Everyone thinks it would be so awesome being an undeniably gorgeously hot babe. Imagine all of the attention you get! The fawning! The free dinners. The jewelry. The marriage proposals. Of course, being a drop-dead-gorgeous beauty isn't without its perils -- but I've never really heard anyone say, "If only I could become uglier!" But there is one thing about it that kinda sucks -- losing that beauty. Ah, yes, Father Time will ravage even the most stunning perfection. And women are so judged on their looks anyway. Hence, gorgeous women -- like Sharon Stone, for example -- have a lot more to adjust to in middle-aged than most. And Sharon is speaking out on how hitting "the wall" affected her-- quite candidly!
Sharon told Shape magazine that she had a bit of a crisis in her 40s, when she began to notice her body starting to give into gravity and lines beginning to grow on her face. She said:
There was a point in my 40s where I went into the bathroom with a bottle of wine, locked the door, and said, 'I'm not coming out until I can totally accept the way I look right now.' I examined my face in the magnifying mirror, and I looked at my body, and I cried and cried and cried. Then I said to myself, 'You're going to get old now. How do you want to do that?'
Wow. Sharon's looks were such a part of her identity that she cried like she had lost a longtime friend when they started to go away. NOT that they've really gone away. Sharon still looks gorgeous. Most 30-year-olds would want to look like Sharon. But only Sharon has looked at her face in the mirror every single day of her life -- so she could see things happening that others couldn't.
After Sharon had her pity party for her looks, she apparently pulled herself together and decided she wanted to age "like a dancer." She quit alcohol, which she says ruins the body and skin, and began working out regularly and changed her diet. It shows!
I think it's okay that Sharon had a drunken goodbye ceremony for her looks. They've done so much for her -- she was probably more attached to them than most of us. But even those of us who aren't world famous for our looks start to miss them when they go. Hey, guys probably mourn their hair loss and ability to get an erection 20 times a day. Why can't we mourn the loss of dewy skin, line-free foreheads, and asses that don't sag?
I think that's better to do than ignore it's happening -- and do everything in your power to look 20 when you're 50. Plastic surgery, fillers, Botox, etc., often only make you look older.
When I think of growing older, I think of Sharon in terms of how an older attractive woman can look if she works at it. So, Sharon, no need to mourn those looks entirely. You still look fab!
Do you ever mourn the loss of your looks?
Image via Max DeAngelo/PacificCoastNews.com