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What's what in the world of cosmetic procedures and (gasp) injectables

by Rebecca

Allow me to introduce you to one of my favourite clips on the internet. Specifically the bit 53 seconds in.

@bbcradio2Vernon Kay and Olivia Colman found out they were the same age when recording #TenToTheTop 😂 Listen to the podcast on BBC Sounds 🎧 #vernonkay #oliviacolman #jessiebuckley

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‘I’ve had loads’.

Finally, someone said it in a way that made it sound commonplace.

Because make no mistake, in my industry it is. In fact on screen, it’s pretty much ubiquitous. Magazine culture would have you believe that any famous person who’s had an injectible looks like Amanda Lepore. But the truth is more or less everyone has Botox, unless you’re Judi Dench.

The only botox that is really noticeable is bad botox, or too much botox. Frozen faces, stretched mouths with dead eyes. Good botox is not noticeable beyond ‘wow, she looks great’. Good botox is being able to frown a bit. Good botox is Emma Stone still looking 30 aged 35. Good botox is is being able to claim it was a team of makeup artists and sponsorship by Pat McGrath. Good botox is why on the Oscars red carpet, the women looked fresh, stunning, and liked they’d been wiped clean of lines.

Good botox is this trailer for this film starring Anne Hathaway and Jessica Chastain.

I appreciate written down this could come across a little prickly, but it isn’t at all. It’s more an observation than anything. What I will say is, botox is coming for us ladies, and it’s coming at a cost.

Where am I in all of this? Well personally I’m not interested in looking like Amanda Lepore, but neither am I ecstatic about the bird woman from Mary Poppins that’s slowly coming for me. The thing that does concern me a bit is that I am 37 years old, and for the last six months or so I have exclusively been sent castings for women in their forties. I don’t look older than I am but these days, in order to play my own age, I need to look younger. Because now 41 (Anne Hathaway) looks 35, and 47 (Jessica Chastain) looks 40.

I am not blaming these two particular actresses for this. All I’m saying is, what used to be a feminist issue for me has since become an economic one. I can’t beat ‘em, but if I don’t join ‘em I limit my employment options.

41 and 47

This is not a ‘run and get injectables!’ post. This is a ‘do not feel ashamed if you’re interested in them because it’s complex’ post. The issue has become so much more than whether you are a double agent for the patriarchy, or whether you hate your face. Every red carpet star has them, meaning the beauty gap between us and them is ever widening and it’s likely we’ll feel less and less adequate as a result.

Enough articles have been written about how maybe more time and money should be spent learning to love ourselves as we are. And yes in an ideal world that’s exactly what I would suggest. But it doesn’t come easy to all of us, or cheaply. When you add up the cost of flights to Bali, a week’s empowerment retreat, Cacao ceremonies, psychedelics and shamanic rituals it amounts to about 7 years’ worth of Botox. Besides, I’ve done every one of those healing things and believe me when I say it’s helped, but I’m still susceptible.

I’m just like whatever makes you feel confident, you know? Getting snobby or judgey about it won’t stop it happening, but it will get people lying about it. Or worse, ashamed. And lord knows if Botox and the like disappeared they’d find something else for women to be ashamed of themselves for, the patriarchy has to put it somewhere after all.

But what actually are they?

For the interest of keeping us all up to speed, I thought I’d run by a few treatments in layman’s terms. I AM NOT A DOCTOR, in case that wasn’t already obvious.