# Would you have cosmetic surgery? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 16, 2004, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699 "2004-01-16T02:40:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/21 "2004-01-16T15:40:25Z")
I’d like to get my teeth fixed. They aren’t hideous or anything, but I have a noticeable overbite that needs fixing. I’ll probably do that this year. I would also do a face lift. Not right now, but in a few years. And I have a stubborn five lbs. around my middle that simply will not leave. I’d get that taken care of if I had the dough. Which I “doughn’t.” ---
**Author:** ![Nightsong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nightsong/32/3083_2.png) [@Nightsong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nightsong)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/22 "2004-01-16T15:55:41Z")
Hm. I’d probably go for a small amount of liposuction, since there’s a bit of belly pooch that refuses to do anything but sit there, and probably a breast reduction and lift. (I’m not big enough for medical insurance to cover it, but a bit too big for my ideal. I wanna find button down shirts that fit, damn it!) Already had a bunion done, for medical (not cosmetic) resons, and that was a breeze. I’d have that done again in a heartbeat, if it was needed. 😃 And yes, I watch these shows as well… and have a mother who’s a nurse, so I’m well aware of the things that go on during these kinds of operations. * * * \<\< Carpe Carp! \>\> ---
**Author:** ![jellytoes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/eb9ed0/32.png) [@jellytoes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jellytoes)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/23 "2004-01-16T16:10:56Z")
All you who have scars that want to get rid of them… When I was 16 I had a bit of skin cancer removed from my right breast. That was scary enough, but then I had a lumpy scar. After years of careful consideration, I got a tattoo over the scar. It’s a little frog and when you run your finger over the tattoo, it feel like the frog is raised from my flesh. It’s really cool. 6 years later and I still love it. I consider it my trophy. ---
**Author:** ![OldBroad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ed655f/32.png) [@OldBroad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldBroad)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/24 "2004-01-16T16:12:19Z")
Yes, I’d have my boobs put back where they started. Gravity is cruel. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/25 "2004-01-16T16:27:43Z")
Don’t forget about the risks, as with all surgery. [http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/books/01/16/obit.goldsmith.ap/index.html](http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/books/01/16/obit.goldsmith.ap/index.html) “‘First Wives Club’ author dies after plastic surgery” ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/26 "2004-01-16T16:56:36Z")
I have a large mole/bump just below the hairline on my forehead, and I can feel another one hidden in my hair near the top of my head. When and if I start going bald, I’ll probably get those removed, just because I think they’d look odd standing all alone out there, like cairns on the tundra. Beyond that I’m pretty satisfied with myself as I am. ---
**Author:** ![Planet\_of\_the\_Shapes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b77776/32.png) [@Planet\_of\_the\_Shapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Planet_of_the_Shapes)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/27 "2004-01-16T17:46:08Z")
There’s no way i’d have anything done at the moment. I’m reasonably happy with my body, well apart from a little beer belly i have… Maybe when i’m quite a bit older, i might have something done to make me look a little younger, remove wrinkles etc, but only if it would look completely natural, if i had a lot of spare cash, and it wasn’t too invasive. ---
**Author:** ![Shade](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2bfe46/32.png) [@Shade](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shade)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/28 "2004-01-16T17:58:36Z")
Liposuction. No way. (a) gross (b) too much like cheating. Laser eye surgery. No idea why this freaks me less than contacts, but atm it does. Depliation. Shaving is such a pain. Vascectomy. Kids are such a… just kidding. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/29 "2004-01-16T18:31:39Z")
> [@](#): > > Liposuction. No way. (a) gross (b) too much like cheating. I’d do liposuction in a heartbeat. I dropped over 100 lbs the hard way and have been stuck trying to lose the last 25 or so I want to drop for over a year. I’m not willing to exercise more (5-7 days a week) or eat very much less than I’m eating now, so if that makes me a “cheater” so be it. I’ve had LASIK and laser hair removal. Loved the first, disappointed in the results of the second. I suppose if it were free/cheap I’d try another round of it but it’s not worth what I paid for it. I’d like to get my teeth whitened. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/30 "2004-01-16T18:50:10Z")
**InternetLegend** and **whiterabbit** I know foot surgery is hellish. (That is, as well as one can gather from observation.) My best friend had bunion surgery and was miserable for well over a year. The first foot had apparently not healed enough by the time she had the second one done, so the last half was even worse. (What’s more, she changed surgeons after the first one-- the second one was apparently horrified that the first one had done the work with only local anaesthesia, quite apart from it being a visibly inept job.) I know how much physical strain feet have to endure on a daily basis. Still, given the opportunity, I’d have a quarter-inch taken off those big-boys if I could. They feel _totally_ alien to me. ---
**Author:** ![cher3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/da6949/32.png) [@cher3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cher3)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/31 "2004-01-16T19:02:13Z")
I admit I slow down and study the ads in the local entertainment paper a lot more than I used to. (Just as an aside, I wonder if the permanent makeup people have ever considered suing Michael Jackson.) I can’t seem myself ever having liposuction and my features are generally okay. If my whole face could be magically hitched up about 1/4 inch, that would be great, but I don’t think I’d go through surgery to achieve that. I have gone so far as to check out sites relating to breast enhancement. I don’t need a reduction or augmentation and the the idea of implants skeeves me out, except in the case of mastectomy, but I thought I’d see what they could do in the way of general repair of gravitational effects. I don’t pass the pencil test anymore (although now I always have a few pencils handy). To my surprise, I still resemble what they were showing as “after” pictures. This was simultaneously reassuring and disappointing. ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/32 "2004-01-16T19:56:35Z")
I had Lasik five years ago, and while I have to wear glasses again, they aren’t coke bottles anymore. Plus, the last time I had my eyes checked, they had actually improved. I would consider the laser hair removal for my back. I have some Italian ancestry and you would never guess where it shows. Everything else I can live with. ---
**Author:** ![jellen92](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/6bbea6/32.png) [@jellen92](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jellen92)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/33 "2004-01-16T20:10:51Z")
You bet I would if I had the extra cash! I’d get a breast augmentation, and liposuction on my stubborn ass and hips. In my older years, I’d do an eye life/face lift without a second thought. ---
**Author:** ![jellen92](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/6bbea6/32.png) [@jellen92](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jellen92)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/34 "2004-01-16T20:10:56Z")
You bet I would if I had the extra cash! I’d get a breast augmentation, and liposuction on my stubborn ass and hips. In my older years, I’d do an eye lift/face lift without a second thought. ---
**Author:** ![JohnBckWLD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d6d6ee/32.png) [@JohnBckWLD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnBckWLD)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2004, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/35 "2004-01-16T20:21:42Z")
To quote Lisa Kirk, > [@](#): > > _“A gossip is one who talks to you about others; a bore is one who talks to you about himself; and a brilliant conversationalist is one who talks to you about yourself.”_ I’ll take the route of the former and whisper something a little bird once told me:[ul][li]InternetLegend: Would “have a tummy tuck.” [/li][li]Sue Duhnym: Would “wait until I’m done having children and then use it for a boob lift.”[/li][li]Jackelope: Requests “penis reduction, please.”[/li][li]Dieter: Would “have them move the extra meat from my nose down to my penis”[/li][li]Juniper200: Would “take a little out of the thighs and hips. And as long as they’re in the neighborhood, they can fix that little poochy belly thing I can’t get rid of.”[/li][li]MissGypsy: Would “have the excess in my thighs transferred up about 18" to the boobal area.”[/li][li]Sublight: “Might go for a tummy tuck. The only thing I really want, though, is to lop off the large mole just below my hairline.”[/li][li]Käse: Said, “OMG! Everything!!”[/li][li]LurkMeister: Would “get all the excess flab carved away from my hips, thighs and calves” or have is wife (who probably doesn’t read his posts) get a “skin-tuck, as well as some cosmetic work on some old surgical scars.”[/li][li]Shirley Ujest: Would remove the “extra skin on the belly” and “donate my proceeds to Calista Flockhart.”[/li][li]MachV: Wants “a mole removed.”[/li][li]Tansu: Would “take a flatter stomach and perkier, slightly larger tits - but I wouldn’t want to go through surgery.”[/li][li]TroubleAgain: Might “do something with my skin, I guess. I’m starting to get a softening of the jawline that I don’t like, and wrinkles around my eyes.”[/li][li]amarinth: Might opt for a “complete overhaul.” [/li][li]Eve: Couldn’t decide between “a middle-aged chin-tuck, or a nose-job. Something swoopy and Kay Kendall-y, I think”[/li][li]auntie em: Might go for “microdermabrasion sessions or electrolysis”[/li]Tansu: Likes the idea of “electrolysis - now you’re talking!”[/ul] ---
**Author:** ![Daikona](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8baadc/32.png) [@Daikona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daikona)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2004, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/36 "2004-01-17T01:33:05Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > Don’t forget about the risks, as with all surgery. > [http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/books/01/16/obit.goldsmith.ap/index.html](http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/books/01/16/obit.goldsmith.ap/index.html) > “‘First Wives Club’ author dies after plastic surgery” Yeah, but mine exists only in my head, since I will never have several thousand dollars and nothing better to spend it on. 😉 Would be nice to have a stomach I dared let see the light of day though. Nothing else gonna fix this one. ---
**Author:** ![UnwrittenNocturne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/6de8d8/32.png) [@UnwrittenNocturne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UnwrittenNocturne)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2004, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/37 "2004-01-17T01:50:56Z")
Absolutely. In fact not only would I have surgery but I intend to. In this day and age I see no reason to let the ravages of time show before they need to. ---
**Author:** ![LurkMeister](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3da27b/32.png) [@LurkMeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LurkMeister)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2004, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/38 "2004-01-17T03:29:56Z")
I was reading through this thread and trying to decide if I should repeat my comments in a previous thread on the same topic when I got to **JohnBckWLD** ’s post, which saved me the trouble. And yes, I would still probably have the same work done. ---
**Author:** ![LifeOnWry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/96bed5/32.png) [@LifeOnWry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LifeOnWry)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2004, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/39 "2004-01-17T06:04:23Z")
My knee-jerk reaction to the question is, “Never in a million gabillion years, I’m not that vain.” But the truth is I’m a great big coward and a cheapskate, because if I think about it long enough, I start hearing little hesitant voices saying things like, “You know, that broken capillary on your cheek that people always think is a pen mark could be fixed pretty easily… and it would be lovely to get the fat sucked out of those eyelids…and you know, boobs really shouldn’t point southeast and southwest…that five pounds of cottage cheese on your thighs could be sucked out, too…” I’ve had necessary surgeries and been a whiney baby about them, though, and every time I think about spending actual money to have intentional pain, I repeat: “Never in a million gabillion years. I’M not that vain!” (In other news, I don’t consider LASIK to be cosmetic and, having repeatedly quizzed Dopers who’ve done it, I’ve almost worked up enough courage…) ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2004, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699/40 "2004-01-17T06:43:09Z")
Would I? If I had the money, yes. _Could_ I? No—I’m a post-transplant patient and elective surgery would be an unnecessary risk to put my depressed immune system through. But I have an incisional hernia from liver transplant—the muscles of my abdomen didn’t completely heal together—and I’d love to get that patched back together. Is it practical? Um, no, prolly not. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-cosmetic-surgery/224699.md?page=3)