Mom always said to wear a hat and sunscreen to protect your skin and prevent premature aging. We wonder: if all else failed, would Mom have tried Botox, now the number-one nonsurgical way to banish wrinkles in the U.S.?

It hardly seems possible that Botox, manufactured by one company, U.S.-based Allergan Inc., has been around for only five years. (Doctors have used it to treat uncontrollable blinking and other muscle disorders of the eye since 1989.) Now it permeates our popular culture; you can even get Botox injections at the mall. Last year alone 3.5 million went under the micro-needle, and customers are no longer just the middle-aged. They are increasingly thirty-, twenty-, even teen-somethings who are coming to rely on Botox to nip wrinkles in the bud. Forget to put on the SPF 30? No problem. There’s always good ol’ Clostridium botulinum to fall back on. We don’t mind that Botox is the deadliest neurotoxin known to man, which in larger quantities kills about a thousand people a year who eat tainted food. We use it anyway because it works so well.

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Washboard abs. Everybody wants them. Movie stars have them. Wouldn’t you like some? Here’s how you get them: eat less and exercise, exercise, exercise.

Oh, already tried that?

Occasionally wheatgrass juice and situps are not enough to sculpt rock-hard abs, no matter what all the women’s magazines say. If genetics predisposes you to a persistent paunch, or a big weight loss has left you with a major muffin top that won’t go away no matter how fit the rest of you has become, an abdominoplasty – aka tummy tuck - might be the answer.

Tummy tucks have become quite the chi-chi cosmetic surgery for the over-thirty set. According to the America Society of Plastic Surgeons, the number performed in the U.S. soared 60 percent in the last three years, more than any other type of cosmetic surgery, so a post-partum Britney Spears is clearly not the only one opting for this procedure.. Chances are you personally know someone who’s had a tummy tuck and is happy to talk about it. But make no mistake: despite their increasing acceptance and cute moniker, tummy tucks are major undertakings.

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So you’re at the bar/wedding reception/gym/dog park. And for the hundredth time, the Antonia Banderas look-alike heads right past your sparkling repartee and straight into the vortex of your friend Dana and her double Ds. He’s hanging on her every word, staring at her breasts like the lips of a translator. You stand by, cocktail/towel/leash in hand, ashamed of yourself and your A cups. In the mating scene, they have failed you once again. A boob job is beginning to sound better all the time.

Most would argue that going under the knife just to attract some dude looking for a big rack is pretty retro, and it is. But becoming more attractive to the opposite sex is just icing on the cake for many women who opt for breast surgery. Take the typical mom, former heavy girl or older woman, who once had full, firm breasts until breast feeding, losing 50 pounds or gravity came along. Some women turn to augmentation after a mastectomy, to get their body back to how it was before cancer. The rest? We just want to see how the other half lives – the half who look good in a halter. Whatever the reason, breast augmentation is the second most popular cosmetic surgery in the U.S., after liposuction.

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Large breasts. They’re everywhere you look: on TV, in magazines, spilling out of bikini tops and low-cut sweaters, desired by most women (and men), celebrated by the media ad nauseum. So if you were cursed with itty bitties and are tired of stuffing your A cups, it might surprise you to know that some women built like a brick house pay good money to take a load off their chests.

Also know as reduction mammaplasty, breast reduction surgery was performed on over 145,000 women and nearly 23,000 men in 2006. (Yes, guys can need it, too; nearly half of all men suffer from gynecomastia, a condition in which one or both male breasts appear large due to fat or excess glandular tissue.) With an average national cost of $5,500, the procedure is not inexpensive. However, it’s one of the few that some insurance companies will cover if you can provide evidence that overdeveloped breasts are causing you pain or other physical ailments.

We don’t wonder why men with flabby chests might want breast reduction surgery, but why do some women tire of their voluptuous builds? Because while Hollywood and society at large might send the clear message that big is better, D cups experience their share of misery.

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There comes a time in every girl’s life when she has to wonder if it’s worth it. All the tweezing, shaving and waxing. All the experimenting with smelly depilatory concoctions. Who needs the hassle or the razor burn? Eventually, many women – and some men – look to a more permanent solution for banishing unwanted hair.

If you’ve had it with high maintenance and the natural look isn’t for you, laser hair removal is a safe and fairly effective if expensive option. Last year 887,000 men and women flocked to laser clinics to zap hair off their chins, upper lips, eyebrows, underarms, legs, bikini lines and other hirsuit body parts. According to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons laser hair removal is the third most popular in nonsurgical cosmetic procedures. (It’s been bypassed by Botox® and chemical peels.)

If you stick with it, laser hair removal can accomplish the seemingly impossible: smooth skin in place of unsightly stubble without the eye-watering sting of electrolysis. But it requires commitment – and bucks.

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Quick, what’s the largest organ in the human body? That’s right - the skin! As you’ll further recall from fifth-grade biology, this suit of highly flexible semi-permeable armor we’re all born wearing is quite the hard worker. Skin does a lot more than keep our insides nice and moist; it protects against infections and airborne pollutants, regulates body temperature, takes a beating from the elements every time we step outside. What do we do for our skin in return? We forget the sunscreen and keep piling on birthdays. Way sooner than we would like, the ol’ epidermis is not as dewy and supple looking as it was in our prime.

If your skin is showing signs of wear and tear but you’re tired of facials and wouldn’t dream of resorting to the scalpel, consider microdermabrasion. It won’t take ten years off your face or address serious skin issues like deep acne scars. (For this, topical exfoliants such as Retin-A might be just as effective and cheaper in the long run.) Cynics consider microdermabrasion little better than sandblasting. But compared with more invasive procedures like laser skin resurfacing, microdermabrasion is easy, low impact, and reasonably priced. If you’ve been looking for something quick and gentle and will be happy with subtle improvements, it might be just the thing to put the pink back in your cheeks.

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