If you think extreme cosmetic surgery includes Sheyla Hershey’s 38KKK breasts or Heidi Montag’s ten procedures in one day, you’re right. But there are examples that go much further than this. There’s a dark fringe of cosmetic surgery that’s pretty scary, where the subjects’ motivations range from wacky to deeply disturbed.
Dr. Martin Donohoe, a lecturer at Portland State University and a physician on staff at a Portland Kaiser hospital, authored a paper a few years ago that explores the dark side of cosmetic procedures and where the field may be heading. Leveraging international research sources, Donohoe reviewed treatments that may have you shaking your head, such as breast implants for teens, circumcision revision, and others you may find quite upsetting. Here are some of the most odd and extreme procedures you’ll ever hear about.
You may have heard about “furries,” people who consider themselves part of the “Furry Fandom,” a group that celebrates anthropomorphic animals and animal/human creatures. A recent outgrowth of the science fiction and fantasy communities, these people may simply admire anthropomorphic cartoons and literature. Others invent characters for themselves; some creating costumes to wear at furry conventions. The extreme furry, noted Donohoe, may go even further. A person with a tiger for an alter ego, he explained, may have stripes tattooed on their bodies, sharpened canine “fangs,” implanted whiskers and surgically altered faces.
There are others who choose plastic surgery to mimic the look of animals—people who are not part of the Furry Fandom. Probably the most famous is Joyce Wildenstein, who has undergone too many procedures to count in her quest to resemble a cat. Then there’s the Lizardman, a performance artist who has has modified his body to complement his act. He had his tongue split by an oral surgeon. He elected Teflon implants above each eyebrow to give the appearance of horned reptilian ridges. A cosmetic dentist filed his upper teeth into points. And to date, he estimates he’s undergone about 650 hours of tattooing.
Cosmetic alteration of the appearance has even hit the eyes—and not the lids or crows feet. A few ophthalmologists are marketing the “JewelEye,” tiny platinum “jewels” implanted into the whites of your eyes. Even though the American Academy of Ophthalmology has voiced concern over the possible risks of the procedure, the so-called “eyeball jewelry” is, according to one person on YouTube, “the newest coolest thing to do.”
A 2005 article in “The Lancet,” one of the oldest independent medical journals, reported on the popularity of stem cell injections in Russia for medical and cosmetic purposes, including smoothing wrinkles. Tom Parfitt, the author, noted that the treatments are of dubious merit, possibly undermining potentially valuable uses for stem cells. Even more disturbing is that some Russian doctors believe a black market in fetuses has been created by this trend, with poor women persuaded to have late term abortions to supply the demand.
Toward the end of the extreme spectrum are people who have a perfectly healthy limb amputated. A decade ago, Carl Elliott, a University of Michigan bioethicist, wrote that these people feel driven or compelled to be an amputee by ridding themselves of one or more arms or legs. Furthermore, at one time a Scottish doctor undertook surgery for these patients, reasoning that if he did not operate they would do it themselves and risk their health. A British psychiatrist who has studied the condition, called apotemnophilia, believes that no amount of psychotherapy can help many of these people and that some will only feel relief when their dream is realized.
There’s no reason to expect this trend toward extreme cosmetic procedures to stop anytime soon. As medicine and technology advance, the end to which people and surgeons will go to alter the human appearance is bounded only by laws and professional ethics. These are tenuous here in the United States, and even less of a factor elsewhere in the world.
Right now, there’s a plastic surgeon interested in body modification to enhance our abilities as humans: chefs with motorized fingers, soldiers with implanted location devices, people with flashlights for noses. And oh, he wants to give someone wings.