Should I lose weight before my facelift or after?

If you read through the questions on this site, you will run across some relatively young people seeking facelifts simply because they'd lost a great deal of weight. Without the volume of the fat to support their skin, their faces have begun to sag. If you are planning to lose weight, please do so before your facelift. You should also be at a stable weight because repeatedly gaining and losing weight is another cause of skin sagging – not just on the face but anywhere on the body.
A facelift is a major investment in yourself, both in terms of money and of time. Make the investment pay off as well as it can by investing further in your health and well-being. Once you have stabilized your weight and have a healthy diet and exercise regimen in place, that would be the ideal time for your facelift.
Conversely, if time goes by and you find that you cannot lose the weight, or if you believe a facelift would give you the “boost” you need to feel good enough about yourself to make some lifestyle changes, then do the facelift first. Just know that if you subsequently lose a significant amount of weight, you may have some facial sagging that will need to be remedied with lasers, fillers, and possibly another lift or mini lift. I hope this helps.

I definitely recommend reaching your goal weight before scheduling a face lift. Loss of volume and the resulting appearance of excess or lax skin will definitely affect your face, so a face lift prior to weight loss would not give you the results you want. Once you have reached your goal weight, I recommend that you schedule an appointment for a consultation with a specialist plastic surgeon. Good luck!

Thanks for your question.  I would strongly encourage you to lose weight prior to your procedure.  Your doctor will be tightening everything up based on your current weight.  If you lose 30 lbs, your skin might appear more loose.  Good luck!

I recommend reaching a stable goal weight prior to surgery.  Otherwise, you may develop lose skin if you lose significant weight after surgery. 

It would be great to lose the excess weight.  But losing 30 pounds prior or after a facelift really won't make a difference.  I have done plenty of facelifts on women who have later lost weight.  None of them ended up sagging again.  So lose the weight beforehand if you can.  If not losing it later is fine, too.

Thirty pounds is significant. If you have gained and then lost weight before and know that fat will come off of the face I would loss the weight before your procedure. If a significant amount of facial fat loss occurs the skin could loosen. A modest amount of weight gain or loss will not affect your facelift and some weight loss may even improve your result.

Hi ivygirl,The only concern about losing weight, in terms of the final result of the facelift, is the loss of volume that can occur. As we age, the face sags from gravity, but we also lose volume. Losing volume in the face will definitely affect the result of the facelift.I do not think that losing 30 pounds over a period of just a few months is a healthy plan and if you want to do the facelift after the weight loss, I would probably recommend that you wait longer than a few months before proceeding with the procedure. On the other hand, if you definitely want to do the facelift in the next few months, I would probably do the facelift first, because weight loss of that amount should probably be spread out over more than just a few months. However, if you do proceed with the facelift first, keep in mind that you may need to have a minor touch up procedure or consider some volume enhancement to help achieve an optimal result.

A lot of weight loss can deflate the face from fat loss.  This is an elective procedure so if you really think you will lose the weight hold off on the facelift.  If you have a certain timeline then try to lose half the weight now and half after and it probably won't make a difference then.  Best of luck!

I would recommend you work on losing your desired weight before the procedure so that you do not risk skin excess after the procedure due to the weight loss. This may create a felt need for additional work.
Good luck!

With weight loss you will loose volume in your face and can experience skin excess.  It would be better to wait.  If loosing less than 10 lbs it should be fine to undergo the procedure but if looking to loose more than this, especially 30 lbs, I would recommend waiting.