From Botox to Detox: A Modern-Day Mid-Life Crisis
When it Takes a Global Pandemic to Come Home to Yourself
Searching for my seat at a Jason Isbell concert in Los Angeles, I observe two women about my age, looking chic in their perfectly fitted jeans over yoga-sculpted asses. Their long hair falls in tousled ringlets, created by the right twist of the wrist with a curling iron. It looks effortless, but I’ve never figured out how to do that with my hair. Mine always ends up looking like a five-year-old played hair salon. These women are holding back age with grace and aplomb. I can’t help comparing myself. Rapidly closing in on 50, I’m in decent shape with dark brown hair as close to my original color as I could get it. I’ve started cutting it shorter because it’s thinning as I get older.
My face is changing. In L.A., we have methods to defy gravity like Botox and sperm facials and microneedling. Still, science has its limits. I find the options overwhelming and slightly terrifying.
I wonder if other men besides my husband would still find me attractive. Then I wonder why I’m wondering. At the gym the next day, while pressing a fifteen-pound dumbbell over my head, I ask my Millennial trainer, “Ever watch a mid-life crisis unfold before your eyes?”
“Should I be concerned?” she answers.
“If I turn up in a yellow corvette, then you can worry.”
Meanwhile, I’ve stepped up my workout routines, completed a 30-day detox, scheduled an appointment with a cardiologist to check my heart, and — I can’t stall the confession any longer: made an appointment for Botox and filler, something I never, I mean EVER, thought I would do. But my face is changing, my jowls becoming more pronounced. The circles under my eyes look deeper. Selfies are my idea of hell. My jawline is drooping and with it my self-confidence. I don’t need to look like Kim Kardashian, I just want to look like me a few years ago.
Two weeks later, I’m tilted back in a recliner that looks like a cross between a dental chair and gynecologist stirrups. I’ve found a doctor rumored to have treated Barbra Streisand, so naturally I trust him. The nurse asks me to wash my face before the procedure. I notice the face wash at the sink is a brand I know to be full of parabens.
“How can you let your patients use a product with ingredients so closely linked to breast cancer?” I ask her.
The nurse shrugs. “They’re samples from reps.”
We all love freebies. Lately, though, I’ve been wary of handouts since learning about the dangers of parabens, phthalates and so called “natural ingredients.” I’m woke to toxins. Nonetheless, I’m about to shoot poison into my face to help me look younger.
The doctor arrives. He’s young-looking of course, handsome, friendly with good bedside manner. My heart pumps faster, my hands clutch the chair. I ask a million questions. It’s my second time here — I chickened out the first time.
“I don’t want to look like all those women my age who look puffy and ‘done.’ I just want to look like me but three years ago. Can you do that?”
He flashes a sympathetic smile. “Yes,” he says. “We can.”
He points to the areas where he’d suggest Botox — across my forehead and around my eyes. Then filler to give the appearance of lifting the cheekbones, like sandbagging to prevent a mudslide. The injection feels like a more chilling version of toothpaste squeezed from a tube and sounds like using the last of the ketchup bottle.
“What about the jowls?” I ask. I’ve been obsessing. The doc masterfully injects a series of painful filler, fanning it out across my jawline to “give the illusion of contours,” as I squeeze a rubber ball they’ve given me so I won’t scream and scare the other patients. The nurse stands beside my head dabbing my face with ice.
“What about the two lines next to her mouth?” she suggests.
“No,” he snaps. “That wouldn’t look natural.”
I trust him even more now.
As he fills my face with various foreign substances, I start to feel depressed and vaguely disturbed — not to mention frightened. What if something goes wrong? Why am I doing this? It feels like weakness, like I’m denying my authentic self. I’m afraid others will judge me. I’m judging myself. I watch the doc’s kind eyes as he studies my face, like an artist working on a sculpture, smoothing out the edges and shaping the chin.
“It would probably be cheaper to go to a therapist and just get over it, right?” I ask.
He laughs. We’re the same age, he gets it. I’ve been looking at pictures of myself recently from five or ten years ago, pondering whether I’d ever fully appreciated how effortless it was to look good back then.
I leave the office with a round ice pack branded with the doctor’s name on it and consider how this will impact my self-esteem. On a surface level, I feel better about the face I see in the mirror. On a deeper level, shouldn’t I draw that value from a place deeper within? That’s rhetorical — I know the answer is yes.
So far, no one’s suspected I’ve gotten work done. It’s subtle and natural-looking. I often daydream about living in a place where looks don’t matter (Mars?) and wonder if I’ll ever stop caring. I’ve resisted going to each subsequent appointment because it costs a fortune, it hurts, and it’s scary. In the end, I go because my looks are rapidly changing as I get older, and I can’t handle it. Vain and superficial, I know. Did I mention I live in Los Angeles?
Now, COVID-19’s changing everything. My Botox is wearing off, I haven’t had a mani-pedi in six months, I’m letting my silver roots shine, and you know what? I kinda like it. People are snapping selfies of their shaggy do’s and proudly posting them on Instagram. It’s our “now normal.” I’d say “new” but I’m sure many of us will return to our pre-pandemic routines when this is over. I’m not sure if I will. I’m realizing now how much time and money I spent racing around “fixing” myself. For the first time in my life, I’m letting it all go. While the world shutters to escape a viral pandemic, I’m using this opportunity to live with myself, my real self. It’s a deeper form of detox. No nail polish or hair dye, I rarely wear make-up anymore. I don’t even blow dry my hair. It feels good for now. During quarantine, I’ve felt anxious, sad, frustrated and angry. But I also feel liberated. No more running around town for endless errands and appointments. No more rushing my kid out the door for school in the morning (now, gently roll her towards her iPad). I appreciate the opportunity to slow down and focus on the things that really matter: quality time with my daughter, perfecting the hula hoop, day drinking and family Zooms. Now, if only I could slow down on the cookies and ice cream.
More from Pam Suchman: