Mommy Makeovers and the Cougar Connection
Turn on the television or crack open a magazine and you’ll notice a hot new trend: cougars. From the exploration of dalliances with older women in the series Dawson’s Creek to the more recent ABC sitcom Cougar Town, it seems that pairing a younger guy with an older woman is the next big thing.
So, why the sudden interest in women who have aged as long and gracefully as Anne Bancroft in The Graduate, the circa 1967 film that possibly kicked off the cougar craze? Perhaps it’s because the classics never go out of style – or maybe it’s because today’s thirty-, forty- and fifty-somethings are looking better than ever.
Contributing to the latter theory is a concurrent trend in cosmetic surgery: the ‘Mommy Makeover.” This has been a somewhat quieter phenomenon. That is because unlike the conspicuous and multitudinous Hollywood nose, belly, and boob jobs that plaster the tabloids, Mommy Makeovers aren’t meant to be completely transformative. Instead, it entails a handful of procedures that are meant to correct the changes that childbirth has had on a woman’s body. After a Mommy Makeover, women simply look refreshed and renewed, not plastic and put together. Because they look more like they did before having children, many can’t tell they had work done at all, commenting instead that they simply “look great.”
As described by one patient of Dr. Amy Bandy, a Newport Beach breast augmentation, tummy tuck and liposuction specialist, Mommy Makeovers make women feel as if they have a “new lease on life.” This restored confidence often spurs married, single or newly single mothers to renew their intimacy with their partners or begin a new chapter in their love lives. As a female plastic surgeon, Dr. Bandy sees many patients with concerns specific to post-pregnancy women at her office in Newport Beach. Tummy tucks, labia reconstruction, breast reduction, and breast augmentation operations are all common procedures among mothers who want to feel more confident and sexy.
There hasn’t been any hard data released linking the rising popularity of cougars to the affordability and acceptance of Mommy Makeovers. But given the confidence and youthful appearance that cosmetic surgery lends to mothers, it’s likely that the Mommy
Makeover is playing a big role in older women becoming more adventurous and, of course, more attractive to their young suitors.