Me and my glorious double chin in stage make-up. Photo by Doug Spearman
Chins, like human bodies, come in lots of different shapes and sizes. But, as they do with human bodies, our society’s screwed up stereotypes of beauty try to tell us that there are only certain chins that are acceptable. And then the medical industry steps in to make money from this ridiculous notion. Enter Kybella.
Kybella is and Allergan product. If that company sounds familiar it’s because they also sell Latisse (it will grow your eyelashes and don’t worry, that eye discoloration is probably temporary,) and the lap band device that tries to use stomach binding to force body size manipulation. This is a company that has committed atrocities of research, and once ran a contest where the prize was a dangerous abdominal surgery that you could “gift” to a friend or family member.
Kybella involves a series of injections of deoxycholic acid into the chin to destroy the fat cells. According to their website:
KYBELLA® is a prescription medicine used in adults to improve the appearance and profile of moderate to severe fat below the chin (submental fat), also called “double chin.”
Moderate to sever fat below the chin? Seriously. We’re talking about a double chin like it’s a medical problem? Also, if you have only “mild” fat below the chin apparently you’re shit out of luck. These people will stoop to literally any low to make money. As my friend CJ Legare says – this is about stealing our self-esteem, cheapening it, and selling it back to us at a profit.
So what are we risking to have a differently shaped chin?
KYBELLA® can cause serious side effects, including trouble swallowing and nerve injury in the jaw that can temporarily cause an uneven smile or facial muscle weakness. In clinical studies, nerve injury in the jaw resolved on its own in a median of 44 days (range of 1 to 298 days), and trouble swallowing resolved on its own in a median of 3 days (range of 1 to 81 days).
The most common side effects are swelling, bruising, pain, numbness, redness and areas of hardness around the treatment area. These are not all of the possible side effects of KYBELLA®. Call your healthcare provider for medical advice about side effects.
And for what are we risking a possible 298 days (that’s almost 10 months!) of nerve damage and 81 days of trouble swallowing? Here are some “before and after” pictures from their own website (you can click on the images to enlarge them:)
Lucky that they labeled them “before” and “after,” otherwise it would be hard to tell which is which.
And how much are we paying for these chin transformations? According to Glamour.com, around $5,400. For some perspective, I could choose to have a slightly different looking chin or I could pay for 2,168 school lunches for kids who need some help.
I think that this passage from their website captures the full on ridiculousness of this entire situation:
Do you have some extra fullness beneath your chin? Maybe it’s something you’ve had your whole life, something that developed over the years, or something you noticed recently. This is a condition called submental fullness, which some people refer to as “double chin.”
People are allowed to do whatever they want with their bodies, regardless of the reason or risk. I just want people to be aware that there’s a lot of money being made by companies who are convincing us that normal things (like double chins, fat bodies, any and all signs of aging) are somehow “problems” requiring dangerous and expensive medical interventions. I also want people to be aware that we don’t have to buy into that. We have the option to opt-out of, of finding love for our double (or triple, or quadruple) chins, our fat bodies, our grey hair and wrinkles, and we can use our time, energy, and money for other pursuits.
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