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POSTED UNDER Botox for TMJ REVIEWS

Terrible Jowls After Masseter Botox

ORIGINAL POST

Terrible Jowls After Masseter Botox

Susan Harrison
$1,000
I am 44 and have a mild superior jowl on my left side and went to get a thread lift just on that side to improve it. Before the procedure, I told the plastic surgeon that I also have TMJ and was curious about masseter Botox to relieve it. I was surprised that he said we could do both in the same session since I assumed we'd want to do botox first and then threadlift after the botox shrunk the jaw, but I trusted his opinion. After he was finished, I was elated to look in the mirror and see my saggy left side nice a tight and balanced with my right side. But what followed has been a nightmare. 4 days after the treatment, I started noticing worsening of marionette lines around my mouth and that my usually triangular jawline was starting to sag, giving me new inferior jowls where I did not have them before. This got worse and worse over the coming weeks as my masseter continued to shrink, thus making my skin and jowl fat (usually stretch taught by my masters) slide forward towards my mouth and hang down, until one morning I looked in the mirror and saw a woman that looked 20 years older. When I contacted my doctor he told me he "didn't know why that happened" and, in his defense, gave me a thread lift of now both sides of my face for free to correct it which unfortunately did absolutely nothing but swell up my lower face for three weeks. So I then not only had saying fat along my jawline, but the sag was exaggerated by the jawline swelling.
It has now been 4 months since the initial botox procedure and my masseters are still gone. The upside is that my TMJ pain has been greatly received, but I would have preferred to not have paid $1,000 to look 20 years older and would do ANYthing to go back in time and have not done this.

Replies (23)

July 9, 2021
That sounds so frustrating! Hopefully when the Botox wears off your muscles in your jaw will return to normal...hopefully not your tmj. I'm wishing you the best.
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September 22, 2021
How are you doing now?
September 22, 2021
Finally starting to look back to normal, how I looked before the procedure. The thread lift did absolutely nothing, and the Botox aged me 10 years. Way to flush thousands down the toilet.
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September 23, 2021
Do you feel as though you still look aged? Or is your face returning to its more youthful appearance since your masseters are growing back? I’m just curious because the same thing is happening with me
January 10, 2022
Same here. Seems like the consensus is that it takes approx. 6 mos. to return to pre-botox masseters. I can’t flippin’ wait. #jowledANDimpatient !
September 23, 2021
No not more aged. I'm basically back to how I looked before now at this point :) (just bummed to have wasted so much money).
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September 24, 2021
That’s good news! Gives me hope. Thank you and glad you’re doing better
December 16, 2021
Thank you, I feel better! I have a terrible crooked smile after my procedure and I’m improving but I’m so concerned it won’t ever be back to what it was :(
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December 27, 2021
Hi Hannah, did you get masseter botox? Have you improved? How many units? How long did it take?
July 11, 2025
Did you ever get your face back to normal?
December 14, 2021
How long did it take your masseters to go back to normal? I had masseter Botox done and had the exact same results as you did. Been contemplating fillers or something to fix the marionette lines and thinking of even a facelift at age 44 for the jowls! I was hoping if I stopped the master Botox my masseters would return to normal, but I haven't had it done since the end of July and still not noticing an improvement yet. Hopefully in a few more months I can build those muscles back up.
December 24, 2021
Hi there. I hope you see this- I am glad your face went back to normal! I wasn wondering how much you got injected in each side? I just got this procedure done - 15 units each side for the first time - I am now hoping I will be ok and not saggy - my doctor said I have nothing to worry about, but now I am seeing all the bad reviews :-(