13 year old who got liposuction last year gets lap band this year

A Nip/Tuck episode is writing itself, "Teen takes another bite from the forbidden beauty apple." Brooke Bates was 12 years old when she got liposuction last year, and now at 13 she has gotten a gastric lap band because she gained back 35 pounds of the 40 she lost during the original liposuction. Brooke's mom says that it isn't Brooke's fault that she can't keep the weight off, it's her stomach's fault that she is a compulsive overeater, so she sees lap band as the only way to physically keep her child from overeating. This is not TV, these people are for real.

Because no reputable doctor in the U.S. would perform such a drastic procedure on a child, Brooke's parents took her to Mexico.

"Most doctors in the United States usually don't perform gastric lap-band surgery unless a patient is at least 18 years old, has a body mass index of 40 or higher or weighs at least twice his or her ideal weight...So against the advice of their family doctor, the Bates' traveled to Mexico to get the procedure done, without trying to find a local surgeon. The procedure cost $7,900." [from ABC News]

Brooke's mother seriously does not see anything wrong with all these surgeries for her pre-teen, and her ability to justify the procedures is truly mind boggling. Brooke, her mom, and her older sister commented on my earlier post about Brooke's liposuction defending the surgery. Brooke's mom wrote, "Just because majority of Doctors say that this procedure (liposuction) is dangerous, how the heck would they really know because they have never taken that much weight from the patients that they see. THEY SHOULD GIVE IT A TRY." Brooke's older sister Bailey wrote, "If you truly have the guts to say that what my parents did was wrong then you need to take a look at yourself... I think that all you people are just in "disgust" because you yourself cannot get the surgery."

I get that a parent would do anything for the well being and happiness of their child but there has to be limits especially when it comes to the child's health. In the case of the Bates family, it looks as if their desire for attention and for Brooke's need to be one of the pretty popular girls outweighs the common sense of well being both emotionally and physically. Brooke says of the recent lap band surgery that she would do anything to be thin. Sounds like an unhealthy obsession with thinness?

Getting liposuction and lap band surgery for an adolescent is taking the beauty obsession to a level that is disturbing and detrimental to the physical and emotional welfare of this child, and to all other kids who see this story and start getting the idea in their head that this is something they should do as well. Kids are supposed to be kids as long as they can and this kind of radical approach turns these children into adults much sooner than they should or need. Can someone please sick Dr. Phil on the Bates family?