Abby Wu, a Chinese girl who was only 14 years old when she underwent her first surgery, wanted to change her body to look more beautiful. Now 35 years old, she has had over 100 surgeries, spending close to half a million US dollars in the process.
While other girls her age were thinking about school or games, Abby began her journey in search of “perfect beauty.” It started after being criticized by her dance teacher who told her she was too fat and had to choose between losing weight or quitting dance. Her mother then took her to the hospital for liposuction.
At the hospital, Abby was sedated but didn’t fall asleep. She saw everything being done to her, including the blood flowing. That first operation marked the beginning of a strange and difficult story.
Today, Abby owns a beauty clinic in downtown Beijing and is widely known as one of the most surgically altered women in China. On SoYoung, a popular social media platform for beauty procedures, she shares her surgery experiences. But even after so many operations, a beauty checkup app called “Magic Mirror” still shows imperfections on her face, pushing her to plan for more surgeries.
In China, about 20 million people undergo cosmetic procedures every year, many of them girls under 25. Most turn to unlicensed clinics, which often results in disfigurement or death.
Yue Yue, a 28-year-old woman, was one of the victims of poor surgery. She was injected with substances to give her a baby face, but her face ended up looking like cement. She underwent painful procedures to remove the material and was left permanently disfigured.
In 2020, actress Gao Liu also faced a botched nose surgery, which led to her nose tissue rotting. The incident shocked many in China and revealed the gravity of illegal cosmetic procedures in the country.
