Content Warning: Beauty Industry Standards, Body-Shaming, Botched Plastic Surgery
It’s no secret that women receive a lot of pressure from society and the beauty industry to look young, flawless, and effortlessly beautiful for as long as possible.
But like anything else, beauty standard trends come and go, largely because many trends have unfortunate consequences that eventually go out of style, cringed the “Am I the A**hole?” (AITAH) subReddit.
Redditor OkInevitable7692 tried as hard as he could to convince his wife to not get plastic surgery and that altering her looks was the last thing he wanted from his wife.
But when his wife went forward with the procedures, resulting in a look he didn’t even find attractive, the Original Poster (OP) wasn’t sure what to do.
He asked the sub:
“AITAH for being truthful and admitting that I find my wife unattractive after her surgery?”
The OP and his wife could not agree about her desire for plastic surgery.
“My wife (36) had plastic surgery recently. We had discussed it and I was against it. It was not my decision and ultimately I had no say.”
“She said she wanted to get this stuff done. I said I would prefer it if she didn’t. I pulled up pictures of celebrities before/after and showed her how weird they look. Meg Ryan, the girl from ‘Glee,’ the girl from Lip Sync Battle (Chrissy Teigan).”
“I collected as many pictures of beautiful celebrities who messed up their faces and spent hours explaining why the celebrities are unattractive now. I was basically begging her not to do this.”
“I guess I could have threatened to leave. But that seems manipulative.”
“She simply said that she would feel better about herself if she got it and that she wanted it.”
The OP was disturbed by his wife’s transformation.
“We talked and argued about it for a year before she did it. She started with lip fillers, a neck lift, some other procedures, and ended with Buccal Fat Removal. Her mom paid for everything.”
“She isn’t hideous. She just doesn’t look like herself anymore. Remember when the girl from ‘Dirty Dancing’ (Jennifer Grey) got a nose job and no one recognized her? It’s like, she’s her, but she’s NOT her.”
“She gives me uncanny valley vibes now. It freaks me out.”
The OP wasn’t sure how to move forward.
“She is fully healed now and she wants us to go back to normal, like me initiating sex. I have done so but not as much as I used to, and when I do, I try to make sure there is very little light.”
“It’s been a few months and I kind of dread having to look at her.”
“Obviously, she has noticed. She has been bugging me to tell her what’s up. I’ve tried telling her I’m just tired from work. Or that I’m run down. Really anything except for the truth.”
The OP’s wife pushed him for an explanation.
“She broke down and asked me if I was having an affair. I said that I wasn’t.”
“She asked to look at my phone. I unlocked it for her and handed it over. I wasn’t worried about her finding anything because there was nothing to find. She spent an hour looking through it and found nothing.”
“This all broke my heart, because I adore my wife. She’s brilliant. She loves books. She can quote the Talladega Nights and The Matrix beginning to end. Her banana bread recipe is insane. She walked from San Diego to San Francisco. She scuba dives. She is my ringer when we play softball.”
“How long of a list would you like? She gives amazing shoulder rubs. She has a project car. She smells fantastic. She punched a guy at a bar when we were dating. He had grabbed her a**.”
“She asked me to explain why I changed. I tried explaining that I just wasn’t that interested right now.”
The OP finally told his wife the truth.
“Nothing I said was good enough for her. She kept digging.”
“I finally told the truth. I wasn’t harsh or brutally honest. I just told her that her new face wasn’t something I found attractive and that I was turned off.”
“She asked if that’s why I turn off all the lights now. I said yes.”
“She started crying and said that she needed time alone. She went to stay with her sister.”
“I have been called every name in the book since this happened. Her sister said I’m a piece of s**t for insulting my wife’s looks. Her friends all think I’m the a**hole.”
“I tried not to say anything. I can’t force myself to find her attractive. I still love her but her face is just weird now. She looks like the blue alien from ‘The Fifth Element.’ I’m in a Kobayashi Maru (‘Star Trek’) situation.”
“AITAH?”
Fellow Redditors weighed in:
- NTA: Not the A**hole
- YTA: You’re the A**hole
- ESH: Everybody Sucks Here
- NAH: No A**holes Here
Some reassured the OP that he had tried to talk to his wife about this beforehand.
“NTA. It’s not my thing, and I am very lucky that it’s not my husband’s thing, either. You discussed it, you voiced your concerns, she did it anyway as was her right.”
“But choices have consequences and these are the consequences she actively chose, knowing how you felt. Freedom of choice doesn’t mean freedom from consequences.”
“She can’t pretend to be all surprised Pikachu now (well, I mean I guess technically she could, but I’m not buying). And siccing her flying monkeys on you? Not cool.” – RNGinx3
“NTA, it’s not your fault that you don’t find her new face attractive. That isn’t a conscious choice. I’m all for people doing what they want with their body, but if they are in a relationship and their partner states their dislike of the body modification, then that person should keep in mind the risk of doing it will be their partner’s lack of attraction.”
“Now do I think that you might have wanted to fess up on what was wrong much earlier? Absolutely.” – twippy
“If it wasn’t a completely elective procedure and it was for a medical condition, I bet OP would not have a problem with it because it would mean his wife is OK. This was a completely unnecessary procedure. His wife can choose to do whatever she wants to her face, but he does not have to like it.” – This_Acanthisitta832
“Oh, man… There are plastic surgeons out there that refuse to do this, first, because of the damage it can cause, and second, because there isn’t enough data to show exactly what it’ll do over time, but they suspect it’ll cause some worse problems down the road as people age (even worse for people under 40 to 50).”
“According to the rabbit hole I went down recently, buccal fat is good to have because it can help reduce jowl sagging later on.”
“Anyway, while it’s totally in her right to make the choice to get that surgery, you’re NTA, OP. No one’s an AH for what they do/don’t find attractive.”
“And I said this in another comment, but you TRIED to compromise internally and tried to protect her feelings… but she flung around accusations of cheating, wouldn’t let it go, kept pushing, and when you were honest with her, she flipped her s**t, left, and pulled other people into your marriage who are now on a slam campaign against you.”
“SHE. DID. ALL. OF. THIS… and still can’t manage to take any personal responsibility or act like an adult about it.”
“To be honest, this post would be fit for the ‘Oh No, Consequences’ subReddit… but not because of you.” – HairyPotatoKat
“NTA. I went to a holiday party at an aesthetic clinic (a place that specialized in stuff like Botox). Many of the women there had so much ‘work’ done their faces truly looked freakish. Yet their husbands/partners were there as well and acted as though it was all normal.”
“I surmised that if enough people in one’s circle adopt certain looks, it becomes accepted (kind of like how so many people don’t see how weird the really big fake eyelashes look). It’s like a mass psychosis. But if you’re outside of that psychosis, the crazy is glaringly apparent.” – 1Toeln
Others hoped that the couple could work through this.
“NTA.”
“I love my partner’s face. I love the lines I’ve seen develop over the years. I love the way his eyes crinkle when he laughs. My favorite place in the world is to have my face buried in the crook of his neck, cheek to cheek. When we make love, his face fills my vision and becomes my whole world.”
“I would miss that face so much if he changed it with plastic surgery. I would still love him, but I would feel like I lost something dear to me.”
“It is her face, and she can do what she wants with it. But she underestimated how much you loved her the way she was. I understand.” – willowviolet
“Now I’m really feeling terrible that your relationship has been damaged by this. I hope you’re able to work through things, in whatever form that takes.” – rowan_sjet
“So it sounds like you have a bunch of reasons to work this out with her, and that couples counseling is the best route.”
“She had a reason for wanting this face, but it doesn’t sound like she told you. It would help to get her in a room with an impartial party (counselor) and tell her EVERYTHING you love about her. She’ll get the opportunity to tell you why she wants the face she created.”
“She’s freshly healed. I think you can get a chance to tell her that you loved her face and thought she was sexy and beautiful, and that you love her enough to try to get used to this new face. Her face will still settle some even though she’s healed, and the human brain is extremely adaptable.”
“With time, even though you don’t like this new face aesthetically, you’ll start to associate it with the person you love, and hopefully grow to like it more. You still need time to see this as her and adjust, almost like she’d been in an accident. You’re allowed to not be ready for sex, and a counselor can help you communicate that.”
“A big question is, why did your wife want this face so much? Unless you weren’t honest with her, she knew you wouldn’t be as attracted to her anymore. So her motivation isn’t to be attractive for you.”
“Hopefully, she has a good reason to do it, and it isn’t the beginning of a much bigger mental problem. I’d worry that she may have body dysmorphia or that she wants to become a completely different person with a different lifestyle, but maybe she just has a reason she loves that kind of face and wants it for herself.” – imyourkidnotyourmom
“First off, this is not a problem you are likely to fix yourselves. If you want to save your marriage, you are very likely going to need outside help. Specifically marriage counseling, which leads into my second point.”
“She ignored your opinion until it affected her. She asked, then dismissed it. It wasn’t a problem until it was her problem. This can be a significant issue for any relationship. It’s not about being right or wrong, it’s about taking the other person into consideration. I don’t feel like she considered how this would affect you or your relationship, and now it is affecting EVERYTHING. It’s hard enough for some people to just be wrong. To be wrong on this level is entirely different.”
“She’s going to have a very hard time accepting the damage she’s done, not with the surgery, but with the trust and communication between you. She also needs to be made aware that her friends are attacking you and she needs to put a stop to that. That will do even more damage to your relationship.”
“My personal recommendation would be to reach out and ask if she’s willing to talk. Or to tell her that you want to try to accept her as she is now. I strongly recommend a relationship therapist if that is an option(maybe her mom could pitch in for that too).” – shut_up_greg
“Honestly, I’m a big fan of people getting therapy or counseling instead of drastic plastic surgery when it’s not necessary. It can become an addiction when you keep altering your body and face and chasing an ideal look, but it’s not going to fix the internal body image and self-esteem issues you have.”
“And OP’s situation is the best example of why. While it is perfectly her right to get the surgery, it was an extremely foolish thing to do. When your spouse finds you attractive and then tells you that they don’t want you to get plastic surgery, you should listen.”
“Why would you compromise the attraction your spouse has for you? And why would you disregard what they are attracted to (you) and go on to chase some random beauty standard that they don’t like? That’s got to be the dumbest logic I’ve ever seen, and this is 100% on her for blowing up their relationship. Disregarding your spouse’s feelings is never a good thing.”
“So yeah, while it was her right to do with her body what she wanted, that doesn’t mean it was a wise thing to do if her goal had been to preserve the health of her marriage.”
“Or put another way, as Ian Malcolm said in ‘Jurassic Park’: ‘You spent so much time wondering whether or not you could do it that you didn’t stop and think about whether or not you should.'” – tyrandan2
After finally talking to his wife, the OP shared an update in another post.
“My wife came home yesterday and we finally had a long talk.”
“She told me that the reason she had the surgery was because her mom and sister talked her into it. They convinced her that she was starting to look old and that I would find someone else to be with if she did not do something. That was why her mom gave her the money for the operations.”
“Her mom and sister look like Bruce Campbell in ‘Escape From LA.’ They are the very last people on the planet who should be telling anyone to get plastic surgery.”
“I used some of the comments I read on my post as talking points. I told her that I loved her and that she was the person that I wanted to spend my life with. I told her that the surgery would take a while longer to settle down and that as I got more used to her new face I would learn to appreciate it.”
“She asked me if I wanted her to see if she could get it reversed. I almost screamed at her. The last thing in the world I want is for her to f**k up her face more than it already is. I asked her if she could please just leave it and let me get used to it.”
“We talked for about three hours and we decided that her mom and sister would not be a part of any decisions in our life going forward. She is going to leave her face alone and give me a chance to get used to it.”
“We are going to look for a marriage counselor and maybe individual counselors for each of us. I am going to make an effort to show her every day how I still find her desirable and she is going to make an effort to believe me when I tell her I love her the way she is.”
“We are going to talk to her mom and sister and tell them that we are taking a break from them. We are going to block them and get our shit together before we allow them back into our lives.”
“Thank you to everyone who tried to help me.”
Fellow Redditors stepped up and showed support for the couple.
“OP, I hope therapy and counseling will help you both. Please tell your wife that you love her for her heart and soul. Validate her inner beauty. Compliment her daily by pointing out her heart, her kindness, and lovely smile.”
“Tell her that you made a vow to love her through thick and thin and you are gonna stick to that vow for eternity.” – Kangaroo-Pack-3727
“I’m so mad on your wife’s behalf that her mom and sister talked her into doing something as drastic as buccal fat removal. I’m glad that y’all were able to talk about it and work it out though.” – Old_Implement_1997
“You guys discussed it. You told her you were against it. And she went ahead and trusted her mother and sister instead of the words that came out of your mouth – and is now upset that you don’t like her new face?”
“That sounds like something to talk about in therapy. Best of luck, OP.” – LightningSharks
“You and your wife will need to keep in mind that her mother and sister [Bruce Campbell faced] purposefully sabotaged her face.”
“Yes, really. It may be subconscious or conscious, but it is very odd to read the state of play and how this came about.”
“I advise you to research Cluster B types, if you are not already aware. Every family seems to have at least one petty, spiteful, jealous, covetous, disruptive, and sometimes dangerous family member [or in-law] that is naturally inclined and often outright purposeful in nature to hurt everyone else.”
“I would think very long and hard, about even telling the mother and sister your intentions of taking a cooling off period. Giving them an awareness that they harmed you and your wife [their daughter and sister] is telling them you are both vulnerable and that they affected you both. You’re telling them they were successful.”
“Them being aware you are seeking counseling, or anything personal, is a bad idea. They are owned nothing, they should get nothing. What they did to her is basically criminal.”
“They should never be trusted again. Don’t you realize [I know you do, I am being hyperbolic] they weaponized your wife’s love for you and fear of losing you – to cause her to cut her face up?”
“My family were psychopaths. My in-laws are sociopaths. I had to spend years teaching myself to be better and psychically recover after I left my family. My father put me in a coma, and I almost died. Then again the same with my wife, and her family. Her mother broke her, until she developed an eating disorder, and she almost died.”
“My wife was a former athlete and runway model. She was the last to need such attention. Her mother was jealous, and my wife was susceptible back then. Today, my wife is strong, and doesn’t interacted with her family. Minus, her amazing younger sister. They no longer engage in being abused. I am so proud of them.”
“These types of people are dangerous. Even if you’re not sure they are malicious, look at what they have already made your wife do to herself. So, you owe it to each other to be very cautious with such people. Give them nothing. Quarantine them.”
“Look what they’ve already done to her, you are each other’s partner, and protecting each other is of paramount importance.”
“You’ve got this, OP.” – FlamingTrollz
The subReddit was heartbroken for the couple who seemed to be one of the good ones, especially before other people tried to get in the way of that. By listening to her family’s beautiful advice, the OP’s wife could have ruined their marriage if the OP had not been willing to work on it with her.
Fortunately, they were planning to work through this together, without the “help” of the wife’s family and friends.