To botox or not to botox?

Hayley Bath takes a wrinkle-filled stand against the pressure to freeze by embracing her unapologetic laugh lines.

If Hamlet were written in 2025 instead of 1599, the iconic line wouldn’t be “To be or not to be?” It’d be “To Botox or not to Botox?”.

Last month, I found myself at an event surrounded by a sea of unwrinkled, unmoving brows. Scanning the room, I realised only myself and one other woman were left in the natural-forehead resistance. Even some of the guys had it. I felt like the last raisin in a bunch of juicy grapes.

Now I’m a fairly expressive person. My forehead alone could star in its own play, and these wrinkles are starting to take center stage. Even in my 30s, I see them while doing my makeup, in videos, and sometimes I catch myself smoothing my forehead mid-mascara, just to sneak a peek at the alternate Botox universe me. She looks oddly surprised.

As a voice and face on radio and in the media, I’ve been offered free injectables. Twice actually. From real, professional places promising no wax-figure vibes. Yet, I haven’t done it. Can’t do it. Every time I think, “Maybe it’s time,” but some inner part of me screams, “Over my wrinkled forehead!” Blame personal hang ups, a weird sense of loyalty to my wrinkles or just stubbornness.

So why haven’t I joined the Botox parade? Especially when many people look great with it.

First, the niggle at the back of my head whispers ‘what about my daughter?’. She’s a quiet observer, learning from my life. I don’t want her to feel like she’s got to change or alter herself, because she’ll already be swimming in a sea of filtered, curated and perfectly polished faces online.

Secondly, people die young. Yikes. Apologies, that got heavy fast. My late-cousin sadly never got to have wrinkles. These lines are proof I’m still here. Laughing and squinting at emails I don’t fully read. Wrinkles are my life’s receipts. I’m trying to see them that way.

And, of course, there’s always a little fear stopping me. What if the results aren’t great? I don’t want to end up looking like you could crack a walnut on my forehead for six months. Or what if I get the dreaded eyebrow droop? And we’ve all met someone who looks like their upper face missed the memo that their lower face is trying to have a conversation. I like having full facial expressions.

To be clear, this isn’t Botox-bashing. Botox can boost self-confidence, make people feel good about their appearance and even be used for relief from migraines. But for me? This might be the hill I grow old, and wrinkly, on.

I haven’t shouted, “This is my wrinkle revolution!” I want to. But what if, in years from now, I wake up feeling worse for wear and the voice whispers, “Just one little jab...?”. Easy to be bold in your 30s, harder later. Do I have the guts to do nothing? I think so. I hope so.

In a perfect world, everyone would stop cosmetic injectables. Then we’d all be back on an even-aging playing field. But what if we revolted? What if laughter lines became badges of honour and we felt the freedom of not giving a toss? What if looking ‘old’ wasn’t something we avoided?

Until then, I’ll keep stretching my forehead in the mirror, wondering what could be, but probably sticking with what is. Because just like Hamlet, the internal conflict is the biggest battle. Having the courage to leave the sword (or in this case, the needle) could mean surviving all five acts with a face that tells the whole story.

There’s also something bad-ass about letting gravity have a go.

Catch Hayley on The Hits 95FM weekdays 9am to 3pm.

Mishaps and mayhem

Proud farm girl turned radio personality, Hayley Bath’s chaotic life is comedy gold.

Radio host Hayley Bath isn’t just the voice keeping you company from 9 to 3 on The Hits – she’s also the kind of woman who accidentally eats her pet sheep, marries a man after 12 weeks and loses her last baby tooth at 32. (Yes, really.) Here Hayley shares 10 delightfully unfiltered facts about couchsurfing with criminals, misbooking Mandarin bus tours, and raising a son who thinks Santa’s reindeer crashed into their lounge. Warning: you will snort-laugh reading this.

1. I accidentally ate my prize-winning pet sheep.
I’m a country girl who grew up just outside of Pukekohe on a lifestyle block, where we had cows, sheep, chickens, pigs, and even a horse at one point. I earned pocket money by rearing calves and quickly learned that naming a cute piglet ‘Bacon’ helped when the circle of life inevitably came around and it was time to stock the freezer. I always knew that my ribbon-winning sheep, Harry, would eventually be turned into lamb chops but when the time came, I absolutely refused to eat him. Lamb? Fine. Harry? Absolutely not. About a year later, I was reassured over dinner that Harry was long gone from the freezer, so I tucked into a lamb chop without a second thought. Fast forward three years to a heated argument with my sister, when she suddenly screamed: “YOU DID EAT HARRY’S LAST CHOP AND THE WHOLE FAMILY KNEW!”

2. I once had dinner with a drug smuggler and spent the night on the couch of a (ahem, cough) ‘woman of the night’.
My sister and I couchsurfed our way around the world, staying on strangers’ sofas and encountering all sorts of characters, some more colourful than others, as mentioned above. We went to 14 different countries in 90 days, travelling as cheaply as possible, which naturally led us to a few hairy situations. My poor mum was worried sick for us. For that reason we didn’t tell her when we got into a stranger’s van in Cambodia, got driven around the middle of nowhere and then had to give him cash to be let out of the van. Some things are best left unsaid.

3. I accidentally went on a four-daylong, full mandarin-speaking guided bus tour in the US.
In the aforementioned trip, my sister insisted I pull my weight and organise something on the trip for a change. I chose a Grand Canyon bus tour but I left it until the night before to book it. We only found out why it was so cheap the next morning when the bus took off and the tour guide started speaking mandarin – for the entire time – for four long days. By then we were stuck on it. To this day I have no idea of any of the history or even what state we were in.

4. My hubby and I decided to get married just 12 weeks after meeting.
When you know, you know, and I’m still unashamedly smitten with the gorgeous man. It was a whirlwind engagement that left a few people shocked, and more than a few assuming I must be pregnant (I wasn’t). So we decided to lean into the whole “shotgun wedding” narrative. Our ‘save the date’ invites featured me dressed as a pregnant hillbilly, with my wonderfully kooky dad posing behind Chris and me with a shotgun, implying an enforced marriage. We tied the knot just four months later. And now, 10 years on, I can happily say we’re still going strong – and still laughing.

5. I lost my last baby tooth at the age of 32.
I know. Odd, right? Turns out there was never an adult tooth underneath it, so it just stayed put. Eventually, it had to be removed by a periodontist. Having waited nearly 32 years for the tooth fairy to show up, I figured this tooth must have gained some interest on the original two-dollar coin I never received. Surely, by now, it was worth at least a five-dollar note. So, with great hope, I placed my final baby tooth on the windowsill. The stingy tooth fairy, however, left me just one miserable chocolate peanut. A far cry from reimbursing me for the rather expensive dental implant that followed.

6. One of my most prized possessions is a taxidermy stag head hunted by my greatgrandfather in the 1940’s.
I’ve named him Lenny, after my great-grandfather Leonard. He hangs on the wall in our lounge. When my son was three years old, he developed a habit of swearing, completely unaware of what “naughty words” actually were. One day, I overheard him in the lounge, delightfully chatting to the stag and calling it a “f**king reindeer”. I think he believed it was one of Santa's reindeer that had accidentally crashed through the wall and become stuck while trying to land on our roof at Christmas. Now, every December, Lenny gets a red nose.

7. I’m a giant.
Okay, technically I’m only 5 foot 10, but I feel like a giant. I shot up before all the boys at school, which is a crushing blow to any 12-year-old’s self-esteem. At my year eight formal, I finally plucked up the courage to dance with my crush, who, unfortunately, was eye level with my chest. In hindsight, he probably wasn’t too bothered, except that my body seemed to use all its energy growing upwards, leaving other, err, developments for much, much later.

8. I am a grateful recipient of the lifesaving service that is Life Flight.
While I wouldn’t necessarily call this a fun fact, I was flown on a Life Flight Air Ambulance while pregnant with my twins. At the time, there were very few NICU beds available across the country, which placed me in a dangerously overdue situation and threatened the life of one twin in the womb. I was transferred on an emergency flight from Wellington Hospital to Palmerston North Hospital – one of the few places with available NICU beds. I’m now fortunate to have two healthy twin boys, along with their older sister. I’m incredibly thankful for the amazing team at Life Flight and the outstanding medical staff here in New Zealand.

9. I spent a whole heap of money on a largely unused degree.
In high school, I wanted to study radio, but decided it might be too risky career-wise. So instead, I opted to study acting at New Zealand’s leading drama school, Toi Whakaari (I’m not quite sure why I thought that was the safer option). Fast forward three years, and I realised that my favourite part of the intense, and very expensive, degree was actually the small bit of radio voicing I did for a handful of radio plays. So, I then went on to study radio after all. An expensive reminder to always trust your gut!

10. I’m secretly an old soul – a 90-year-old trapped in a 34-year-old’s body.
If I weren’t married, my dating profile would probably read: “Loves reading,

gardening and staying in on a Friday night. Always up for discussing self-pollinating

trees.” Thankfully, I’m not single, because, as my husband once put it, “I’m not sure we would have matched if we’d met on Tinder.” Ouch.

Catch Hayley on The Hits 95FM weekdays from 9am to 3pm.