MSNBC Media Analyst Steve Adubato has been critical of the “reality” in reality TV. Sybil has written about it here. Mr. Adubato recently sat down with Meredith Vieira to talk about it on the Today Show.

Our friend, Cindy Fuchs-Morrissey, wrote the following letter to Mr. Adbato:

Dear. Mr. Adubato,

I totally agree with what you stated this morning on the Today Show about ‘Reality’ TV leaving out the reality of plastic surgery for people of all ages to view. These shows, I fully believe, are really NOT good for our already dysfunctional society, nor good for our young people, who are really getting a false impression of what plastic surgery is really like and who really have NO idea of what they may be opting for. Parents may think they are giving their beloved child a wonderful gift with plastic surgery, but what parents DO NOT really know may hurt everyone in the end.

My name is Cindy Fuchs-Morrissey from Macon, Missouri.

I have indeed walked the walk I am very capable of talking the talk about plastic surgery, like breast augmentation.

For my birthday present in 1976, I got silicone breast implants. Oh yes, I had the “OK” from my parents as they wanted to make their little darling – me - happy. I was before my time with getting plastic surgery as a “gift.”

Now at almost 50-years old I observe parents giving these types of gifts to their young kids, something I would never consider for my own daughters (Hannah 24, Haley 21, and Hilary 17). Of course, our girls have witnessed first hand the hell their mother has gone through.

I have to tell you that I am still TO DATE trying to blow out the candle on that crappy 18th birthday present, but by now, August 2007, the flame has gotten out of control. The flame will die when I do.

This is far worse than a California fire. The flame has crossed into surrounding states, moving north, south, east and west. So, I go through life just trying to manage the flames, picking up pieces of life where charred rubble is. I deem this “resiliency.”

I sometimes say that being a past teenage breast implant patient has given me wisdom and great resiliency, nothing more. Yet, whoever wants plastic surgery, can still make a “choice” - understand that sometimes you may NOT always know what you are buying. So buyer, BEWARE.

Yet these gifts of great wisdom and massive resiliency have been priceless in the end. They have really given me the self-esteem I was searching for in my youth when I opted for breast implants. So I see that the hellish experience I was given when I opted for breast implants as a teenager in 1976 may have helped define who I was really meant to be.

Yes, I made lemonade from really, really sour, rotten lemons.

I became a teenage breast implant patient to correct a congenital deformity of my chest wall. All I wanted was to just be equal on both sides of my chest wall, nothing more. I opted for silicone breast implants, and subsequently had three surgeries: the first in 1976 several days after my 18th birthday, another in 1978, and another 1980.

Guess what? The implants did not work for me, like they do not work out for a lot of women. My implants ruptured, and this rupture was documented in the medical records of my 1978 surgery. My plastic surgeon, however, never told my parents and me. We all found out much later, when I requested my medical records from the hospital in 1992. Anyway, after MANY, MANY years of massive hell with breast augmentation/reconstruction, I had to have a double mastectomy in 1993 at the age of 35. I am very glad I had the mastectomy because the procedure gave me the end results that silicone breast implants never could give me: to just be equal on both sides of my chest wall. Now I am. I am happy with NOT having breasts. Odd as that may seem, the mastectomy helped me mentally be whole again, something I could not find with my breast implant experience. No, there was no quick fix…this took time.

There is more to my story, but I will spare you, Mr. Adubato, from the details….just like these Reality TV shows leave out the “reality” of the truth about plastic surgery. My reality would NOT make for good viewing to sell plastic surgery over the TV. These are the kinds of stories that plastic surgeons do NOT want known.

Remember, these shows really are all about “business as usual,” nothing more. The truth of the REALITY I have learned from experience, and it hurts…hurts really bad. For those TV doctors to go along with the shows and avoid putting their “mistakes” on TV flies in the face of the Hippocratic oath of First Do NO Harm, nor are they fully informing/educating patient (and parents who buy these procedures as a gift for their little darlings).

And patients need to be informed and educated, and NOT by some insert, most certainly not by the FDA (which I believe IS broken), or by some plastic surgeon’s verbal comment, or by some biased so-called Reality TV show.

Anyway, I hope when you read my e-mail, you did not rolls your eyes and put it aside.

Those of us who have experienced ‘reality’ with plastic surgery need a Chris Hansen type, you know, the man who does To Catch a Predator? We need a person who really looks at The Art of Medicine, especially medical devices breast implants. You could do this, Mr. Adubato.

Take care, Cindy

Cindy Fuchs-Morrissey