Anyone under 40 turn away now

because I don't want to traumatise you before it is absolutely necessary.

Yesterday I visited the skin doctor.

I took my naked face on the train in peak hour and had to wear these.

Just in case I ran into someone I know. (Although its questionable whether anyone would recognise me without makeup anyway).  

  

There was no point painting my face because the doctor would then have to take my makeup off with a trowel and charge me exorbitant labour fees on top off her already exorbitant specialist’s fees.

I don’t know, things seem to grow on you the older you get and I don’t just mean your nose, ears or your daughter's boyfriends.

I have fair skin, live in a very hot country and have to be careful about sun damage.

I’ve been wearing Factor 30 (it doesn’t get higher here) religiously since it was finally revealed in the Women’s Weekly that drowning ourselves in baby oil and lying in the mid day sun was not as cool as every 70s teen thought it was.

I went into the doctors feeling so so with myself but came out with an expression like this.

Somehow the conversation about sun damage turned into how she could reorganise my whole face and the features that sit on it in four easy moves for a few thousand dollars.

Checkmate!

I wasn't keen. Someone tried to rearrange my face for free once and it's completely turned me off facial alterations.

It all happened like this.

The Doctor held my face carefully in her hands as though she was examining an 1000 year old egg.

“You actually have very good skin for your age and you only have some areas of sun damage. We can easily fix that with a few zaps from our IPL laser or use the M123DF.”

Or did she say the IRS, or FTS or the MiG-21? I can’t remember but it did make me wonder if this is where Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction ended up. In her office.

Pretty good skin for my age. I clung to those words and was feeling smug for, oh I don’t know, about a second.

She handed me a guilt edged mirror and in an earnest tone said, “Can you look at your face in the mirror for me?”

I was about to do the usual mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest……. when I suddenly caught my reflection.

I recoiled in horror. What the hell …… so not a pleasant sight.

Do you think people use mirrors for their own mischievous purposes? We all know Estee Lauder uses a soft focus mirror for its products so that you always look 25. Is it possible that dermatologists have mirrors that make you look 105?

For my sake, please say it is definitely so …

The Doctor, expressionless and immobile, got a little agitated. “Look in the mirror again. No, no, don’t close your eyes like that; it accentuates your crow’s feet. Do you see how your temples go in here and your cheekbones jut out there?”

What? I now need spandex for my cheekbones? Aren’t jutting cheekbones a thing of beauty? Didn’t I starve in my twenties for prominent cheekbones?

I was scared what was coming next.

“Well that’s because your face is losing fat and dropping. Your temples have lost weight (thank god for small wins I say!) so your cheekbones are more exposed causing a sharpness of curve and the fat to drop so your face looks long and narrow with a rather square jaw line. Do you see?”

I looked down at my feet. “Yes Doctor, I see the fat pooling around my ankles”.

“Well it might make it there one day but at the moment your cheeks are now jowls. Don’t worry, I have just the thing to fix that.”

As I knew she would. She has an arsenal of weapons at her fingertips. I hope someone from the AFP is reading this. Email me. I will give you names, numbers, everything.

“What I can do is use injectables, a lot of injectables actually, to fill in here, there and oh let’s just say, everywhere” she shrieked excitedly. Tracing her dancing fingertips around my face she waxed lyrical about the results she could achieve. For me or her, I was not quite sure.

“We will plump this up here, lift this to where it used to be and hide that under there. What do you think?”

What do I think? It is no wonder people end up at plastic surgeons taking the easy way out and just getting the excess bits cut off with a chainsaw.

“Injectables? It sounds like it would be easier if I stood against the wall and you threw poison darts at me. How’s your aim?”

She ignored me as if my views did not matter anyway and pressed on.

“Of course, it is quite expensive”, she said looking out the window and no doubt thinking about the yacht she has moored in the Bahamas. 

“It’s about $1200 a section and we… well we would have to do a lot of sections”.

I must have frowned. Very. Deeply.

“Oh my”, she cooed, while pointing and staring. “That is an extremely large frown line you have there.”

It is indeed.

“Can you give me the biggest frown you can please?”

I thought I had but I tried a little harder.

“Oh my, that is really something, best I have ever seen”, she said shaking her head from side to side.

Did I just see her rub her hands together like an excited child about to open Christmas presents? ….No way.

“I could fix that you know…..in a few moments with Botox or Dysport”.

“Dysport?” I queried

“It’s a Botox alternative and just a little cheaper”, she said.

Oh, so now Botox has a home brand? My prediction is that Woolworths will  have an off the shelf version in its stores within the year.

“However”, she warned, “the only consideration is that you will need more Botox than the average person.”

Suddenly I could feel my face starting to burn. Red hot.

“Oh”, she gasped, “did you know you are quite highly coloured as well? I could get rid of the nasty red blotches quite easily with….”

“No, no, doctor it’s really OK. I just need some fresh air. It is quite warm in here. The hot air is overwhelming. I will think about everything you have said. However, I need to go as I have something urgent to do.”

I quickly left the office and started fumbling through my bag to find my trusty Estee Lauder mirror. I had to do an urgent stock take of the damage to my psyche.

Thank goodness. 

I immediately saw the same familiar face looking back at me. Phew, it must have been the bad lighting in her office. I am as I always was. 25 again.

She had me worried for a while…...and with that I put my big black sunglasses on, tossed my jowls over my shoulder and walked off into the sunshine. 

Hot Topics – next week's post focuses on Sexism. Why is the subject so topical at the moment? Plus another exciting Giveaway for Aussie readers on Sunday.

Tell me, how do you wear your jowls? I am joking....