The new wedding craze that includes plastic surgery on an unlikely place.

By AVI VINCE

Marriage, or the prospect of marriage, makes some girls go bonkers. And this new craze just testifies to that.

We have all heard of how some girls turn into Bridezilla during the planning of their wedding. As well as their bridesmaids, sisters, mother, mother-in-law, step-mother and really any female within 10 kilometres of the bride being infected with the disease.

But as of today, there is a new gold standard of crazy bride stuff. As of today, this is the number one craziest thing a woman can do prior to getting engaged:

And that’s to have hand rejuvenation surgery for the perfect Instagram engagement-ring shot.

This from ABC News in the US:

When Christa Hendershot got engaged last fall, she, like thousands of other women, wanted to show off her engagement ring on social media. But after snapping a few photos, she realised she didn’t like the way her hands looked.

So the 33-year-old from Mount Sinai, New York, turned to plastic surgery, hoping it would smooth out her hands in order for them to become more “selfie worthy.” She recently shelled out more than $3,000 for hand rejuvenation at her plastic surgeon Dr. Ariel Ostad’s office in New York.

Hendershot told Ostad she was unhappy with her hands because she thought they were veiny and her knuckles were “very red.”

No, sadly, I am not joking.

“What we’re doing today is basically using a filler called juvederm and it lasts nine months,” says NYC dermatologist Dr Ariel Ostad. He says doing so achieves a “fuller and younger look for the picture-perfect selfie,” with ”a smooth surface so we don’t see any of those underlining structures.” Um, bones?

And I am here to say, I understand the pressure. I hate my hands. I think they are too big. I also have really weak nails which I sometimes bite/play with, so my finger tips are usually ugly.

So when I got engaged, I didn’t upload a photo of my hand and sparkler. I changed my Facebook relationship status. (For the record, I had to first change it to “In a relationship with” and then “Engaged to”.) And that is how I told people who I didn’t make contact with every week (others got a text message – no photo).

My sister was the only one who begged for a hand selfie (she lives interstate). And I sent one to her. And only her.

But after that, every outing looked like this: “Oh my God, let me see!” followed by grabbing my left hand and shoving it as close to their face as possible. Yes, they were super happy for me. Yes, I hoped they paid more attention to my ring than the state of my left hand.

And apparently, I am not the only one who hates my hands. According to cosmetic surgeons, hands are the body part that looks older faster, because the skin can lose fat becoming more thin and bony with prominent veins and wrinkles. And apparently, Instagram doesn’t have a filter to help that out. And real-life hand grabbing comes with no filter.I thought about getting a manicure in the two days between being engaged and having my hand repeatedly grabbed. But it was just too much effort. And I even hate it when the nail lady sees my hands.

So, if I did it all over again… would I get a hand lift? Or even the intenstive-moisture mani?

No. I would just take off my engagement ring, place it in an artistic-style position and take a pic.

I don’t like my hands. But I hate needles more.

This post originally appeared on iVillage.com.au, and is republished here with full permission. 

Do you think this new wedding craze is taking it one step too far?