Board Certified Plastic Surgeon
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Dr. Said is a board-certified plastic surgeon with over 20 years of experience, specializing in the breast, face and body. He listens carefully to his patients, and works hard to deliver what they want with compassion, artistry and attention to detail.
Asked By: luna_moon7
ANSWER
Hi Luna, excellent question! The Preservé technique is intended for undisturbed anatomy, and has about 6 main benefits: shorter scar, avoiding cutting and dissection should preserve sensation and support, avoiding the muscle makes movement look more natural, feel less painful, and shorten recovery. Depending on if you have already lost sensitivity, have a long scar, already lost internal support ligaments, or cut the muscle to cover the implant, then you might not get any benefits from using Preservé. If you have a short scar, a small implant and are upsizing, you still might benefit. Talk about it with a board-certified surgeon who offers Preservé to see if it makes sense for you
Asked By: Hubertina
ANSWER
Hi Hubertina, great question! If you mean the dark areas under your eyes, which can look blue, purple or just darker than the surrounding skin, the answer is yes. Lipofilling works very well for that and almost nothing else does. The fat of the upper cheek slides downward over time, leaving just the thin skin of the undereye immediately over muscles, veins and lymphatics, which all look purple, bluish or at least a little darker. You can try to put make-up on, but it will not fill in the valley from the missing fat. You can try to use a synthetic filler but that area will still look dark. Natural fat, on the other hand, can solve both problems: it adds a creamy yellow layer to restore a lighter color and also smooths out the valley. It can be injected using your own fat, using tiny pinpoint incisions for fat removal and fat re-injection. Although you lose a little bit of fat during the transfer process, most of the fat usually stays and unlike fillers, usually does not require re-treatment. It makes a world of difference in how tired you look. Hope that helps!
Asked By: fg0111
ANSWER
Hi fg0111,You should consider a lollipop lift, which will reduce the areola, move it upward into a perkier position and tighten the lower breast where it used to be. You will be very happy with the shape improvement you get from that. Find a board-certified plastic surgeon with pictures you are happy with. There are so many terrific surgeons in the Dallas area, it's hard to go wrong. Bring them pictures of the breasts you would like to have. That will really help your surgeon know what shape to give you. Go for it! Hope that helps!
Asked By: Happycamper1243
ANSWER
Hi Happycamper1243,Depending on your desired look, there are a number of good options for you. You may be asking for a donut incision because you realize that a standard augmentation with round implants will give you a downward-looking nipple, which will look worse. I think you are right. You will be back on this forum trying to find a solution after that. Many examples of it, if you look around here...If you are open to a teardrop-shaped implant and a more natural looking breast, you could have a full but graceful augmentation and completely avoid the scars around the nipple. On the other hand, if the areola size is a key point for you, you might consider correcting that first, improving your tuberous breast anatomy, getting ideal aesthetics in a small breast, and then later have the augmentation to a size of your choosing. Either way, you will be on track to reach the breasts you are looking for. On the other hand, without a good plan, a basic breast augmentation will tend to make your nipple look lower, and the donut excision will not be enough to compensate for that. You should be able to keep your sensation, but the tighter the donut lift, the more flattened the central breast will be. Find a board-certified plastic surgery you can talk to about your concerns, plan ahead, and you will get what you want. The final result is the important thing, not a shortcut that leaves you unhappy. Hope that helps!
Asked By: Miamimia
ANSWER
Hi Miamimia, Lifts around the nipple often run into those issues of stretching out. There are two options for that: a gore-tex suture can be very effective in keeping the areola small, and a lollipop lift is ultimately the solution if the gore-tex is not enough.If the implant keeps drifting down, usually it is a sign that you are slender, with delicate tissues that need help holding that implant in place. There are mesh options, both organic (expensive) and synthetic (cheaper), to keep the implant in better position without depending on your skin to carry that weight. You might also consider textured implants, which stay in place much better, so they don't drift down. Talk to your surgeon about those options, or find one who will make a detailed plan to help you fix these correctable issues. Hope that helps!
Asked By: RSProfile3695427
ANSWER
Hi RSProfile3695427, First off, It looks like you have come a long way with your mommy makeover, looking at your picture number 6, so congratulations on that! Once the swelling subsides, it can be disappointing to find out that your skin elasticity is not corrected by removing some of that skin and fat. Just getting active again will stretch things out a bit, and your skin won't spring back the way it used to. On top of that, your body is trying to reaccumulate the missing reserves of fat that were removed-- that's the so-called rebound effect. That doesn't mean anything was done wrong, but it is a reason to optimize your diet and get to a sustainable weight plan before surgery. Once all those changes settle in, if the skin is loose in places, that can relatively easily be tightened without having to redo everything. You surgeon knows that, and would very likely want to see you get to your goals. Ask for help-- the time, cost and recovery are all much easier than the first round, and your surgeon will meet you partway. I know I would. Hope that helps!
Asked By: realself270681
ANSWER
Hi realself270681, Everyone wants their breasts to look better, bigger, and younger. Sometimes you can only have 2 out of 3 at one time, and something has to give. I am sorry to tell you that this would have been much easier and cheaper to do BEFORE putting in your implants, and it is entirely predictable that your right nipple position would look worse with a high, round, full implant. You need a lollipop lift for the right breast to put the nipple in a perkier, matching position. That can not be done while your breasts are tightly overfilled with the implants you have, so they would need to be removed for a while, or at the very least, downsized temporarily. Your scars are not optimal, most likely because they were under so much tension from the implants placed at the same setting-- that's another consequence of those prior choices. Another option going forward is just waiting enough time until the skin loosens, and eventually you can have the right nipple lifted, but that might be years away, living with one downward-looking nipple. Taking out implants and replacing them is expensive; which ever way you decide to proceed, there are some issues you will need to backtrack to fix. The good news is that you can get there, with a little careful planning, to having beautiful, bodacious, perky, matching breasts, with a surgeon carefully guiding you toward that goal. The bad news is you can't have it all at once. Find a board-certified plastic surgeon you can really talk to, to help you get there. Hope that helps!
Asked By: jasminm
ANSWER
Hi Jasmin, Although the changes you note are real, they are still too subtle to be worth a full facelift. When people feel they need a facelift, they are really asking about a number of different components which can be treated separately without the full downtime, scars or risks of a full facelift. I like to break those parts into the lower eyelid (mid face), the cheek, the lower face / jawline, and the neck -- which has a superficial and deep part. For example, I might offer lower eyelift, fat grafting to the tear troughs and superficial neck tightening as an early intervention without the full facelift scar around the ears, in fact almost no scarring at all. Then later in life, you could come back for the cheek, face and lower jawline to treat those ares when they need it. In your case, from the pictures you show, the only element you seem to need is treatment to smooth the jawline on the left side. I would find a dermatologist you can trust, with a local treatment option to gently tighten the skin there, and save your money for surgery another day. Consider needle treatments, sometimes done with energy (like the Agnes system), and a dermatologist with the skills for subtle correction. If you don't know of one, your plastic surgeon should be able to recommend one, as we often try to partner with the good ones to offer comprehensive care. Hope that helps!
Asked By: Learning430555
ANSWER
Hi Learning, Thanks for this question. Patients often believe that facelifts "last" or "go away", and usually that means they don't understand how things works. A facelift cannot make you look a certain age forever, but it will have effects that last forever. Let's say you are 50, a facelift might make you look 40, but you will still continue to age, and eventually 5 years later you will look 45 years old. On the other hand, you don't go back to looking 55 where you would have been (now you look 45). Those years which it returned to you are still yours to keep. That is not true of many non-surgical treatments (I'm looking at you thread lifts!) which have a temporary effect and when they wear out, you are back to where you would have been anyway. Kind of wasted value there. You have some jowling and loose areas in your lower face which are very treatable with a lower facelift. We can debate whether that will make you 5 or 7 or 10 years younger, but that effect should be durable (assuming it is done well). It's a little bit like painting a house. The paint will fade eventually, but that is not a reason to do it. A fresh coat of paint may make you feel much better about your house. Hope that helps!
Asked By: JoanX
ANSWER
Hi Joan, This is a great question about timing surgery with weight loss. Of course, the ideal situation is to reach a stable ideal weight and stay there for a while before surgery. The tricky part is sometimes knowing when you have reached a stable point, especially since many people cycle in a range all the time, and that is normal. I like to tell people that 20 lbs or less of weight fluctuation has a modest to minimal impact on tightness. More than that (like 30# or more) will start to require a revision to retighten a surgical result. That threshold really depends on age and skin elasticity and genetic factors. I have seen patients spring back after more weight loss than that and still look good, but 20# is a point where most people will still look fine. Also you never know if this is actually your new stable weight, and you might be waiting forever for the number to get lower than that. So, if you are within 20# of your goal, I would say you are basically ready for surgery, and unlikely to mess it up even with a little more weight loss. Go for it! Hope that helps!
Dr. Hakim Said continues to receive high praise for his surgical expertise, compassionate care, and natural-looking results. Patients highlight his thorough consultations, attentive post-operative support, and detailed surgical skills. His ability to address both cosmetic and health-related concerns has solidified his reputation as a top plastic surgeon in Seattle.
