Oh....I feel a Heidi Montag moment coming on. Have you SEEN the before and after photo's?

To me, they are more than a little sad and such a huge statement about where our society has headed. What is this pursuit of beauty and "perfection" saying to the rest of us?? Heidi has spent over $30,000 on plastic surgery including making her boobs so big they need their own zip code. She can afford it. How many of us who can't would do the same thing? Well, maybe not such huge boobs, but fixes here and there...How shameful is that? How sad. Many of us (including yours truly) question and ridicule her excessive and expensive pursuit of beauty, yet does it not allow the rest of us to think, well, I'm not so bad in comparison. But are we not? Am I not?

I get poor body image from a truly personal point of view. I hated my body growing up. I have athletic body envy. I dreamed of smaller hips, longer legs, better hair in my teens and twenties. I was never terribly satisfied with my own body. I dieted on and off from 15 onwards, and my weight has yo yo'ed for years. It still does I shamefully admit. At one point in my life I would have chosen thin over health. Hands down. Then came a life changing time for me when I was stricken by a very severe case of Post Partum Depression and had to go on medication in order to live. Get better. Not die.

One of the side effects of the medicine was weight gain. At one time, I would have chosen not to do it, but with PPD, I was so sick, I had absolutely no choice. And then when I was better, and it became a choice, for a while I had perspective. Extra weight or back into that land of crazy. A wake up call indeed. I struggle being heavier but ultimately my mental health is more important than fitting into skinny jeans.

Do I still struggle? Of course. What women (and men) don't. There's so much pressure, especially now with the accessibility of plastic surgery and botox. My friends are thinner. They look better in cool jeans. I exercise and try to take care of myself, but I feel less because I am not a size 6. When I became bigger, I lost some of my feelings of femininity. I buy into the myths. For goodness sake, I dream about being thinner and younger all the time!

Even as I age, I color my hair to hide the grey. I may even have had a shot of two of botox. But I can't afford to keep up with those wrinkles. I can't afford to stop the advance of time. And sometimes it makes me feel less. The outside image telling me I'm not as worthy.

And then there's Heidi. A very young girl. A girl who was very pretty before her surgeries, prettier than most "normal" people can hope to be. But it wasn't enough for her. She wants more. "Better". Needs to keep "improving".

She is the epitome of poor self image. Yet how many of us in a tiny way identify with her dissatisfaction with herself. And that is the sad. Would the money not be better spent with a therapist trying to heal the poor self image. Would we not all feel better if we loved ourselves for who we are a little more??

How can you begin to love yourself and feel good about yourself if you keep changing the outer body seeking self acceptance. But really who am I to judge?

The only thing I can be truly thankful for is that I did not marry a man like Spencer Pratt. Someone who truly seems like he'd feed her insecurities. Encourage her to believe she is not good enough. Pretty enough. Busty enough.

I am lucky enough to have a husband who looks at me and doesn't focus on the weight gain or the wrinkles. A husband who says to me, "You look beautiful," even when I don't feel it myself.

Obviously working on accepting who we are and embracing that person is a constant process and struggle. At the risk of sounding like a patronizing old woman, it does get easy as we get older. We are expected to look so good in our teens and even twenties and are judged by it in so many ways. I am much kinder to my imperfections now than I was as a teen. It is