Cosmetic surgery helps boost self-esteem

Just the mention of cosmetic surgery brings to mind any number of celebrities known for taking medical procedures to the extreme – Pamela Anderson’s implant-enhanced bosom, Joan Rivers’ overstretched face, and of course there’s Michael Jackson.

But in real life, far away from the cesspool of vanity that defines Hollywood, cosmetic surgery is quietly helping many people to just feel normal.

Take John Wilson (not his real name), for example.

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Right around puberty, Wilson began noticing that his breasts were becoming just that — breasts. The condition is known as gynecomastia ­ a Greek word for “woman-like breasts” and affects an estimated 40 to 60 percent of men.

Now 38, Wilson remembers a particular day in junior high when a new student looked at him and said, ?I didn’t know if you were a girl or a boy.’

“Junior high is ugly anyway,” Wilson said, “but I got a lot of that kind of stuff.”

So Wilson spent much of his life concealing his frame with layers of baggy clothing. He never wore T-shirts in public and he never learned to swim.

“So I dealt with it, and dealt with it, and dealt with it,” he said. “And finally I was like, ?why?'”

For about $4,000, Wilson was able to rid himself of his condition.

“The best thing was being able to erase 24 years of crap for less than $4,000,” he said. “I’ve paid more than that for a piece-of-crap car, and that wasn’t a life-changing experience.”

Wilson said he would encourage anyone in a similar situation to “Just do it.”

“The longer you wait, the more emotional baggage you’ll have to carry,” he said.

Liposuction helped

And then there’s Cathy Trujillo, a 38-year-old mother of three teenagers.

Trujillo had lost more than 40 pounds, and she did it the hard way — increasing her exercise and watching her diet. Still, the personal victory left her with sagging, excess abdominal skin and deposits of facial fat that wouldn’t go away.

For nearly $8,000, Trujillo had an abdominoplasty, or tummy tuck, and liposuction on her face and neck. Her doctor removed more than seven pounds of skin from her stomach. While the recovery took months, Trujillo said she would not hesitate to do it all over again.

“At first I thought I’d never go there again, but now that I’m seeing the results it’s a no-brainer,” she said. “I feel more self-confident than I ever have in my life. I have more energy. Even my girls notice a change in me.”

Trujillo said her husband was supportive of her decision but didn’t think it was necessary. They both agreed that the improvement in Trujillo’s self-esteem would be worth it. “Now he just loves it,” she said. “He wants to take me shopping all the time.”

If Trujillo had told her doctor she wanted the procedure done because her husband was nagging her about it, most likely she would have been turned away.

“I turn away about 10 percent of potential patients,´ said Dr. Jeffrey Chapman with Northern Colorado Plastic Surgery PC in Fort Collins.

“They have to have realistic expectations. If someone comes in and wants to have breast augmentation because their boyfriend will leave them if they don’t, I tell them no,” he said. Also, if you’re a smoker, don’t expect Chapman to perform any major procedure on you. Likewise, if you’re significantly overweight, there will be no liposuction.

Chapman, whose specialties include reconstructive, cosmetic, hand and microsurgery, warns that this isn’t always the case.

“Anyone with a medical degree can call themselves a plastic surgeon,” he said. “Make sure you know who you’re dealing with. Make sure they’re board certified.”

New techniques

While Chapman said breast augmentation is the most common procedure he performs, he is also seeing an increasing number of patients requesting less invasive procedures.

“With surgery, the biggest change is the shift from the traditional facelift ? to endoscopic procedures,” he said. The technology, which uses a tiny camera and a video screen to assist a surgeon’s view, has been used for decades in procedures such as gallbladder and knee surgery. Using an endoscope during a facelift allows for smaller incisions, results in a more natural look and reduces recovery time and the risk of nerve damage, Chapman said.

Also gaining popularity is the “lunchtime procedure.”

Injectable treatments like Botox, and the recently FDA-approved Restylane, require minimal downtime, often allowing patients to return to the office looking nothing more than a little puffy.

While Botox is most effective on forehead and eye wrinkles, Restylane is cited as an alternative to collagen for treating wrinkles around the nose and mouth.

“There’s the idea of collagen as the gold standard. But it’s not an insignificant number of people who have had an allergy or a reaction to collagen,” Chapman said. “Restylane is billed as not having the problems and lasting longer.”

But Chapman, who does not yet use Restylane on patients, describes himself as cautious when it comes to new procedures. “As far as our practice here, the big thing we try to stick to is well-proven and safe techniques,” he said. “We don’t push the envelope here.”

One local surgeon who does perform Restylane injections is Fort Collins-based Dr. Diane Duncan, who has been in practice for 20 years and specializes in facial rejuvenation and body contouring.

“Restylane lasts twice as long — six to eight months,” she said. “It’s not derived from cows and it costs about the same as collagen.”

Duncan is also an early adopter of another non-surgical, skin-tightening technique called Thermage. Unlike other treatments that use chemicals or lasers, Thermage uses radio frequency to deliver heat deep under the skin. In addition to tightening the skin, the procedure also melts subcutaneous fat, Duncan said. “A lot of ladies like it for their necks,” she said, adding that it’s proving to be popular with the men, too.

“For a lot of gentlemen, it’s heaven forbid they’d get a face lift but they’ll come in for Thermage,” Duncan said.

According to the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, more and more men are taking Wilson’s advice and just doing it.

From 1997 to 2002, the number of non-surgical cosmetic procedures performed on men increased 554 percent. For women, it was 352 percent. Botox injections made up the largest increase by far with a whopping 4,334 percent increase for men and a 2,279 percent increase for women.

The advances in non-surgical cosmetic procedures fit the nation’s psyche, Duncan said. “There’s no to little risk, you get immediate gratification and there’s no down time,” she said. “That’s what Americans want. People don’t have a lot of time to recover from surgery.”