Bravo to Dr. Zuckerman for her sage comments, from Ilena Rosenthal,
Health Lover.
www.BreastImplantAwareness.org/
www.BreastImplantInfo.org Dr. Zuckerman's site
Taking a Kid's-Eye View Of Cosmetic Surgery
Plastic Surgeon Turns Author to Explain 'Mommy Makeovers'
By Sandra G. Boodman
Wa****ngton Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, April 22, 2008; HE05
The hardcover book by board-certified plastic surgeon Michael A.
Salzhauer, published by Big Tent Books and available for purchase
online, seeks to answer the insistent questions posed by some young
children: Why is Mommy's nose smaller? Where did her tummy go? And
what's with all those bandages?
"I don't know whether to laugh or cry," said Diana Zuckerman,
president of the nonprofit National Research Center for Women and
Families, after reading "My Beautiful Mommy."
"This is disturbing on so many levels," she added. "For one thing, it
perpetuates a completely unrealistic ideal" of female beauty: the
large-breasted, wasp-waisted, midriff-baring Barbie-doll look.
Zuckerman, who says she is not opposed to all plastic surgery, notes
that the book's ****trayal of postoperative recovery seems remarkably
short: The mother is up and around soon after her tummy tuck, which in
real life can require a much longer recuperation.
"And I'm sure there's a good reason the mother had to wear skin-tight
pants and a crop top," Zuckerman added, "but I don't know what it is."
Salzhauer does. "Mothers, at least those in South Florida, do look and
dress like that," said the 36-year-old physician who hosts a Sunday
morning radio call-in show called "Nip Talk Radio."
"Being a doctor, I can't deal with the political or philosophical
arguments" surrounding cosmetic surgery, Salzhauer said. "I have to
deal with reality." The book, he said, gives parents "a vehicle to
explain the plastic surgery process to their kids" who may be too
young to understand why a parent is choosing to undergo an
appearance-altering operation.
The bulk of his practice, Salzhauer said, consists of women between 20
and 40 undergoing what he calls "mommy makeovers": breast implants,
breast lifts and tummy tucks.
Salzhauer said his interest in children's reactions to cosmetic
surgery was sparked by questions his daughter, who was then 4, asked
when he underwent a nose job several years ago. As the father of four
young children, Salzhauer said, "I read a lot of children's books" and
realized there was no book for 4- to 7-year-olds that could explain
why a parent who wasn't sick was having an operation.
Many of his patients, he added, bring their children to plastic
surgery consultations and even postoperative appointments.
Zuckerman questioned why the mother in the book has just a small
bandage on her perky new nose, not the black eyes that typically
follow rhinoplasty, and why she's up and around a few days after her
tummy tuck, not lying in bed in a haze of pain waiting for her next
Percocet.
Then there's the appearance of plastic surgeon "Dr. Michael," who
looks like Superman. "It wasn't my idea," said Salzhauer, who said it
was the illustrator's concept. "Of course, that's how I see myself
when I look in the mirror."
Ten percent of the proceeds from the book, he said, will be earmarked
for children's plastic surgery charities. A Spanish-language version
is also available; Salzhauer hopes it will appeal to patients in Latin
America, where cosmetic medicine is also popular.
|
