Explaining Mommy’s cosmetic surgery to children: What a crazy and sad world
There are many wonderful children’s books written to help young people deal with terrible things in their lives.
Books help kids cope with the loss of a loved one, such a parent, grandparent, sibling, friend. Books help children understand cancer and strokes. Books helps kids relate to the handicapped, or to the loss of a pet, or to natural disasters.
These books are blessings to parents, family and teachers.
And now, there’s a book that helps kids ages 4-7 understand why Mommy got a tummy tuck, a nose job and breast implants.
While it’s clear that many people (and not just women) choose to have plastic surgery for cosmetic reasons, think about the horrible messages that Dr. Michael Salzhauer’s book, My Beautiful Mommy, is sending to our children about their parents’ values, about our society’s values, and about their bodies.
No wonder why so many children and teens have problems with body image. If you are contemplating buying this book for your child – for heaven’s sake, think about what you’re doing to yourself, and to your family.
Read more about this in Newsweek.
I hear you loud and clear, Alan! Your post is especially refreshing in the wake of the Faux News blurb about the book I saw over the weekend — lauding it as a valuable resource for children.
It’s also interesting in the light of a recent L.A. Times article noting the ubiquity of both anorexia and plastic surgery among movie stars–even young ones–nowadays. The normal-sized female stars of the 1940s and 1950s wouldn’t even be granted a screen test nowadays–not in our era of the size-0, tummy-tucked, be-Botoxed bimbo.
It’s a damn shame that STILL, in the 21st century, the patriarchy twists not just people’s minds, but their bodies! “Crazy and sad” says it all.