To lift or not to lift, that is the question

You have to make an utter ass of yourself to get on reality TV, everyone knows that, but most, it seems, simply don't care. So, yesterday, I was watching this reality TV show called Make a Twat of Yourself on TV and have all your colleagues snigger at you when you walk into the office Monday morning. Actually, God knows what it was called, but some woman (not the one above) had decided she was going to make an idiot of herself in order to get cut price plastic surgery. Now, this woman, who was a single mom, was thirty, and there wasn't anything wrong with her apart from her tits were saggy from breastfeeding two kids. Apart from that, she maybe needed to lose ten pounds. But obviously, she was having the lipo, a Brazilian butt lift (aparently Brazilian butts are the gold standard), breast implants which ended up looking like car air bags, and something intimate I'll get to in a minute.

Okay, I'll get to it now. With a cheerful expression, like she was talking about the fact she had an irritating zit on her nose, she said, "Since I had my boys, I lose bladder control several times a day and have to wear a pad in my pants all the time."

I blinked. Sorry, did you just go on national television and tell people you wear Depends at thirty? Americans are weird like that. They simply don't have an embarrassment gene. I've been known to say some pretty revealing things, but if I had the problem of peeing in my pants at thirty, maybe I would shut up about it. Hello? Your colleagues watch this crap. And your sons' friends. And everyone you've ever known. And you're surprised you don't have a boyfriend? Do you mention this on your first date at a restaurant?

Depends wearer: "Hi, I think we should be open with each other. I lose bladder control during sex, even through walking about. Are you okay with that?"

Date: "Waiter, check please!"

Okay look, I'm not unsympathetic, I know this sort of thing happens. But a little part of me must be utterly British, because that is not a topic for public conversation. Especially not telling some satanic looking doctor about it.

Depends wearer: "What about my bladder problems? Can you help with that?"

Satanic doc: "Say what? You are going to have the Brazilian butt implants aren't you? I feel like Michaelangelo when I create one of them big butts. They are so fashionable right now. They're big! They're huge! You're gonna have such an authentic looking Brazilian butt, people are going to think you're from Rio."

"I told you, I want the Brazilian butt. Now what about my incontinence?"

"Birth causes major trauma on the birth canal. Your muscles are all stretched out. We need to do vaginal rejuvenation surgery on you to tighten that love canal and stop you wetting yourself." I'm not sure that's exactly what he said, but that was the gist of it.

"Great!" gushed the woman and was rushed off to surgery.

Two months after the surgery, she had bagged herself an (admittedly ugly but still genetically male) boyfriend. Maybe he was an actor, who knows. He probably was. He'd known this woman two weeks and was already hanging out with her and her kids at Disneyworld where she demonstrated how unselfconscious she was about her tits now that she could jump in the water and have a wet t-shirt hanging off her car air bags. It was a bit embarrassing actually, the message that if you have yourself carved up like a turkey and vaginally rejuvenated you will find the secrets of pure happiness.

But here's the even more embarrassing fact. Not as a result of that program, but I am seriously considering having breast augmentation (lift) and implants.

I was always one of those people who laughed at the idea of people who have implants. How vain! How superficial! But that was when I had nice firm breasts, i.e. before I breastfed two kids.

And now, they are, how shall I put this politely? Not so nice and firm. And let's face it, gravity being what it is, things can only get worse.

My friend Kira says you only need implants if you are divorced and going back out on the market, but I disagree. I just reckon it would be nice to, well, to have nice tits. And it only costs $5,000. Bargain.

No, I'm serious. I quite fancy it. Look, don't get me wrong, I don't want Pamela Anderson type things. Just a C. Well, I'm a C now, a saggy C, so it would just be a plumper fuller C.

Most people tell you that you can get up and walk around the day after the surgery, which pisses me off no end. Of course I want to lie around for a few weeks and be waited on hand and foot, but these plastic surgery places want you out immediately, unless you want to pay an extra $2,000 a night. I've heard you can go to Thailand and have your whole body remodeled for practically nothing, and stay in some luxury complex for weeks to recover, like a vacation, for about three hundred dollars. But say what you like about saving money, you'd be worried about standards of medical procedures in Thailand, wouldn't you?

So, I'm thinking this over. My main problem is, I want them to look natural and not like some of the crap you see on these programs. Also, I sleep on my stomach and I'm wondering if the stuff (saline/silicone/what's the difference?/maybe I should research this topic) feels like you're sleeping on an air mattress or disperses so that you can actually lie down.

Women: Are you fed up with the state of your breasts after the kids have sucked the life out of them? Would you have implants? Or if you have had implants, were there complications? Are you pleased you had them? What do they feel like? Are you aware of them sitting in your chest?

Men: Has anyone actually felt a woman who had implants? If so, does it feel natural or like a bowl of Jello?