Ali Wentworth Says She'll Wear Black Turtlenecks Instead of Getting More Plastic Surgery: 'I Just Don't Quite Care Enough'

Ali Wentworth, 52, the star and executive producer of Nightcap on Pop TV, reflects on aging in an essay she penned exclusively for PEOPLE in this year’s World’s Most Beautiful issue.

It’s been said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Clearly that was said before Instagram and HD television. Lately I’ve been in an editing bay watching dailies from my show Nightcap—and I find myself so distracted by my aging facade, I can hardly focus on the comedy and carefully crafted fart jokes! The lines aren’t just unsightly, they’re a reminder that middle age is here and the march of time seems to be accelerating. So how do I reconcile with being a woman of a certain age? Not easily.

It doesn’t help that I have age dysmorphia. I think because I am childish with an infantile sense of humor that my outside reflects my inside. On many occasions I have pointed to a gaggle of 20-something-year-old gals giggling over sake and sushi and asked my husband, “Do I look that age?” He always gazes at me with a saddened, sympathetic expression. “No. You could be their mother.” And I’m shocked! What happened to my face? When did I become that old lady?

RELATED VIDEO: And the World’s Most Beautiful Woman 2017 is….

Watch the full episode of People Cover Story: World’s Most Beautiful People now on the new People/Entertainment Weekly Network (PEN). Go to PEOPLE.com/PEN or download the PEN app on your favorite device.

Every once in a while I look down at my iPad in the brightness of daylight in order to torture myself with every age spot and wrinkle. I ponder how I took for granted my youth by basking in the sun and never moisturizing. I remember the days when Maybelline mascara and Bonne Bell lip gloss were more than enough to make me “date-ready.” And how now my bathroom looks like the storage closet of Sephora. How many tubes of antiaging serum can a lady hoard? I try to remember to exfoliate, derma-scrub, oil up and mask my skin. And then layer moisturizing SPF 30 face cream with hydration and micro-youth beads. But nobody is carding me when I order my glass of Pinot Noir.

The lotions-and-potions portion of life is clearly coming to a close, and the time of nipping and tucking is upon me. My friends are trading plastic-surgeon numbers like 10-year-old boys with baseball cards. And there isn’t just one doctor who does the full menu, soup to nuts. There’s a specialist for each feature. The best doctor to shave your chin is uptown, and the best doctor for a three-quarter face-lift is in TriBeCa. With eyes, nose and boobs in Midtown. I have girlfriends burning their faces off, then hiding for 10 days in gauze. These women are drowning their faces in bowls of ice or popping Vicodin for post-liposuction pain. I had the bags of my eyes done a few years ago. More for professional survival than ego. And it was elective surgery I don’t feel like repeating. I don’t like flu shots or getting my teeth cleaned, and I’m saving a colonoscopy for my 60s. So the idea of slicing, burning, scraping and digging deep enough to hit the pipe of the fountain of youth is terrifying.

Julia Roberts is the 2017 World’s Most Beautiful Woman! Learn her secrets to staying young — and subscribe now for this special edition featuring over 50 pages of beauties — only in PEOPLE!

Maybe it’s a combination of fear of the scalpel and the feeling I just don’t care quite enough to execute what is necessary to sharply shave off some years. Honestly, I’d rather not compete, and it will be such a relief to wear black turtlenecks and huge straw hats and start growing beefsteak tomatoes!