Plastic Surgery Addiction

It's completely normal to not be happy about some part of your body, whether it's your stomach, your nose, or your breasts. That doesn't mean, however, that you should get plastic surgery for any part of your body that you are unhappy with. Before you get plastic surgery, you need to make sure you are doing it for the right reasons.

Plastic surgery is not a problem psychologically if the patient has high self-esteem. The problem comes when people want to have plastic surgery because they think it will make them happy. Most of the time, these people won't be content after just having one surgery. There are some people that actually suffer from a medical condition called body dismorphic disorder (BDD). Both men and women can be affected by BDD. Anorexia is another subtype of this kind of disorder. People suffering from BDD imagine or exaggerate problems with their body. For example, a person suffering from BDD could look into the mirror and see his or her nose bigger than it really is. Often people with BDD think that plastic surgery is the only way for them to fix these problems. However, one surgery does not necessarily fix the problem in their eyes, so they want more. This leads to plastic surgery addiction. Some famous examples of people who are famous for the amount of plastic surgery they have gone through are Michael Jackson, Joan Rivers, and Heidi Montag.

One danger with plastic surgery addiction is that the person will never be happy, no matter how much work he or she gets done, spending thousands, or even millions, of dollars. This is threatening financially as well as physically. Magazine covers and TV shows love to mock those in Hollywood who have overdone their plastic surgery. Sometimes the nose will start to look pinched or unnatural because of one too many rhinoplasties.

Not only could excessive plastic surgery bring undesired results, but it can also be harmful. For example, if a woman gets repeated breast augmentations and her breasts get too big, she will likely suffer from chronic back pain for the rest of her life. Great risks come from plastic surgery anyway, and being continually operated on opens up the potential for more risk.

People suffering from plastic surgery addiction need psychological treatment, such as medication and therapy. Although plastic surgery can be a good thing in some instances, it should not be the basis for imagined happiness.