'Mummy Makeovers'

Rant time. (Again).

This morning on Channel 7's The Morning Show, which runs from 9am - 11:30am and whose primary target audience is stay-at-home parents (particularly women), there was a segment called "The Mummy Makeover". It featured some sort of cosmetic surgeon and a "patient" of said surgeon (I use inverted commas because it seemed so orchestrated to me like a paid advertisement with actors) talking about mothers who are 'getting their pre-pregnancy bodies back'.

I do not know where to begin in describing how heinous this is. If you want liposuction, laser therapy, tummy tuck etc as a means of last resort as the only thing that will make you happy (and my suggestion is, that it has more to do with your own perception of what you should look like rather than the reality) then that's fine, you can come to this decision without any input from morning television. However, to me, putting this segment on this program targeting this demographic is basically preying on mothers who are mostly at home, alone, coping with raising children and the associated hormones and body changes that go with it.

I got quite upset because the last few days I have started to have feelings about how my body looks. I describe it as being "banged up", the same body I had before but a few dents, scratches and chips now. My jeans don't do up the same they used to, I bulge in different places, and sometimes I really don't like what I see in the mirror - which really isn't that different to how I felt before I was even pregnant. Actually, I have a good reason now why I look like I do, I've successfully carried and am nourishing a 7 week old baby. And I have to remind myself this, to not get myself down... and seeing people getting nipped and tucked doesn't exactly help.

The Morning Show should be more responsible and promote how to be happy with who you are, what you are, and if they're going to talk self-improvement, let it be about diet and exercise, not cosmetic surgery. You look at where the US is in terms of obsession with perfection and cosmetic surgery being a social norm, and it's terrifying. We don't want to go there.

FYI, if the Morning Show would like to take me up, I'll happily go on air and show them all my flaws and maybe that'll make people feel better about themselves and how good that look in comparison!!