"Swan" Winner Regrets Surgery Decisions
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Ilena Rose
Aug 31, 2008, 9:21:01 PM8/31/08
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Corona woman says surgery for TV show left emotional, physical scars
http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_swan01.34d1735.html
05:32 PM PDT on Sunday, August 31, 2008
By JANET ZIMMERMAN
The Press-Enterprise
Video: Contestant on 'The Swan' wanrs others of plastic surgery
Her sculpted cheekbones, movie-star smile and double-D bust line may have been gratis, but Corona resident Lorrie Arias said they didn't come without a price.
She regrets the 17 cosmetic procedures she underwent as a contestant on "The Swan" makeover TV show in 2004. Arias said her surgical transformation caused her emotional damage as well as lasting physical scars.
She warns those thinking about plastic surgery to reconsider and cautions the public that reality shows are far from real.
Story continues below
Amanda Lucidon / The Press-Enterprise
Lorrie Arias, of Corona, who was on the reality show "The Swan," holds a family photograph of a time where she remembers being happy.
"It's not worth it. I'm totally a mess," Arias, 38, said last week in an interview in the one-bedroom apartment she shares with her teenage son. "I did get a whole bunch of free surgery out of this, and I got a whole bunch of complications, too."
Arias applied for the second and final season of the Fox television series at the urging of a friend. She wanted to get rid of hanging skin from a 120-pound weight loss nine years earlier, and she wanted breast augmentation.
But more important, she said, was the promise of intensive therapy for participants of the show. Arias said she has low self-esteem because of family issues when she was growing up, and she has not recovered from her husband's death from liver failure in 2002.
Arias, who said she passed psychological screening to get on "The Swan," said the only counseling she received during her six-week makeover was four sessions from the staff therapist that were taped for the show. She was asked questions about her weight loss and her husband's death to make her cry on camera, but there was no follow-up, she said.
Cosmetic surgery is "only a quick fix. ... When you come back to reality, you're still you," she said.
The TV show's Los Angeles-based marriage and family therapist, Lynn Ianni, was out of the office and could not be reached for comment last week. The show's creator and executive producer, Nely Galan, and officials from the production company, Fremantle Media North America, did not return telephone calls seeking comment.
The show, which was panned by TV critics, pitted one "ugly duckling" against another each week. They were given extreme makeovers and, at the episode's conclusion, one was selected to move on to a final pageant and compete against the other women. Arias was not chosen as the winner of her segment.
Dr. James Wells, past president of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, said the show's premise -- surgery awarded in a contest -- violates the ethics policy of the society.
"I'm sorry for this patient. She was set up for the needs of a television show. It's about ratings and 43 minutes of unreality," said Wells, who practices in Long Beach.
Arias said she was pushed into having more procedures than she wanted, including the narrowing of her nose.
For the six weeks Arias was sequestered, she didn't have access to a mirror, and show officials sprayed the TV screens with aerosol deodorant to prevent reflection, she said.
When she was revealed at the end of her makeover, Arias was shocked.
"I had these huge eyeballs. I thought I was looking at E.T.," she said.
A contract with the production company provided three years of coverage if something went wrong, said Arias, adding that the show's plastic surgeon redid her thigh lift a year later because it didn't heal properly, then injected fat into a sunken spot on her left hip in 2006. But a wound in the same area went unaddressed in late 2007, and should have been repaired because she was still under contract, Arias said.
After she lost a porcelain veneer, used to improve the look of her teeth, Arias said she had to take out a $1,000 loan to get a crown because she couldn't afford a new veneer. The show's dentist did not return her telephone calls, she said.
There are other side effects of her metamorphosis that she didn't anticipate. Arias said when she touches her eyebrow she feels it on the back of her scalp, and her belly is numb. She can no longer comfortably tip her head back, Arias said.
In May, she began seeing a therapist twice a week. In a June assessment for Arias' application for federal disability benefits, the doctor wrote that Arias' post-traumatic stress disorder was complicated by her experiences on the show and she is unable to work.
He also wrote that she has social anxiety, low self-esteem, extreme depression, bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder.
Arias, who lives on Social Security survivor's benefits, rarely leaves her apartment. She spends her days in her pajamas, watching movies and playing computer games.
"You feel like everyone is looking at you more, expecting you to fail, after you've had a makeover," she said.
Diana Zuckerman, a psychologist and president of the National Research Center for Women & Families in Washington, D.C., said plastic surgery is not a substitute for therapy.
Research shows that people who have cosmetic surgery generally feel better about the body part that was reworked, but not about themselves or their lives, Zuckerman said.
But such makeover shows often bill surgery as a way to boost self-esteem, she said.
Wells, of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, said Arias was clearly a poor candidate for the show, given her emotional state. She might have benefited from a couple of procedures, which may have uplifted her enough to get into therapy.
It is not reasonable to squeeze so many procedures into such a short amount of time, because it doesn't give the body time to recuperate, he said.
"You can almost predict she would have some problems," Wells said. "I think it's tragic."
--
Breast Implant Awareness Website
http://www.breastimplantawareness.org
Breast Implant Awareness Blog
<http://breastimplantawareness.blogspot.com>
http://ilenarose.blogspot.com
Corona woman says surgery for TV show left emotional, physical scars
http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_swan01.34d1735.html
05:32 PM PDT on Sunday, August 31, 2008
By JANET ZIMMERMAN
The Press-Enterprise
Video: Contestant on 'The Swan' wanrs others of plastic surgery
Her sculpted cheekbones, movie-star smile and double-D bust line may have been gratis, but Corona resident Lorrie Arias said they didn't come without a price.
She regrets the 17 cosmetic procedures she underwent as a contestant on "The Swan" makeover TV show in 2004. Arias said her surgical transformation caused her emotional damage as well as lasting physical scars.
She warns those thinking about plastic surgery to reconsider and cautions the public that reality shows are far from real.
Story continues below
Amanda Lucidon / The Press-Enterprise
Lorrie Arias, of Corona, who was on the reality show "The Swan," holds a family photograph of a time where she remembers being happy.
"It's not worth it. I'm totally a mess," Arias, 38, said last week in an interview in the one-bedroom apartment she shares with her teenage son. "I did get a whole bunch of free surgery out of this, and I got a whole bunch of complications, too."
Arias applied for the second and final season of the Fox television series at the urging of a friend. She wanted to get rid of hanging skin from a 120-pound weight loss nine years earlier, and she wanted breast augmentation.
But more important, she said, was the promise of intensive therapy for participants of the show. Arias said she has low self-esteem because of family issues when she was growing up, and she has not recovered from her husband's death from liver failure in 2002.
Arias, who said she passed psychological screening to get on "The Swan," said the only counseling she received during her six-week makeover was four sessions from the staff therapist that were taped for the show. She was asked questions about her weight loss and her husband's death to make her cry on camera, but there was no follow-up, she said.
Cosmetic surgery is "only a quick fix. ... When you come back to reality, you're still you," she said.
The TV show's Los Angeles-based marriage and family therapist, Lynn Ianni, was out of the office and could not be reached for comment last week. The show's creator and executive producer, Nely Galan, and officials from the production company, Fremantle Media North America, did not return telephone calls seeking comment.
The show, which was panned by TV critics, pitted one "ugly duckling" against another each week. They were given extreme makeovers and, at the episode's conclusion, one was selected to move on to a final pageant and compete against the other women. Arias was not chosen as the winner of her segment.
Dr. James Wells, past president of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, said the show's premise -- surgery awarded in a contest -- violates the ethics policy of the society.
"I'm sorry for this patient. She was set up for the needs of a television show. It's about ratings and 43 minutes of unreality," said Wells, who practices in Long Beach.
Arias said she was pushed into having more procedures than she wanted, including the narrowing of her nose.
For the six weeks Arias was sequestered, she didn't have access to a mirror, and show officials sprayed the TV screens with aerosol deodorant to prevent reflection, she said.
When she was revealed at the end of her makeover, Arias was shocked.
"I had these huge eyeballs. I thought I was looking at E.T.," she said.
A contract with the production company provided three years of coverage if something went wrong, said Arias, adding that the show's plastic surgeon redid her thigh lift a year later because it didn't heal properly, then injected fat into a sunken spot on her left hip in 2006. But a wound in the same area went unaddressed in late 2007, and should have been repaired because she was still under contract, Arias said.
After she lost a porcelain veneer, used to improve the look of her teeth, Arias said she had to take out a $1,000 loan to get a crown because she couldn't afford a new veneer. The show's dentist did not return her telephone calls, she said.
There are other side effects of her metamorphosis that she didn't anticipate. Arias said when she touches her eyebrow she feels it on the back of her scalp, and her belly is numb. She can no longer comfortably tip her head back, Arias said.
In May, she began seeing a therapist twice a week. In a June assessment for Arias' application for federal disability benefits, the doctor wrote that Arias' post-traumatic stress disorder was complicated by her experiences on the show and she is unable to work.
He also wrote that she has social anxiety, low self-esteem, extreme depression, bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder.
Arias, who lives on Social Security survivor's benefits, rarely leaves her apartment. She spends her days in her pajamas, watching movies and playing computer games.
"You feel like everyone is looking at you more, expecting you to fail, after you've had a makeover," she said.
Diana Zuckerman, a psychologist and president of the National Research Center for Women & Families in Washington, D.C., said plastic surgery is not a substitute for therapy.
Research shows that people who have cosmetic surgery generally feel better about the body part that was reworked, but not about themselves or their lives, Zuckerman said.
But such makeover shows often bill surgery as a way to boost self-esteem, she said.
Wells, of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, said Arias was clearly a poor candidate for the show, given her emotional state. She might have benefited from a couple of procedures, which may have uplifted her enough to get into therapy.
It is not reasonable to squeeze so many procedures into such a short amount of time, because it doesn't give the body time to recuperate, he said.
"You can almost predict she would have some problems," Wells said. "I think it's tragic."
--
Breast Implant Awareness Website
http://www.breastimplantawareness.org
Breast Implant Awareness Blog
<http://breastimplantawareness.blogspot.com>
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