Wrinkles Away In Today's Culture

Although the number of Americans who regularly have cosmetic facial injections is estimated to be only about 1 million, the mere availability of the procedures has heightened the pressure on women over 30 to consider a level of intervention that until recently was embraced only by the famous or the rich. Women have forever been under pressure to look good, but that has expanded recently because we have become so used to beholding perfect, unwrinkled faces.

Are wrinkles becoming a thing of the past for the self-selected few, like crooked teeth with modern orthodontics? Well we think that at the very least, wrinkles are being shifted as the new gray hair, which is simply another means to judge attractiveness, romantic viability, professional competitiveness and social status. In recent interviews, many women, some as young as their early 30s, said they're feeling caught between nature and an anti-aging climate. Many are involved in an internal argument about how much they're willing to intervene.

As recently as a decade ago, the annihilation of wrinkles required full face-lifts or deep laser resurfacing. To share of these expensive treatments required a significant investment and recovery time; patients retreated with their lesions, to reappear weeks later with smoother skin or a tighter jaw. However, now newer, less invasive treatments like Restylane injections to fill out facial creases, Botox injections to temporarily paralyze muscles beneath frown lines and updated lasers to eliminate surface layers of skin are easily available and relatively safe, but still too expensive for most people of middle-class means.

These cosmetic technologies are also changing the way pop culture perceives the aging face. Once a biological fact of natural kneecaps or navels, wrinkles now appear to be optional for those who can afford to smooth them. By now the disdain for them is deep-rooted in our culture. One reason for the pressure is, of course, our increasing life spans. As Americans live longer, middle age has shifted to 60 from 40, with 40 recast as a youthful stage. That leaves some women grappling with the idea of what 60 looks like.

While about $12.4 billion was spent on cosmetic medical treatments in America in 2005, about $49 billion was spent on cosmetics and toiletries so these are obviously the most sought after alternatives to looking younger for longer. The plastic surgery statistics show, includes men as they see appearance as a matter of economics. While face-lifts were down to about 150,000 procedures in 2005 from about 157,000 in 2004, cosmetic Botox treatments increased to about 3.3 million from about 2.8 million.