I love the way I look. I’m confident and generally pleased with my body in a bikini. Well, at least I am now… after my breast enhancement. That’s right, I have implants and I’m not ashamed of it.

I’ll give you a moment to get all your thoughts and comments out of the way:

“I can’t believe you succumbed to breast implants just to fill some ignorant societal notion that ‘bigger is better.’”
“Getting implants is so slutty.”
“You’re an embarrassment to women and should be ashamed for fueling the fire for women to attain an impossible body image.”

Trust me. I’ve heard it all. But maybe it’s time for you to hear my side of the story. I’m not giving you the stink eye for going all natural (or spending all your money on Victoria’s Secret’s latest push-up), so hear me out.

I never was extraordinarily flat-chested, but I couldn’t fill out my prom dress the way most girls could. I had perky ta-tas, but they never drew any attention. I was unhappy with my chest, which left me rather unhappy with myself. I envied girls with bigger chests; I often felt they were more worthy than me. And why not? The guys who were walking right past me and fawning all over them and their cleavage-y ways seemed to think so.  I even resorted to stuffing my bra a couple times; particularly embarrassing when I had bits of Kleenex poking out of my Gap tank top after gym class one day in high school. Boarding school kids show no mercy.

The point is, I wasn’t happy with my body and I wanted to do something about it. I can work out and get a flat tummy, throw some cover-up under my eyes when I’ve downed too many dirty martinis at Pure and guess what? I can go to my doctor and get him to boost my, errr, confidence.

I know the taboos and I knew all the risks going into the surgery, but I’m thrilled with my choice. I feel better about ME. It’s not about pleasing others and it doesn’t mean I’m going to run out and pose for Playboy (at least not yet) or hop onto a pole (although I am a big fan of Carmen Electra’s strip tease excercise DVDs); it was a personal choice and I feel my life has improved significantly in more ways than one because of it.

No one says anything to the girl who works out six days a week and starts eating healthy when she feels self-conscious about her weight. Same for the millions of girls who dye their hair or layer on the makeup every day. We all have our insecurities and, let’s be honest, we’d all do just about anything to fix them and make ourselves feel better.

My boobs were my insecurity and my implants make me feel better. In fact, they make me feel great.

And really, what’s so different between what I did and, say, that water bra you picked up last week?

And I’m not talking “only eat bacon” ridiculous.

Allow me to introduce you to Dr. Nikolas Chugay’s mesh patch. When sewn onto the tongue it becomes so painful to eat, that you just can’t. That’s right this doctor from California who has a PhD in medicine is going to make it so painful for you to eat that you won’t have any other option but to stick to a liquid diet.

Ten women have already done it and – surprise, surprise – some have lost up to 20 pounds. (Really, if you don’t eat any solid food, you’ll lose weight? Who knew!)

Now if this guy has actually found women desperate enough to inflict physical pain on themselves to lose their muffin top, I think the world of medicine is ready to radically expand. Can you imagine how much money can be made inventing other completely unreasonable ways for women to keep their stomachs empty?

I have a couple of ideas already.

The Wisdom Tooth Replacement

Anyone who has had their wisdom teeth removed knows that it was the best you’ve looked in years. Sure, your cheeks swell up like your a chipmunk going into hibernation, but it’s too painful to open your mouth wider than a centimeter so you drop six pounds as you lie on your couch in agony. Sadly, though, you heal and are soon able to open your mouth wide enough to fit that hamburger. Why not just do a monthly removal/replacement procedure? That’ll keep you (painfully) thin.

The Flu Sauna

Having the flu is a socially acceptable excuse to be bulimic for a week. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if you continue to infect yourself, you will continue to barf up any and all food that enters your stomach. So after your elliptical session, stop by the flu sauna, fully equipped with a virus-infected individual who will cough, snot and sneeze your way. You’ll be infected and unable to keep food down by tomorrow!

The Judgment Hand

That little voice inside our head (you know her, “don’t you dare eat that cookie, it’ll go straight to your big ass!”), isn’t that convincing. Sure she makes you feel guilty, but it rarely stops you from resisting the chips at a party or the pizza at the sorority meeting. Luckily for you, we can now give that little voice a powerful weapon. Doctors simply install a robotic arm on the side of your body, linking it to your brain waves. As even the thought of eating crosses your mind, the hand will whack you upside the head, knocking any craving out the door.

I walked around my apartment, touching things, pulling my blankets tighter around my bed, staring at the window, and then eventually sitting down on my couch. The TV was playing in the background, Olympic synchronized diving, and I tried to concentrate on what was happening on the screen, but besides a few thoughts about how synchronized diving is an odd sport and how did it get into the Olympics? — I couldn’t keep my head clear.

In a little less than a week, I’ll find myself lying on a hospital bed, hooked up to beeping machines, and wheeled by a bunch of masked people I don’t know into an operating room. The surgery is either simple or complicated — nobody can seem to decide — and all that’s clear is that there’s something foreign that needs to stop renting space on my 9th rib. I’ve been thinking about the surgery for a few hand-wrung weeks, and the closer it is to happening, the fuller my brain gets with every. possible. horrible scenario.

To combat my irrational fears, I’ve been watching a lot of TLC, because TLC tends to have shows like “Face Eating Tumor” or, “The Boy Who Had His Skull Broken Off Than Reattached”, and those types of programs make my surgery seem like a paper cut. I feel better about my prognosis after watching a 5-year-old kid get his skull hacked away and then put back together again — and totally recover. If the kid with the broken face was fine, I say to myself as the credits roll, the girl who needs a benign tumor removed from her ribs should also be fine.

Besides TLC and glasses of red wine, there really isn’t anything else I can do to keep myself from freaking the f*ck out, especially at night. Lying in bed, watching the clock tick down, every good piece of advice melts away and I’m stuck with thoughts that include: I will not wake up after surgery, the doctors will make a mistake, the pain will be really bad, I’ll get sick, I’ll wake up during surgery, I won’t be able to move for days...the list goes on for basically a mile (possible 1.4 miles). It’s amazing what a sane person’s head can do to them when they’re alone and it’s 11 PM. I now understand crazy people. Because I go a little insane every night.

I’ve been assured by everyone that the surgery will go fine and recovery won’t be that bad. And while the normal part of me is sure they’re right, the psycho part of me thinks they’re all lying. It’s bizarre to be in your 20′s and feel like a 5-year-old child. All I want to do is scream “No needles!” and yell until someone gives me ice cream and pets my head.

And if they just want to give me ice cream, and skip the head-petting, that’ll work too.

[What about you? Facing surgery? Faced down surgery? And tips and tricks about how to cope?]

Shia LaBeouf, the adorable movie star who used to seem so sweet and cute, apparently made a promise to himself to become just another one of those a**hole actors by breaking a bunch of laws in recent months. Early this morning (Sunday, July 27th), LaBeouf pushed his a**shole act up a notch by flipping his car on “the corner of Fountain and La Brea” in Hollywood and smashing up his hand bad enough to go into surgery shortly after. As soon as he got to the hospital, LaBeouf was arrested and charged with DUI.

Updates will no doubt come in as the day wears on, but as we all wait for those updates to happen, we here at CC are going to make our own promise to ourselves: no more fantasies involving actors who are lame enough to think that driving while intoxicated is a great way to get around.

Thanks to the J.Lo-inspired era of backside obsession, I’ll admit I’ve certainly been paying more attention to how I fill out my jeans. But according to Marie Claire, there are women who really get up close and personal with their rear ends—and they don’t like what they see.

So, what’s a gal to do when she’s plagued with an imperfect backside? Anal bleaching of course!

The cheeks on your face aren’t the only ones that need color, apparently. Women are now looking to get that rosy glow on a part of the body that, up until now, remained untouched by cosmetic enhancement—-the anus.

Lucky for us, our anal imperfections can be fixed in a simple trip to the salon to pick up an at-home bleaching kit.

It doesn’t end at the anus. Next time you’re having your dermatologist erase any evidence that you may have smiled or frowned at some point in your life, ask the doc about bum Botoxing. An alternative to exercise and cellulite creams, there’s no faster way to get your butt swimsuit-ready than dropping your pants and injecting it with poison!

If anyone asks, just thank your regime of Pilates and Spinning for your peculiarly smoother backside.

Labia got you down? Just make an appointment with your local plastic surgeon for the “Toronto Trim,” a procedure that involves the reduction of the labia and slight unhooding of the clitoris.

Who exactly are we trying to impress with these extreme makeovers? I don’t know about you, but I don’t walk around holding a hand mirror to my ass. And I’m certainly able to point out the location of my clitoris. So, I’m left with the assumption that these procedures mainly benefit those who spend the most time looking at (or fruitlessly searching for, as the case may be) those body parts — men.

I won’t pretend that my standing appointment with the bikini waxer and impressive collection of Nair is something I do for myself, but how far will we go in our quests to be perfect, hairless, cellulite-free creatures before it’s time to say “enough is enough?”

And let’s be honest, when was the last time your boyfriend’s nether regions came in contact with hot wax, a needle full of Botox, or heaven forbid, a scalpel?