Original Article by Nicole Catanese. I consider myself a pretty honest person, yet for the past five years, I have kept a secret from nearly everyone I know. I get Botox.
I started when I turned 30, with the intention of blurring the three distinct lines that ran clear across my forehead and the frown lines between my brows, both of which, unlike in my 20s, now remained etched on my face, even at rest. Initially, I didn’t tell a soul. I felt embarrassed that I even had wrinkles at 30 and that my go-to face creams weren’t cutting it and because all the girls in my crew seemed naturally line-free. (Or so I thought.) I looked at getting Botox like a secret experiment. The result: I loved how it made me look. My forehead was suddenly smooth, yet I could still move my brows like a normal human. And although I saw a dramatic difference, no one else did. They never asked. I never told. [Source: Cosmopolitan]
Now, five years later, getting Botox has become a staple in my beauty maintenance routine — something as essential as keeping my buttery highlights bright and never skipping a mani. Yet my trips to the doctor’s office remain on the DL. Only a very select group of girlfriends are in the know. My family has no clue. And I have purposely kept it from my boyfriend-turned-fiancé. And I’m not alone. A few years ago, Transform, a U.K.-based cosmetics company, released the results of a survey that found 72 percent of women keep nonsurgical cosmetic procedures such as Botox from their friends and family, and half do the same with their S.O. Gervaise Gerstner, M.D., an NYC derm, even says some patients are so hush-hush about their Botox that they ask her office for help to hide the evidence. “Women will split the bill two or three different ways — credit card, cash, check,” she says. “If they also came in for a mole checkup, we’ll print out a sheet for their insurance and it won’t have a whisper of Botox on it.” And after surveying my thirtysomething NYC-based friends, I discovered the majority of them are on the secret Botox bandwagon too. Why? It seems everyone has their own reason for keeping their Botoxing to themselves.