The importance of your emotional well-being is getting a lot of attention these days, and rightfully so! However, that doesn’t mean that your physical well-being isn’t also important. In fact, these two concepts are connected in more ways than one.
Here’s what you need to know:
What Is Physical Well-Being?
Contrary to popular belief, physical well-being is more than just the absence of disease. It also involves lifestyle and behavior choices that can lower the risk of illness and disease. For example, things like sleep, diet, and physical activity can greatly impact your physical well-being.
What Is Emotional Well-Being?
Emotional well-being involves emotions, moods, thoughts, and feelings. Emotional wellbeing can be understood as the ability to engage in stress management techniques, be resilient, and generate good emotions that contribute to good feelings.
Overall, emotional well-being is about acknowledging, accepting, and reacting to your feelings in a positive way.
How Are They Connected?
At first glance, it might be difficult to see how physical well-being and emotional well-being are connected. After all, one deals with physical issues, and the other one deals with emotional issues. However, one closely influences the other.
For example, poor mental health can cause you to develop physical health conditions. Mental health conditions can also cause chronic physical conditions. On the contrary, physical conditions can contribute to poor mental health.
How To Simultaneously Improve Your Physical Well-Being and Your Emotional Well-Being
As you can see, physical well-being and emotional well-being are inextricably linked. So what can you do to improve both at the same time? You can find the answer in plastic surgery.
1. Breast Reduction Surgery
A breast reduction surgery could potentially improve your physical and emotional well-being if you have large breasts. Large breasts can cause harm to both your physical health and your self-esteem.
Large breasts can contribute to chronic neck, shoulder, and back pain. They can also make it more difficult to exercise and breathe effectively. They can even cause shoulder grooves, skin indentations, and skin rashes. Large breasts can cause you to feel self-conscious if they aren’t proportional to your frame. They can make you feel insecure if you can’t properly fit into clothes.
So instead of dealing with negative physical and mental side effects from large breasts, feel more comfortable and pain-free in your skin with a breast reduction.
2. Breast Augmentation Surgery
A breast augmentation surgery also has the potential to improve both your physical well-being and your emotional well-being. Although people may see breast augmentation surgery as purely cosmetic with no actual health benefits, that’s not always the case.
For example, after extensive weight loss, women might consider breast augmentation with a breast lift to improve the appearance of breasts that may have become saggy and droopy. This procedure could give them the confidence to achieve their final weight loss goals instead of feeling self-conscious and insecure about their bodies.
Another example involves women who have undergone a mastectomy. Breast reconstruction surgery with breast implants can help these patients feel more confident and comfortable, potentially giving them the boost they need to make it through the treatment process.
3. Nasal Surgery
Nasal surgery is another seemingly cosmetic surgery that could have real physical benefits. While some patients may simply feel insecure about the appearance of their nose due to its size or shape, other patients may experience breathing problems due to a deviated septum.
In addition to difficulty breathing, a deviated septum can also cause symptoms like chronic nosebleeds, facial pain, headaches, recurring sinus infections, and sleep issues. Nasal surgery with a rhinoplasty can address both the physical symptoms of a deviated septum and the confidence issues that a crooked or bumpy nose causes.
With rhinoplasty, you can look better, breathe better, and sleep better — improving both your physical well-being and your emotional well-being.
4. Weight Loss Surgery
One of the best ways to simultaneously improve your physical and emotional well-being if you’re overweight is weight loss surgery. Obesity comes with many health risks, including high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, and more.
More than that, obesity can contribute to insecurity and negative self-esteem, leading to depression and anxiety. The very nature of obesity itself makes it extremely difficult to lose weight through diet and exercise alone, which is why weight loss surgery can prove particularly beneficial.
Weight loss surgery has been shown to lower the risk of death from many diseases, including heart disease (40%), diabetes (92%), and cancer (60%).
5. Gender Affirmation Surgery
Gender dysphoria can have a significant impact on an individual’s mental and physical health, causing things like anxiety, depression, eating disorders, substance abuse, and self-harm. Mentally and emotionally, it can cause low self-esteem, social isolation, and self-neglect.
Gender affirmation surgery provides a solution to those with gender dysphoria as it helps their physical traits reflect how they feel on the inside. This surgery can improve physical and emotional well-being based on a 42% reduction in psychological distress, a 44% reduction in suicidal ideation, and even a 35% reduction in tobacco smoking.
Final Thoughts
As you can see, plastic surgery can be used to improve both your physical and emotional well-being. If this sounds like the right option for you, finding a board-certified plastic surgeon and setting up a consultation is the next step.
Dr. Applebaum is a board-certified plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills with decades of experience. Reach out to his office today to set up either an in-person or virtual consultation to see how he can help you improve your physical and emotional well-being with plastic surgery.
Sources:
Connection Between Mental and Physical Health | Canadian Mental Health Association