‘Should we use plastic surgery to make her beautiful like us?’
March 2nd, 2008
Two-year-old daughter has Down syndrome
From the [UK] Daily Mail, a feature on Laurence and Chelsea Kirwan, a plastic surgeon and his wife whose daughter Ophelia has Down syndrome. An excerpt:
The couple make their fortune from the quest for physical perfection. To become parents of a daughter with Down’s syndrome may have, to say the least, profoundly challenged their ideas of what beauty is, whether it resides in the spirit or the body and whether cosmetic surgery is truly worthwhile.
Laurence himself has admitted that he suffers what he calls “the curse of the plastic surgeon” - he is unable to look at a person without “mentally improving their face” in his mind’s eye.
So, perhaps it is no surprise he says he “may well consider” cosmetic surgery to correct his daughter’s features.
… Chelsea and Laurence make a glamorous couple, commuting between their beautiful homes in Connecticut and Knightsbridge (London).
Chelsea cheerfully admits that she has been happy to make use of her husband’s talents … They married, three years after meeting in 1997 through mutual friends, and Laurence operated on his wife, giving her a breast lift, shortening her nose and enhancing her lips.
See also: Writer: ‘I am thankful for my son’s face’
See also: Couple refutes plastic surgery story
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on Sunday, March 2nd, 2008 at 1:48 pm and is filed under Down syndrome, NOT2BEMISSED, controversial procedures, families, medicine, personal stories.
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March 20th, 2008 at 8:12 am
This the text of a letter received from The Daily Mail today, 20 March 2008
‘Dear Sirs,
Professor Kirwan and Chelsea Kirwan
Thank you for your letter dated 13 March 2008 and addressed to Alex Bannister.
We too are keen to adopt a pragmatic approach to your clients’ complaint. WE have therefore marked our archive cuttings database with the issues you raised. I have also circulated an internal note to our journalists that they consider your clients’ concerns in respect of any future articles.
This has been done without any admission of liability but in order to adopt a sensible and reasonable approach to this matter at an early stage.
I trust that this is sufficient.
Yours sincerely
Charles A Garside
Assistant Editor.’
This is not sufficient. Both Chelsea and I deserve a published apology for the damage their articles have caused.
Laurence Kirwan
March 17th, 2008 at 6:38 am
I would recommend that you read Chelsea’s and my comments in response to the Mail article. Please see Ophelia’s website http://www.opheliablueeyes.com where the comments are posted. You can also read my interchange with the ‘Mail on Sunday’ writer, Bonnie Estridge prior to publication of the article.
As a friend of mine with a Down syndrome child said, ‘the only thing you can believe in the Mail is the date!’ This article by Amanda Cable infers that she had an interview with the Kirwans prior to writing the March 10 piece. Neither I nor Chelsea has ever spoken to Amanda Cable. We never stated or implied the title. Ophelia is reported as living in Knightsbridge whereas the Mail commissioned her photographs at her home in Greenwich, Connecticut, USA. All of the interviews between Bonnie Estridge of the ‘Mail on Sunday’ and Chelsea were held by transatlantic telephone calls.
We have never recommended or even considered cosmetic surgery for Ophelia. We are far more interested in her health, as well as her physical and mental development. Of course we love Ophelia as she is.
The decision to have surgery on a child with congenital anomalies is a complex one taken between the parents and their surgeon. We should leave that decision to the individual family and their medical advisors to decide on its own merits. Reconstructive surgery for congenital anomalies of all kinds has improved the quality of life of millions of children. As a plastic surgeon I have spent my life correcting congenital deformities in the USA and in Third World countries, as part of charitable missions
Please take the time to read our comments on Ophelia’s web site as well as her diary which documents Ophelia’s progress over the last 2 years and our emotions during that period.
Lastly, Chelsea and I were assured that this was a mother daughter article for Mother’s Day without any mention of me or plastic surgery. If we had known otherwise we would never have been a party to this shameful article which is a disservice to all individuals with disabilities and to the Down syndrome community in particular. We have always championed research into Down syndrome and that is why in the original article of March 2, Bonnie Estridge gives the names of the charities we support. Neither charity has any interest in cosmetic surgery but is primarily concerned with developmental progress and quality of life issues.
Laurence and Chelsea Kirwan