Mold Surgery

That would be the literal translation for plastic surgery if you were to translate it from the original Greek. But don't worry, it's not the yucky green stuff that has an affinity for proliferating in unclean bathrooms (like the one in my basement, cough, teenage brother, cough....) That would make for some pretty unsanitary surgery. Although, on second thought, mold is the original antibiotic so maybe it wouldn't be too bad? I mean, gross for sure, but maybe not lethal. At the very least un-beneficial. So moving on.

Anyway, plastic surgery gets its name from the Greek word for "to mold" (which on second thought doesn't really clarify....hmm.) Well, let me explain. The term "plastic surgery" has been around much longer than the stuff water bottles are made of. Plastic, both the surgery and the name for the material are taken from the Greek word "Plastikos" which means "to mold" or "to shape." It was first practiced over 4,000 years ago (I can't believe that surgery existed that long ago, not to mention plastic surgery, but apparently it did) in the form of skin grafts and such.

The history of plastic surgery in the US begins in earnest around 1830, when surgeons began to repair cleft palates. After that it got a big boost from various wars, especially World War I, due to the various non-lethal injuries that soldiers sustained. There were a lot of advances in skin grafts and burn treatment at that time and in 1931 the American Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons was formed. After that it was pretty much history. The shift from reconstructive (repairing birth defects or injuries) to cosmetic (purely for aesthetic reasons) happened slowly but got a big boost in the 1960s and 70s. Nowadays when you say plastic surgery most people (well, at least, I) think Hollywood glamor/beautification. But even though the glamor aspect is probably more common, the repair aspect is still important and still practiced.

As I was looking up the various types of surgery offered, I realized that the idea of beauty and glamor is pretty subjective. I was amazed to learn that among other things, plastic surgeons can

• Turn your outtie bellybutton into an innie (But not the other way around. Interesting sidenotes that I learned about bellybuttons: Did you know that there really is no reason for it to be one way or the other? The doctor can't make it be an innie or outie when you are born by tying or cutting the umbilical cord a certain way. Actually, tying is a myth. They put a little plastic clamp on it after they cut it to stop any residual bleeding and then they just let the cord fall off on its own. This usually takes about a week or so, but it can actually stay put for 3 months or more! About 85% of people are outties but nobody really knows why)
• Etch a six pack on your abdomen,
• Enhance your calf with implants (Is the plural of that calves? Is that confusing to anyone else?)
• Shorten your second toe if it is bigger than your big toe (or if you just happen to think it's too long. Whatever)
  
• Implant hair from your head into your eyelashes
  
• Fork your tongue
• Make your ears pointy like an elf (also pin your ears back if you were born with pointy ones that stick out)
  
• Create dimples if you don't have them
• Bedazzle your eyeball (seriously, they implant a little jewel just under the conjunctival layer of the eye...because, you know, that wouldn't be at all irritating. Can you imagine allergy season? Ugh!),
• Create a permanent nose piece for your glasses!(This is actually more of a piercing but it was so interesting that I had to include it here.)

It is also possible to alter people's Asian eyes to make them look less "ethnic", which understandably upsets quite a few people, and fill in holes in your ears from piercing. I think I would have that done because I never wear earrings anyway as I am allergic to most of them. You know, if I had extra money lying around. So pretty much I am going to go through life with holes in my ears :) I can live with that.


I used to be very opposed to plastic surgery (At least for aesthetic reasons. Cleft palate repair is a different story), but now I am not so sure. I mean, I would still say that eyeball bedazzling and tongue forking are on my list of surgeries that should never be done, but I am somewhat less opposed to other procedures. I think this is because I just recently realized that one of my nostrils is bigger than the other. Really. It's kind of weird. I always hated school pictures because when I got them back it looked like I was flaring my nostrils, or you could see up one of them, or sadly, in one picture you could see a shiny rim of snot around the edge. I never figured out that the problem was with my nostrils and not the photographer until after I was out of school. Though if I had caught it earlier I could have avoided the head tilt they always make you do that just ended up emphasizing the larger nostril!

Anyway, after realizing this, I am more sympathetic to people who are self conscious about certain aspects of their appearance and I can understand their desire to change those things. I still don't know if I would ever change my nose, because I feel like it is a part of my heritage. My grandpa on my mom's side gave it to me and I have grown rather fond of it, large nostrils and all :)

But I do think that celebrities should be limited in the procedures they have, or be forced to disclose them. (Maybe not the embarrassing ones. There are lots of those and I have refrained from mentioning them here. But if you are curious look up labiaplasty on wikipedia.) Anyway, I think that this would serve two purposes. The first is that it would prevent things like this from happening:

(Love MJ, but the nose makes me sad.) The second reason is that it would prevent the rest of us from feeling bad about ourselves and our imperfections. For example, celebrities who have had children and sell ab workout videos would be forced to disclose their tummy tucks so that the rest of us wouldn't have such unrealistic expectations. (I'm sorry, but once your skin is stretched out like that, only one person in a million can go back to a flat six pack without the help of a surgeon. If you happen to be that person, congratulations, but don't try to sell me on ideals that I will never reach.)

So there you have it. More than you ever wanted to know about plastic surgery. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get my beauty rest. It's a lot cheaper than plastic surgery : )