Sweet Surrender Read Online Free PDF

views were political as well as emotional. I didn’t like the idea of being sweptup in a tide of vain women incapable of accepting the natural results of living their lives, who allowed themselves to be ‘got at’ by the media and the advertising industry. I continued to feel this way very strongly – until I hit fifty! It’s easy to be judgemental about all sorts of things until you find yourself affected by them.
    Genetics has a lot to do with how our faces age. Those of us with Celtic complexions who grew up as beach babes in the fifties and sixties have paid the price in later life. At menopause, our skin also starts to deteriorate rapidly as our hormonal levels drop. The combination of the two effects can be truly disturbing.
    For me, this sudden facial ageing really started in my early fifties, and accelerated at such a rate that I became alarmed. Until then my face had been comparatively unlined and my jawline smooth, but it seemed as though overnight I developed pouchy jowls, and my face began to look worn and weather-beaten. No amount of cosmetic creams or make-up could cover what I feared was rapidly advancing old age.
    Out of curiosity, I experimented with a Botox treatment, enduring a series of injections to smooth the lines on my forehead between my eyebrows. Although it wasn’t painful, it was expensive, and I didn’t like the sensation of numbness that accompanied the effect. I decided I would rather have a few frown lines than an expressionless forehead.
    But my anxiety about my face falling apart returned with full force when the daytime television show was proposed, and I saw some of the pilot footage. While I was more than prepared to acknowledge I was at least fifteen years older than any of the other women in the auditions, I felt miserable that in the close-ups I often looked saggy and tired – not so much when I was talking and animated, but when I was in repose.
    Like so many women of my age I stood in front of the mirror in the bathroom, and pulled back the skin on either side of my face to try to imagine how it would look if I had a facelift. I liked the ‘tightened up’ me and started to make tentative enquiries about plastic surgeons and the various procedures that were available.
    David disagreed entirely with my perception of what was happening to my face, but then again he rarely notices if I put an auburn rinse in my hair or buy a new dress. He was quite horrified when I first suggested I might do something ‘surgical’ to pull my face back into line. But in November 2004 after some research, I decided on a cosmetic surgeon and booked an appointment anyway. I wasn’t prepared for the clandestine nature of the industry. Apparently people having ‘work done’ insist upon total discretion and often husbands and boyfriends are kept in the dark completely. When the receptionist phoned the day before to confirm my appointment – I wasn’t at home at the time – she refused to say who she was or why she was calling to David, who became irritated by all the secrecy. When I arrived at the doctor’s rooms I was ushered into a private waiting room just in case someone who knew me arrived at the same time. I found this cloak and dagger approach quite hilarious.
    The surgeon took some ‘before’ photos and we discussed the various options. I didn’t want a full facelift – I dislike that artificial, stretched look that I have seen on other women. I was a fifty-five-year-old grandmother and I was happy to look my age. I just wanted my ragged edges tidied up – the good old euphemism ‘nip and tuck’ was all that I desired. He recommended an ‘S-Lift’, which concentrates on the lower half of the face, mainly the jawline. It was proper surgery, requiring an overnight stay in hospital and an anaesthetic. It amazed me how quickly the whole thing was organised – almost before I had time for a