobs, three breast lifts, and liposuction on her arms, stomach, hips, thighs, and knees. Jenny says that the total cost of her plastic surgeries is about $80,000.

 

But even all these surgeries have failed to stop Jenny from scrutinizing her imagined imperfections.

 

"I still see a lot of things that are wrong," Jenny says. "I still want other things done. I'm unhappy with stretch marks left from pregnancy, and I would like a tummy tuck. I still see imperfections in my nose and wrinkles around my eyes and all kinds of stuff. I mean, it just depends on the day. It's been a battle that I've had with my poor self-esteem that started a long time ago and the continuous need to feel like I should fit in somehow, and I never can fit in. .I'm obsessed with it, I don't know what an addict is. I've never been addicted to drugs. I've never been addicted to alcohol. I've never been an alcoholic. So if this is what addiction is, then, yes, I'm addicted to it. I think about it all the time."

 

Lauren is Jenny's 18-year-old younger sister. Jenny's plastic surgeries have made Lauren feel insecure about her own looks. "I feel like she's rejected my looks as well as hers," Lauren says. "I'm self-conscious about the way my nose looks now and how my eyebrows are too low or my breasts are too small or my hips are going to become too big."

 

At the same time, Lauren is disturbed by her sister's radically altered appearance.

 

"Honestly, I don't think she looks as good as she would if she had never had plastic surgery," she says. "I think that she looks plastic. I think fake almost, and materialistic. When we walk down the street, it's noticeable. It's almost kind of like a circus clown. I think she cut herself short. She was beautiful even before she had her surgery. . It hurts to know that my sister has changed her face so much that we don't look alike."

 

Dr. Nancy Etcoff is a psychologist who teaches at Harvard Medical School. She's also written a book called Survival of the Prettiest, The Science of Beauty.

 

"We're a nation obsessed with beauty pursuing it at all costs," Dr. Etcoff says. "We see images of perfect beauty everywhere. We see extreme makeovers now. People will do so much to be beautiful. When I'm listening to [Jenny], what I hear is a profound lack of self-acceptance, contentment, even a self-loathing that fuels all this."

 

Dr. Etcoff says that Jenny likely suffers from a common condition now known as Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). BDD often strikes people in their teens."

 

It's a psychiatric problem where people are pre-occupied with an imagined or very slight defect," Dr. Etcoff says. "They can't stop thinking about it. They've checked the mirror all day. They spend hours thinking about it. They'll ask people, 'How do I look?' And what happens is, everyone says, 'Sure, I think about my looks.' But it becomes so preoccupying that it's torturous. It becomes an obsession."

 

Cheryl, a mother of two, admits she is addicted to liposuction-and what was once a quick fix has now turned into an obsession. Cheryl's had a breast reduction, liposuction on her lower abdomen, "love handles" in the back, as well as a tummy tuck and tightening of her lower stomach muscles. Cheryl's obsession is taking a toll on the entire family, especially her husband Brad. The plastic surgery bills have put the family in serious debt, and Brad is working three jobs to work on paying off Cheryl's plastic surgery tab. Now, Cheryl wants liposuction on her legs. If she goes through with it, Brad has threatened divorce.

 

"It wasn't an argument," Brad says. "You get it done, and I'm leaving. I mean, it's over. I'm prepared to get a divorce and take our kids. I've had enough with the plastic surgery. Our household can't take it anymore. It doesn't benefit me and it doesn't benefit my children. It's not only a financial thing. It's hard to live in a house where somebody is always so unhappy about themselves. I have an 11-year-old daughter and a 9-year-old son. I don't need them growing up to be obsessive about their weight or their looks."

 

Cheryl says, "He's tired of it all. We can't afford it. I mean, we refinanced our house to do this. So I need to stop."

 

In her quest to get the "perfect face," Jenny decided she wanted Michael Jackson's nose. Although her plastic surgeon told her she could never have Michael Jackson's nose, Jenny insisted. She has had a total of three nose jobs and says, "The last time I went in there [the plastic surgeon] said to me, 'I'm warning you. If I do this, there's a very good possibility your nose will completely collapse and it will be flat on your face. And we will have to start all over again.' And I said, 'I'll roll the dice.'"

 

Jenny's words hit home for Cheryl. "I'm done," Cheryl says. "I can't. I don't want to roll the dice. A light bulb went off. I have two children. And my husband. To roll the dice with my life, to lose my kids, lose my husband.I'll stick with my legs [the way they are]."

 

Hope Donahue seemed to have it all: beauty, wealth, social status. She was an only child who grew up with the best private schools, debutante balls, and a home in Hancock Park, Los Angeles's old-money enclave. But beneath the family's façade of "keeping up appearances," Hope hid a host of ugly truths, including a mother increasingly jealous of her daughter's good looks, an uncle's sexual advances and a father who cowed to the demands of his wife and coolly reserved parents. Hope became addicted to a quest for physical perfection in place of her self-esteem-and by the age of twenty-seven she had undergone seven plastic surgeries. In riveting, unflinching prose, Hope recounts her downward spiral that alienated her family and friends, and led her to theft, bankruptcy and a sadistic relationship before she began her recovery.

 

A powerful response to a culture obsessed with extreme makeovers and risky procedures that promise flawlessness, Beautiful Stranger is a timely, cautionary tale. Her story will inspire the countless women and men like her who struggle every day in a culture that feeds us dangerous images of unattainable perfection.

 

http://www2.oprah.com/tows/booksseen/200502/tows_book_20050208_hdonahue.jhtml

 


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