Cosmetic Medicine Isn't About Vanity Alone

When you think of 'beauty', what's the first thing that comes to mind?

Flawless skin, luscious lips, perfect proportions? While some use makeup

or well tailored clothing to enhance their outer beauty, others are opting

for more advance methods of preserving their youthful look or optimizing

their inherited appearance.

Recently, I had a conversation with a holistic healer who challenged my

stance oncosmetic medicine, touting it as Vanity. Society at large, has a

very stereotypical image of beauty, and a very biased perception of women

and men who pursue it.

Is it vain to want to improve the way we feel about our appearance and take

steps towards become the highest versions of who you want to be? Is it fair

to continue unnecessary prejudices against those who seek cosmetic procedures,

while dismissing them as self-obsessed, brainless or flippant?

While some people do cosmetic procedures for luxury, for others, acid attack,

cancer survivors, and those with chronic skin conditions, it's a necessity of life.

Take for an example, hereditary skin conditions like eczema, vitiligo, melanoma,

warts, acne scarring. Conditions that can be difficult to manage with holistic and

modern medicine.For people who suffer daily with these hereditary conditions

cosmetic medicine can combat the intensity of their condition and give them a

shot at a normal life. Essentially levelling the field against others who do not

have these same problems.

Similarly, there are individuals plagued with permanent disfigurations, such

cancerous lesion removals, car accidents, chemotherapy and radiation treatment,

or general side effects from chronic medication use. Cosmetic medicine presents

an opportunity to address, itching, inflammation, pigmentation, swelling and redness that ravage the largest organ in our body, our skin.

All these individuals have a judgemental looks because of their appearance.

Daily life can be traumatizing because of snide looks or persecution about their looks.

For these individuals, cosmetic procedures mean a shot at normal life and a chance

to escape the isolation of feeling alone in their own skin.

So the next time you see a person walking into a cosmetic clinic, hold back on the judgment. Beauty may be many things for many people-power, confidence,

leverage-but for some, it's life itself.