How to talk to your daughter about ‘tweakments’
If your children want to get lip fillers like Kylie Jenner, it’s time to face the facts, says Alice Hart-Davis
By the time your daughter reaches the age of 20, you might think you’ve discussed, negotiated and fought over all the issues that life sends to test a parent – but here’s another one. How would you feel if she wanted lip fillers? Or a nose job, for that matter?
Next week, the Government will launch a patient-safety campaign to educate us about these “tweakments” – and not before time. More and more young people (mostly women) are seeking cosmetic treatments, and we are all increasingly aware that things can and do go wrong.
I’ve been writing about non-surgical cosmetic procedures – or tweakments – for nearly 20 years. They have become a way of subtly remodelling faces of all ages and, in the past couple of years, the companies that make fillers have begun marketing them directly at youngsters, under the guise of “beautification”.
Neither of my two daughters – I’m pleased to say – has any interest in trying these things. Molly, 24, says it’s never occurred to her and it’s not something her friends talk about. Beth, 22, says she has no interest either, even though one of her friends wants to get her lips done.
I often joke that they, and their brother, Rob, 19, take a dim view of all the tweakments I have. And I im
agine that the fact they’ve seen all the bruising, swelling and scorched-looking skin that can result may have put them off, although they deny it. I’ve made a point of talking with my children about what motivates people to want tweakments, and I’m pleased that they are very aware of the doublethink that goes on in this area: “If you are wearing make-up or having tweakments to enhance confidence, you need to consider the external forces that are making you feel you need to look a certain way,” says Molly. Beth agrees, saying tweakments are just adding to the pressure to confirm to a “stylised norm”.
And to that, I say: “Thank goodness.” Tweakments can and do go wrong, and once you start trying these procedures, it tends to be a slippery slope. You like them. You try more. And it is very easy to end up looking weird!
And also, the real message I have tried to instill in my daughters is that we are all enough as we are, without glad rags and make-up
– let alone enhanced lips.
We all know that it is what is on the inside that matters. Yet evolution has hard-wired us to judge each other by how we look on the outside. And we tend to feel better about ourselves when we think we look good. And by that token, tweakments can be helpful if you are talking about correcting facial asymmetry, or reshaping a nose to disguise a bump or a drooping tip.
But for some young people, tweakments have become a fashion statement. My gut instinct is to shout at anyone under 30: “No! Don’t go there!” Although that is hypocritical, since I can’t pretend I’m not enabling the trend – I’ve just launched a website that provides information and a guide to the best practitioners…
But then again, if this conversation is happening, we probably need to know how to join in with it. What are other youngsters wanting done? Lip fillers, mostly. They all know that Kylie Jenner has been having her lips injected since she was 16. If they watched Love Island last year, they’ll have heard the girls discussing just how much they had all done to their faces. Contouring the cheeks from the inside with filler is popular. And so is non-surgical nose-reshaping.
How do you begin to discuss all this with your children? Here’s my advice.
Where to start: as a family, you are bound to be discussing the thorny issue of looks. Tweakments slot right in here. Norman Wright, the psychotherapist, who advises patients before and after cosmetic procedures, suggests a supportive approach, at the same time as communicating your concerns. “Try to understand how they see the subject. Ask them to tell you what it’s like. Are their mates doing it? Are they feeling pressure to look good the whole time? You need to show you are listening to what they are feeling,” he says.
Keep the lines of communication open: when your daughter says she wants her lips done, shouting: “Over my dead body!” is useless, even if that is how you feel. “If you just say, ‘Don’t do it!’, she is likely to go off and find the cheapest possible option and possibly get a botched job,” says Dr Tracy Mountford, the leading cosmetic practitioner, who points out that sourcing tweakment deals on Groupon and Facebook is not the way to a happy result.
Discuss motivation: talk about selfesteem, and how she feels the procedure she wants may affect that. “Be curious, in a non-confrontational way,” says Wright. “Ask your daughter what makes her want to have her lips done, or to try Botox – how does she think it will enhance her?” Is she looking to change a feature she’s not comfortable with? Is it something she has been picked on about in the past?”
Educate yourselves: do the research together and discuss everything fully, advises Dr Mountford. What exactly is the procedure your daughter is interested in? What does it involve? What are the risks? “Just doing the research can be enough for people to counsel themselves out of having treatment,” says Wright. Go to the consultation together. Be involved, and chances are they’ll make a sensible decision.
Discuss the implications: if your daughter has treatment and likes it, is she prepared to go on doing this for the foreseeable future? Has she the budget for it? Will she start to overdo it and look strange?
‘Once you start trying these procedures it tends to be a slippery slope. You like them. You try more’