Catfish mum: Is beauty only skin deep…?
Millions have watched ‘Alicia’ share her daily transformation of ‘snap-in’ dentures and make-up. Some call her a ‘catfish’ – but she doesn’t care
To look at, Alicia is like any other wellgroomed woman in her 30s. With tousled hair extensions, carefully applied make-up, false eyelashes and a beaming smile, she’s striking to say the least.
But beneath her glossy exterior is a whole different woman – and Alicia is, quite literally, baring all on social media. And the real her is causing worldwide controversy.
She uses buckets of makeup to clear up her skin, a wig to cover her receding hairline and, most important of all, false teeth.
In the video, posted on TikTok under the handle @princxssglitterhead, the 36-year-old mum-of-four says: ‘Hi, I’m Alicia. I’m the girl with the snap-in dentures. I’m here to show you today what we look like with or without.
Are you ready?’
She then goes on, ‘Let’s start a trend, I want to show everyone how hot we look, how beautiful we look.’
Then she reveals a toothless smile to the camera, admitting she began to lose her teeth at 21.
Free of make-up and with missing teeth, Alicia looks very different by the end of her transformation. As the song says, ‘don’t believe me – just watch.’ It’s fixating and has had 11 million likes.
The New York-based TikToker explained that she’d experienced severe tooth decay during her pregnancy with daughter Katie, 15 years ago.
‘I wasn’t as healthy as I should have been,’ she admits. ‘The baby had to strip things out of my body… mostly calcium from [my] teeth.’
‘Genetically predisposed to extreme calcium loss’ during her pregnancy, Alicia’s teeth became hollow and brittle, then began falling out.
After her second child, she paid around £7,000 for tooth repairs but nowadays, she wears dentures to give her a sparkling smile.
There has been a barrage of support for her social media videos, with people praising not only her bravery and beauty, but her honesty. ‘Don’t let others define what beautiful is! You are such an inspiration,’ was one comment liked by many. ‘Please normalise young people with dentures!’ another wrote. ‘As a dental assistant, I hate seeing how much it affects my patients’ self-esteem. You’re so beautiful.’
But Alicia’s videos haven’t been so well-received by everyone, and she’s been sent an onslaught of hurtful comments. Not only do they not approve of her dentures, but they also disagree with how she transforms herself with make-up.
They believe her hashtag – #ToothlessTikTokCatfish –
‘Please normalise young people with dentures!’
is too true. That she’s conning people into believing she’s someone she’s not.
‘This should be illegal,’ said one, ‘absolute witchcraft’ added another, with ‘false advertisement’ and ‘gross’ being other comments. Really? We’d suggest honest. For some people, it seems, beauty really is skin-deep.
But Alicia is holding her head up high: ‘I’m a happily married mom of 15 years with four kids and I wear make-up for me.’
Well said. Let us know what you think...