Are the choices we make about our bodies really our own, or are we more influenced than we think?
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In this episode of Mums the Word, we get into the thoughts behind our choices to do “tweakments” and touch upon the wider culture driving those decisions. It’s an open, honest conversation and we can’t wait for you to be a part of it.
Gemma opens up about still succumbing to beauty standards set by the patriarchy, and the frustration that comes with knowing that. Sarah questions whether opting out even means anything if we’re not all doing it together.
And through it all, one thing becomes clear: it’s complicated, it’s personal, and nobody has a clean answer.
Under 30 minutes. No judgement. Just real women talking about real decisions.
M’s the Word is hosted by Sarah with Shelley, Gemma and Jade – four women having the honest conversations you actually want to hear!!
Full Transcript
Today’s word is modification. We’re talking makeovers, maintenance, and modifying your body — tweaking things for your own beauty routine. It’s something that hasn’t really been discussed too openly, but we’re going to go for it.
Dyeing your hair is normal. Getting braces is normal. Skincare routines at twelve is apparently normal, according to some of our daughters. Botox is becoming very normal. Breast augmentation, fillers — are these maintenance or modification? Let’s get into it.
So, what have we actually had done? This is a safe place. Let’s be honest.
One of us had a nose job at twenty-two, but it came off the back of being bullied. A broken nose at ten that never got properly fixed left a bone visibly out of place. There were breathing issues. Eventually, the doctors confirmed what had gone unnoticed for years — the nose had broken and healed incorrectly. The surgery came through the NHS partly for medical reasons, and couldn’t happen until the face had finished developing. The bully who’d made life miserable? He saw the result. Nothing was said. But he saw it.
Another had breast augmentation a couple of years ago, along with Botox, fillers, adult braces, and ears pinned back over the years. Makeup, tattoos — these things just become more normal over time. And the interesting thing is that when people meet her now, particularly men, they’ll say they like how natural she looks. She paid for this face. There is a very fine line between an enhancement and going too far — the duck-bill look, the over-filled cheek, the lips that have lost all sense of proportion. That line exists. But everything she’s had done has been for herself, for her own confidence. A little enhancement because she wants to look how she feels. If she’s feeling good, she wants to look good.
Another started sixteen years ago with her teeth — one of the first to try Invisalign, back when it was considerably cheaper. Working in screen at the time made that feel necessary. In recent years, she’s had some Botox, which she kept secret for a while because she felt uncomfortable about it — she does a lot of things in the name of being natural, and it felt a little hypocritical. But she really likes it. The decision came from wanting to preserve something, not change it. She specifically asked for certain areas to be left alone — the expressive lines she likes about her face. She’s also had a blush lip tattoo that made the top lip appear bigger and bolder, exactly as she’d hoped.
So what was the moment each of us decided?
For breast augmentation, there wasn’t one single moment. It was something never really had in the first place — not replacing something that was there before, but something always wanted. The decision was to wait until after having children and breastfeeding, and then, once that chapter was done, to gift something back to herself. It felt like a reward, a reclaiming. The surgery was underestimated — the recovery was intensive and uncomfortable in ways that weren’t anticipated. But looking back, there’s no regret. It felt like going from being a mum who was pregnant and breastfeeding for five years back to back, to being herself again. Confidence, self-esteem, sexuality — all of it came back.
For another, watching a friend go through it was what made it feel possible. It wasn’t just how she looked afterwards — it was how she showed up. The energy. And that grew over time, it didn’t just arrive the moment the surgery was done. The moment of real decision came on a holiday in Dubai. She’d worked hard to feel great in a bikini, and in herself she did feel great — strong, present, alive. But then someone took a photograph and she didn’t look how she felt. She looked around and noticed that her friends all had smooth faces without a filter, and realised she’d somehow missed something. She asked tentatively. Then she said out loud, for the first time: I might get breast surgery. Her husband and best friend didn’t believe she’d actually do it. That, if anything, confirmed it for her. Why not? What kind of person gets it done? The answer was: her friend, who was still entirely herself — brilliant, unchanged in any way that mattered.
There’s a particular grief in giving up on feeling good in a bikini on holiday. When you’ve got young children, there’s no lying in the sun tanning anymore. You’ve got a spray tan that’s darker at the start of the holiday than the end. You’re in one piece and that’s the goal.
Was it confidence or comparison that drove the decision? For the nose — it came entirely from bullying and a medical need. For the others, it’s harder to separate entirely. What’s clear is that something about seeing yourself photographed versus how you feel inside can be deeply disorienting, and at some point that gap becomes something you want to close.
Something worth noting: HD phone cameras have a lot to answer for. Three years ago, a new phone with a particularly sharp camera revealed forehead lines that simply hadn’t been visible before. Suddenly there they were. It changed things.
Teenagers today can contour better than most of us ever could. They have eight-step skincare routines. They’re dissolving fillers at nineteen. We grew up with magazines. They’re growing up with filters.
So has Botox become normal? Has a breast augmentation become just another beauty treatment? And how young is too young?
There’s something frightening about how young these things can happen. There’s a wish that young women in their twenties could truly understand how beautiful they are simply by virtue of having youth — the collagen, the skin, all of it. An ideal world might have an age cap, somewhere in the thirties, before these decisions are made. Not for things driven by genuine medical need or severe bullying, but for the elective stuff — made when someone is still so full of natural beauty they can’t quite see it. That said, the argument falls apart a little, because self-knowledge and security don’t come with age necessarily. You could be fifty and still not have them. The real point is that these decisions should come from a place of empowerment — from feeling secure in yourself and wanting something — not from a place of not feeling good enough. And knowing the difference is harder than it sounds.
There’s a responsibility felt, as a mother, to tell your daughter what you’re doing. At twelve, she’s not going to not notice. For Botox, she’d already noticed. For the breast surgery, a conversation was had — not asking for permission, but explaining. Her response was characteristically direct: your breasts are fine, you don’t need anything. But the point wasn’t need. The point was want, and choice, and doing something for yourself after having children, after years of your body belonging to others. Her daughter’s response, ultimately, was: you do you. I support that. I’m not looking to do any of this myself.
But that daughter has now also seen the real side of it. She helped with hair when her mum couldn’t shower. She said her mum looked worse than she had after giving birth. She watched the recovery happen. And more recently, in a changing room, she said something unexpected — seeing her mum’s body after surgery, softer in places she’d never been before, actually made her feel better about her own body. Because now she knows other people’s bodies change too. Who knows entirely what lesson is being passed on, but it’s a real one.
There’s something significant, too, about a daughter watching her mother make this decision in her forties, with full context and self-knowledge, rather than at twenty-two without it. It says something different. Though equally — the twenty-year-old version of herself would have loved to have had the confidence to do it sooner. She carried an insecurity for over twenty years. At some point, enough is enough. You stop carrying it. You decide, if not now, when?
Walking into that theatre is genuinely terrifying. And at the same time, there’s this inner voice going: are we actually doing this? Yes. We are. You said you always wanted to. Come on. You’re brave. It’s an odd, tender thing.
It’s not a bad thing for children to witness. Sons were told too, even though it’s not something they’d do themselves. One said: I don’t really understand it, Mum, but I support you. That response — and the weeks of making cups of tea and pieces of toast during recovery — taught him something about looking after the people he loves.
As for younger women today: it has become very, very normal. There are families where a parent has casually told a daughter that if her boobs don’t grow by eighteen, they’ll buy her some. She’s nearly eighteen. They’re not in yet. She’s already planning it. That’s how normalised it’s become.
A viewer question: I’m thirty-two and constantly feel pressured to keep up with treatments because all my friends are doing Botox and fillers. I don’t even know if I want it. I just don’t want to look older than them. How do I know if I’m doing it for me or for social pressure?
The answer is almost in the question itself. She’s already told us: she’s doing it for social pressure. That’s clear from the way she’s framed it. She doesn’t want to look older than her friends — that’s not the same as wanting something for herself. Drink lots of water. Sleep well. And if the day comes when she genuinely wants it for herself, she’ll know the difference. It feels different from the inside. Right now, her inner critic is doing the talking, and that’s worth sitting with rather than acting on. Though it’s also worth saying — for some of us, it did start in a similar place. It started with comparison and then gradually shifted into something more personal. So she should sit with it, let it unfold, and see what’s really there underneath.
On the question of men — do you disclose it, downplay it, feel judged? There’s a strange social dance around this. We’re meant to look effortless, but not admit what effort looks like.
Some of us don’t advertise it but are honest when asked. Some kept it secret from a partner who was health-conscious and wouldn’t have approved — the approach being not to lie, just not to volunteer the information unless asked. Eventually: are you secretly having Botox? Yes. And that was that. Many women have had secret facials. Many have navigated this same conversation.
Some partners are very firm — you’re not getting anything done. Others come around. Some worry not about the aesthetics but about the medical risk — about general anaesthesia, about putting yourself under when you have a family who needs you. After watching someone go through three traumatic childbirths, a partner struggling to understand why you’d voluntarily go back under a general is understandable. But you risk your life crossing the road. Getting in a car. Getting on a plane. If it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen.
And there’s the eternal question that follows any woman announcing this kind of decision: what does your partner think? Every single person asks it. As if it needs approval. As if it’s not your body and your life.
Maintenance or modification? For all of us, ultimately, the honest answer is both. The line between the two shifts depending on who you ask and what they’ve had done. What matters more is why — and whether the answer to that question is really yours.
