sashab

Hi surgery buddies. Springup and I have been holding hands across the miles to keep up each other's spirits, now we have a whole group! My smile wasn't lopsided, but one eye was smaller than the other for months. I did some little push up under the eye exercises for 10 seconds every hour to relax the muscles and pull gently on the cut skin under my eyes.

I had forgotten the scab picking! It drove me nuts to have blood in my hair and scabs for so long, I can't believe I forgot it. Its either because I'm 60 or because all this healing will fade for all of us. I hope its because bad news fades, not my memory, LOL. Between me pulling out hair with the picking and all the hair loss from losing an inch of scalp with the forehead lift, it was not pretty. I don't have thick hair to begin with, but its loking much better now.

I do have deeper marionette lines than I thought I would and little lines under my lip, but they are going to have to stay there. I can't handle more needles or laser or anything else that hurts yet. I wasn't going for perfect, just better, and I've definitely got that.

I'm glad the rest of you are getting happier and happier. Keep up the good healing.

SashaB

face escape - that's great news that you are happy. Always glad to hear someone is pleased after all the money and misery. May you all feel that way soon.

SashaB

Hi Miserylovescompany! We're getting quite the "merry" little band here. I'm sorry you're having panic, I think you've probably read others have experienced panic, too. I didn't have that problem, but I did have the misery. I had the laser around my eyes and my mouth about 10 years ago, in a separate procedure and it was quite extensive. The after care was a lot and the doctor didn't tell me I would have such swollen eyes I couldn't get them open for a day or two. The results were wonderful, though. I think I can say the same about the face lift.

No clue the recovery would take so long, but wonderful results. I'm quite happy with my results. I do still have a bit of tightness at my neck, no lumpness at all, and I don't believe I ever had any ridges, although others have.

Best of luck with these next few weeks and then I bet you'll start to be happy with your results.

SashaB

Hi Balloonhead. Sorry you are feeling so bad. I'm sure you are correct, its probably like having a very sore muscle and when you stand up and move around it hurts until you get the motion back in the muscle. We inflict a lot on our heads and necks to have this surgery and its going to take time.

I especially agree that the recovery time is glossed over. We are told that "full healing" takes a year, but not that it will be full blown misery for months. Plastic surgery is incredibly lucrative, there is no messing with insurance, you pay up front and there is little follow up. Just taking all the insurance hassle and payment wait out of the equation has to be a huge benefit to the doctor's office. This must be a field to coin money in or you wouldn't see every dentist and doctor jumping in and offering surgery after a 3 days course. Of course, their liability is huge, too, since we want results for all this.

My surgeon was excellent, he was also fairly indifferent to what went on past the first few days and his PA was a complete jerk. I'd have to recommend him for his beautiful work, but I'd give him a zero for follow up and his office staff is a joke. Since his work is what I'll wear for the rest of my life, I'm just going to move on about the rest of it.

SashaB

Oh.My.Gosh. Paddington Princess, that is the scariest thing I've seen on this site and I am so sorry this has happened to you. We all know there can be a problem outcome, we never expect it to be us. I'm just so sorry.

May your doctor be correct, may you have the results you want when this set back is over. I know I had so much swelling and bruising I looked like a pumpkin, color and all. I had clots in my drains. And I've had a very positive outcome.

To all of you, I'm 60, my surgery was in June, and I'm happy. Recovery was miserable, long and obvious to everyone that I had something major done.

But, I'm glad I did it, I have the results I wanted and I like the way I look.

Many healing thoughts sent to all ofyou.

SashaB