Cosmetic Surgery, Why have it?

As I stated in my P90X hub, I had just had cosmetic surgery a few days ago to repair the ptosis I had developed in my left eyelid. Ptosis is an abnormally low position, or drooping, of the upper eyelid. The condition ususally worsens the loger a person is awake because the muscles in the eyelid are tired. Ptosis occurs when the muscles that raise the eyelid are not strong enough to do so properly. It can affect one or both eyes and occurs more often with the elderly as the muscles in the eyelids begin to deteriorate.

Ptosis can be caused by damage or trauma to the muscle, damage or trauma to the nerve, or an underlying disease such as diabetes, a brain tumor, or any disease that causes weakness in muscels or nerve damage, such as myasthenia gravis.

My ptosis was directly caused by myasthenia gravis, an auto immune disease, wich is classified as related to muscular dystrophy. I'll write more about mysasthenia gravis in another hub.

I was diagnosed with Ocular Myasthenia Gravis almost 2 years ago. In my case, I feel pretty lucky that my form of myasthenia is only related to the eye. In most cases of MG the symptoms start with the eye and then move on to other motor functions and organs in the body, but in my case, I have had this disorder going on 14 years and I have had no other problems besides the drooping and drifting of my left eye. So yes, I am lucky!!!

The treatment of the disease has caused me to become Type 2 diabetic, but I was borderline anyway and now that I have it I can deal with it with proper nutrition and exercise, along with my glucose medication.

My main concern was, of course, my appearance. I needed to have something done about my droopy eye. I'm in a business where I speak to a lot of people on a daily basis and first impressions count tremendously. I have to build an immediate trust.

 About a week and a half has passed since my surgery and I have gained tremendous results.  No longer is my eyelid in an almost permanently closed position.  Although the lid is not entirely in the position I was hoping for, it is above the pupil and my field of vision has more than doubled. 

For reference, my eylid position prior to the surgery was nearly the same as the picture above.  Today, both eyelids are at approximately the same level.  I have had many complements at work and in my social circle.  The people that know me have noticed a great boost in my ego and my confidence, which is what I was hoping to gain.

The whole point of having cosmetic surgery is to be able to feel good about yourself.  The people who care about you the most will always tell you that you look fine but they're not the ones who get the snares and glares.  They're not the ones who have to field the question by almost every young child they come in contact with, "what happened to your eye?"

Cosmetic surgery is all about building or rebuilding confidence in one's self.  I have only one regret with regards to having this surgery and that is not having it done sooner!