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We’ve never been here before—in the middle of a pandemic that has millions of people either sheltering in place or minimizing their exposure to other humans. But if there is one thing we have right now (until a vaccine is found and things are not so scary), is time. Time to create. Time to improve. Time to take three steps back without punting.
All over social media, there are jokes and memes about people gaining weight, doing projects they have put off, sitting back and seeing how others are coping with all the same things they are, or simply not coping at all. So let’s talk a bit about self-care. Assuming you are not significantly suffering financially, what if you were one of those rare human beings who decided to actually use this time to improve your health, take better care of your appearance, or just do the kinds of rewarding things you never permitted yourself to try before?
I am coming at this purely from a female perspective, but men might benefit from my musings as well. It’s no secret that watching your diet and exercise promotes good health, especially as you age. So how is beauty care so radically different? We work hard to take care of our insides as well as our bodies, but is paying attention to your looks such a narcissistic endeavor? I see it as part of the whole.
Baby boomer daughters were born of a generation of mothers who kept trying to tell us that looks weren’t everything. Be modest. Deflect compliments. Be demure—while men were allowed to boast, show off they prowess and strut their stuff. Don't let boys know you're smarter than they are. And when you dress, dress for men, not yourself. When women of this era dressed, did their hair and wore makeup, their looks certainly seemed at the center of their world in the 1940s through the 1960s. Women became experts at “smoke and mirrors,” using foundation, eye makeup, clothes that showed off only their assets, and always, always that siren red lipstick. Clothes were fitted and elegant and everyone had a few “cocktail” dresses and flowing “swing” coats atop their pumps and nylons. Everyone looked well put together, it seemed, even though they were not wealthy. Somehow I think most of these women went to all that trouble, but not necessarily for men. Looking great made them feel better about themselves.
Back then few people sought professional help with what they considered physical anomalies—like an oversized nose, a receding chin line, or premature bags under their eyes. They just accepted what God gave them and did the best they could with what they considered their exterior flaws. But it makes you wonder: If these “flaws” in their minds were considered impediments to their self-esteem or even their success and suddenly got “fixed,” how differently might their lives have turned out—not just because of the transformation but because of a renewed confidence that manifested itself inside them because of it? Today’s millennials don’t give a second thought to a boob job, a well-placed Botox injection, or a “lipo” job after giving birth to a few kids. Why is our generation so bothered by it?
Some of us are concerned about how age is treating us, and others are just on a tear to look as glamorous they can be. To me, there is a difference. The first tends to preserve what you have and not permit it to radically change as you age. And the second is for the purpose of change and transformation—to look the way you always wanted to look but nature did not make that happen. Of course, many med spas and plastic surgeons delight in addressing all of it, preying on the insecurities of those entering their doors. In my opinion, only the best ones will deter patients from unnecessary treatment—perhaps suggesting that the “work” is not truly warranted, or to wait another decade before addressing it. Those are the ones I would return to if I found myself off-base on wanting to make a physical change. I want reality and good advice, not a doctor who would do anything I asked.
As for the patients themselves, some will not breathe a word about seeking help, as if spending money on themselves were the ultimate in self-centeredness. Many practitioners will admit that it’s rare their patients permit them to use before-and-after photos of them (even with their eyes blocked out and their identities hidden) to show others how their treatments work. In other words, beauty care tends to be a deep, dark secret except, perhaps, between BFFs.
While I understand this need to keep beauty care private, I also don’t see the need for shame. If you remodeled parts of your house or pay good money to maintain your car, it's no big deal. How are your looks any less something you own and keep up? In reality, it just makes you feel better about yourself, so how on earth is this a bad thing? In my (R)aging with Grace article, Beauty Care: Feeling Good About Your Looks Past Age 60 I get into the meat of it. I mention how I often hear resignation from my age 60+ peers about keeping up with beauty care, but when I think about the alternative, it just sounds unacceptable in my world of one. So I began looking for the advantages to beauty care past age 60 and found that it’s not uncommon to be shamed by others about wearing makeup and/or appreciating it. I quoted a psychologist who argues that activities that allow us to take care of our personal beauty needs should not be viewed as “guilty pleasures.”
We have been carefully taught to suppress our interest in our looks, especially as we age, as if aging is a lost cause. In fact, as many women age they stop wearing makeup or doing skin care, accepting whatever nature hands them. And that’s fine. It’s a free country. But to put down others because they enjoy trying to look like fresher and younger versions of themselves? That’s patently unfair. There are no absolutes where self-esteem is at stake. When you feel great about how you look, you have a better outlook on just about everything.
Morgan Shanahan’s Babble article I Got Botox and Didn’t Tell my Husband tells the story of a woman’s guilty pleasure. While she wanted to get rid of a wild eyebrow that had bothered her all her life, she failed to tell her husband, Scott, that she was going to get Botoxed. Her first reaction was to run to her husband and make him poke her forehead and point out how she had her crazy eyebrow. fixed. But she couldn’t. "Because I’d lied by omission and I was in it to win it now.” She goes on to say that about six months later she admitted it to him at a party. “The thing is, my husband does think I’m beautiful no matter what. He also never noticed that I had frozen a quarter of my face. But now that he does know, our trust has been damaged. He can’t believe I would have gone and done something like that without telling him, and honestly … neither can I.” While Shanahan loves what the injections did for her, the penchant to keep it a secret took a toll in this case.
While self-care is now a popular topic, many women find it necessary to justify spending money on beauty. According to my own med spa doc, one of her clients told her that each beauty product or procedure she spent money on began to feel like a small victory after years of feeling guilty about it. She also told her that this was quickly followed by remorse and then another round of justification. When she discovered what she purchased actually worked, however, there was euphoria. This is a cycle that repeats itself, but there is no reason she should continue to suffer from it. We have one time to go around, and there is no reason to think that an investment in your looks is not a prudent one.
Personally speaking, having dominion over my looks means have a sense of control over something. The concentration with which I apply eyeliner is unmatched and when I’m done with my going-out preparation, it makes me feel more confident to face the world.
In a few months, I turn 69—the age at which my sweet, lovely little mom departed this earth. I never got to see her as an old woman. But it was she who taught me how to dress, how to wear makeup, how to “sit like a lady” and how important “looking your best” was at all times. Of course, as a teen of the ‘70s, I relaxed those rules a bit. Eventually, however, I embraced them all in my own way.
Today I am on a self-improvement kick not to try to look younger, but to address things that can bolster my aging mentality. Having flunked a “visual field” test at my ophthalmologist, I was told insurance might pay for an upper lid eye lift. I am now at home recovering from it. I also embraced the logic of a keto diet and am 12 pounds lighter, trying to go the distance to get into the size I think this frame should fit. I finally addressed a set of lower teeth that looked as if God threw them into my mouth without a plan and I wear Invisalign to improve my smile—the visible essence of who I am. And I finally take pride in skin care after decade upon decade of sun damage. Why all this and why now? If I count the number of summers the average person has left at my age, I have to keep asking—why not? Even one little improvement can elicit those beaming smiles on my face—the weight, the teeth, the eyes, the skin care—what have I got to lose?
And yes. I still wear pumps. I am a total throwback and I have no shame about it. Be well. And be beautiful. There is only one you.
