Notes from LA… dermatologist or what

I moved to LA with my family, at quick notice in July 2008.

It’s been one crazy ride.

I’ve never been a girlie girl.  No make up, hairdos, heels – well not daily at least!

In fact, vanity is quite new to me (my friends will quite likely disagree). .  . This is the first house I’ve actually had a full-length mirror.  HONEST!

I am however; certainly in the right place to have discovered the glories of vanity . . . maybe my new surroundings are the catalyst for my recent mirror gazing.

Sometimes I wonder how much of a part age is playing in my newfound mirror gazing?  Age or my blissful naivety, that unlike the rest of the world, age would never catch up with me and it certainly wouldn’t reveal itself so blatantly on my face!

So when I look in the mirror and I see me, an older and battered looking version, it is to be blunt, somewhat horrifying.  Where have I gone?

Thus appalled by my reflection 6 months into my time here I did it – I got a dermatologist.

You have to have a dermatologist in LA, well so I’ve been told and everyone I know does.   You have a special Doctor for everything here . . . GPs are not something you come across and spas are spas . . . . If you have pimple, you have a dermatologist.  Thus my much bigger questions regarding how to turn back time to 1992, required, without doubt, expertise.

So after various recommends and some gruesome tales, I took it upon myself to do my own research. You can’t trust anybody in this town, especially if they’re telling you with the inability to raise their eyebrows!

Google search – Dermatologist and my zip code.  HA! . . . a million plus options arise.

I went though the first page looking for the ‘right’ one.  In my opinion, if it wasn’t on the first page, why on earth would it be on page 23?   After a bit of cross referencing with information from various sources (my mates) and taking the gospel that is Cosmopolitan, to heart, I called a place Cosmo had recommended three years in a row.

Gotta love Cosmo!

On calling I was quite relieved .  . they were sooo nice. So accommodating, so helpful, so informative.  Not a big deal at all.  I made an appointment.

Not a big deal . . . until the day.

As always happens, (and I know I’m not alone here), my appointment came around quickly and of course, happened to be on a day where my “to do list” exceeded reasonable expectation and then some . . . I arrived a mess, and completely preoccupied with work and the children.

My preoccupation was short lived as I raised my eyes from my always-in-hand blackberry to greet a face, that quite frankly, frightened me.  Yikes!

You never get used to it – the faces that stalk this town.  You think you will, you think you’ve seen it all and then like a bolt of lightning, wham there’s another – worse than before!

Lips . .  bigger, fuller, redder, more.  This was more than lips, this was stretched eyes, taught skin, overly dyed and then styled hair.

“Welcome Mrs Marshall, please take a seat, the doctor will be with you shortly,” the face said.

Speechless was an understatement.  Deep breath, I’m here. Quick consult and I’m out.

So I sat in the waiting room, which thank god was packed with all the latest mags, and there was of course all the forms and waivers ( only in America) I had fill out. 

I wrote and I read.  I tried not to stare.  Telling myself that regardless of “her” I was fine, I didn’t want any of that and I was here for a reason.  A reason that did not involve lips.

Let’s be clear, occasionly plastic surgery has come to my mind.  Would I ever do it? Hmm no? I think.  Now, no!

However here I am.  A dermatologist, in the heart of LA.  Sigh.

Perhaps I was presumtious in my theory that with age comes wisdom. I snuck a look, jeez,  those were big juicy lips.  It was amazing she could be verbally understood.  I realised I was staring. 

All age has brought me to date is wrinkles.  Wrinkles and bad pigmentation.

And my vanity had taken hold of me.  So much so,  that leaving, despite the lips, was not an option.

I stayed.  And I waited and I got over myself and my insecurities (sort of) and I just stared.

I’ll fill you in with what happens next soon,

By Belinda xx