Plastic Surgery Junkies

So far, I am loving the new and improved cable package! There are so many things to watch! My favorite show so far is a documentary called "Plastic Surgery Junkies" on BBC America. I have always been fanscinated by people who are willing to essentially risk their lives for vanity. The people featured in the program were a varied bunch. One was a young woman who wanted to get lipo and a different woman wanted a boob job. Another was a man in his 50s, who had bicep implants put in (but previously he had lipo, eye work, a tummy tuck and pectoral implants) and another guy who had so much work done that he looked like he was made of Silly Putty. The last person who had work done was the host of the show - a British guy named Louis Theroux, who reminds me of Ira Glass.

He didn't look fat at all to me, but when he took his shirt off and the doctor started drawing on him with his Sharpie, you could see that he was a tiny bit paunchy and had a little bit of lower back fat. It wasn't anything to be concerned about, but I think he just wanted to see what the surgery was like and he also allowed the cameras to film the procedure from start to finish.

So, they showed Louis going into the surgery room and then showed him getting his stomach and back area numbed (that part actually hurt, he said) and then they showed the doctor sucking out the fat. Louis was awake and talking the whole time! The fat sucking procedure was not like sucking a milkshake out of a straw - it was a lot more aggressive and painful looking. Louis reported that the actual lipo process didn't hurt, but he did say there he had a feeling that something was going on, but the area was so numb that the feeling was hard to describe. Then, they showed Louis back in his hotel room, recovering. The spots where the lipo sucking tool (the calendula?) was poked in were draining fluid, so he had to wear a girdle and put mini pads over the leaking holes in his skin. Gross, right?

At the end, they show all the people post surgery, when they are all healed. Louis reports his mixed feelings about his satisfaction with the lipo, because while he is happy with how he looks, he feels guilty, self absorbed and lazy for not toning up the old fashioned way. The other people are all happy with their results and don't have any mixed feelings. They just feel they are better people post-plastic surgery.

It was a gripping show. BBC America has a lot of documentary style shows and I plan to add them all to my DVR roster (which is getting longer every day. You may never hear from me again.)