Oh… the “horrors” of back-fat. They keep me awake at night.
Heh. No, they don’t.
In fact, I was going out last Friday with a friend and did the all-over check to make sure my clothes were in the right place and all that. I had a roll of back-fat. Oh noes! Not. My reaction was… omg, look at you! You are hot! What sweet curves!
No, the picture at the top of this post isn’t me. I have far more back-fat than that – a fact, not a good thing or a bad thing. My point in posting that pic was to show a positive image of a little chunk on the back. That, and she is wearing a red top – the same color I wore the night I looked in the mirror I loved my back-fat. Good memories.
I have been postponing writing this post for a week, as I JUST KNOW I saw an article on MSNBC (other than the one I am going to reference) that introduced the idea of back-fat removal surgery. I have Googled. I have Dogpiled. I have searched over and over on MSNBC’s site (and related sites) and I do not know where this article has gone. It was posted probably more than a month ago. It described the new plastic surgery, but it also criticized it. It talked about the people who had the surgery having fat come back in weird patterns on their back, sagging around the scar and the huge brutal scar that comes of the work. Now, when I search the interwebs, I can find NOTHING truly critical about this surgery. Coincidence? I’m guessing not. Hopefully at some point, someone will take on this subject and put it back out there for all to see!
The article 
that is on MSNBC about the back-fat removal surgery is more in the tone of a big, wet-kiss. I will start with the before and after picture:
Personally, I prefer the before picture. In the before picture, she looks like a normal, curvy woman. In the after picture, she has lost her lovely curves and looks like someone attacked her with a weed wacker. I cannot be the only person who feels that way. Anyone?
It is noteworthy that this is the most flattering picture of the “after” surgery results I have ever seen. I remember the picture on the first MSNBC article to look fairly gruesome. I suspect that in the example shown in the latest MSNBC post that surgery to hide the scar has already happened. The photos I saw previously had scars that were a deep purple and looked painful. They were also much wider and longer. The scar made the surgery look cruel, so I can see why these are no longer so easily found on the net. Again, I have spent a week looking through Google Images and MSNBC (and related sites) archives trying to find the ones I saw originally. What is with that?
The most critical article that I have been able to find (as I have given up on finding the original from MSNBC) is from WebMD. I know. Not the best source. But, I’m taking what I can get:
The women were followed for nearly two years. Two of them had to have their scars redone within a year of their back lift surgery. Study authors don’t say whether the women have since regained the fat.
Rolls of back fat are something that often comes with the natural aging process.
Right, so you have this gruesome surgery that looks like they chop off pieces of you and after all that they don’t even SAY if the fat is regained or if there are any abnormalities of fat coming back in? That is a huge omission and it steams me that the rest of the WebMD article (not to mention the MSNBC one and any other article I pulled up) sound like a big thumbs up to finally exiling the horrible, unsightly back-fatz.
It is acknowledged that having back-fat is part of the natural aging process… and yet women with hardly any body fat are portrayed in the media as strong, disciplined and virtuous. Women with such natural body geography such a back-fat are “fashion don’ts” and otherwise considered frumps. <<POTENTIALLY TRIGGERING LINKS of judgemental craziness. But, what does strength, discipline and virtue have to do with the natural process of aging? Oh right. Nothing. You will age no matter how good a person you are and how disciplined you are. And, those of us who have been blessed with certain genetics will develop back-fat. I never developed it. As far as I know, I was born with it. Even before back-fat was a popular way to criticize a body, I was already noticing mine and worrying about what it meant for me as a person.
Is it really such a radical idea to love and respect our bodies rather than to have pieces of them cut off? Our bodies are our genetic legacies! These genes helped our ancestors survive and thrive so that we could exist today! Both my grandmother had back-fat and she is one of the main reasons I am able to think coherent thoughts today. She was a wonderful woman who tried to shield me from the abuse of my father, mother and step-father… and she and my grandfather were the only two people I can remember from my childhood who taught me that I was a loveable person and that it was okay to trust myself. Was my grandmother any less of a life-saver and otherwise wonderful person, because she had back-fat and a double-chin and an apple-shaped body?? NO WAY!
I think about my grandmother and I think about how I loved her… and I suddenly feel PROUD that I have back-fat just like she did. If I get a double-chin, so be it! I would rather focus on being the best me I can be than to chop off parts of me that are completely natural, but are deemed unfashionable by the mainstream.
When I think of nature, I think of beauty… such wild beauty. That beauty exists in our bodies right now, if we only take the time out to recognize it. Beauty even exists in my back-fat… my lovely, curvy back-fat.
–AngryGrayRainbows
PS…
And, now that I have seen a fashion mag don’t page for the first time in years, I realized what I will be posting about very soon!
Angry Gray Rainbows 
I would much rather keep my back fat than have this done. It’s got to hurt like hell, and I’d imagine that it would be very easy to take off too much skin, which could make bending over very uncomfortable. It’s sad that we can’t age normally, that we can’t look live we’ve had children, that we can’t stop starving ourselves, just to be acceptable.
Hi Limor!
I remember some book I read when I was a teen. The main character was a woman who didn’t have a perfect body. She had scars. One nipple was much bigger than the other. Her body actually looked like she lived in it. Which inspires me to ask the question: is it some kind of crime that we look as if we have really lived life?
The point that you made about looking like we’ve had children… sheesh… having children is one of the most amazing things in life – and yet we are ashamed that we might look like we have? How sad.
It seems to me that as a culture, we have a scarcity mentality. Instead of being in awe of what our bodies have done and can do… we worry about their imperfections, etc.
Thanks for stopping by!!
I agree…people think it’s a compliment to look like they HAVEN’T done anything in their lives. I am proud of my body looking like I had a baby! It iritates me when people say “Oh my gosh, it doesn’t even look like you had kids…” I WANT to look like I had a child…it is one of the biggest accomplishments of my life!
Well said, Peg!
LOL… your comment about people wanting to look like they haven’t done anything in their lives brought visions to my mind of people keeping themselves sealed in those chemical smelling plastic wrappers to save their looks for when there is a party or something. Heh.