In the end, worth it - Chicago, IL

Wonderful and long-term experience, ups and downs. Please read in entirety. I waited years to write this review because that's the only way to really know.

A few years ago I did Cellfina with Dr. Casas. I was very excited about it and we treated a lot of areas with a lot of insertions. Afterwards, however, the results did NOT progress as Merz (manufacturer) had said they would ... There was a lot of initial extra sagging, and the insertion marks looked dark and awful for quite some time. I was horrified, scared, indignant... you name it. I was afraid my body had been "ruined" and I had moments of severe panic. 

In a case like this, the one thing you really need is a doctor who is YOUR advocate. That's rare, often because it's hard for doctors to take a position of discord with a big supplier they work with. But I got very lucky - I had Dr. Casas. She got in touch with Cellfina, told them about my results and just how scared and unhappy I was, and that she was, too. She asked them why this would happen with me and not her other patients, and they admitted that their recovery description did NOT take into account the prolonged healing time of darker skinned patients...! As for the sagging I had, if I remember correctly.... it seems it was because we did a lot of insertions, so it would look more saggy before everything started to tighten up. 

Truthfully I was VERY upset at times when I went into her office afterwards. I was civil but it was obvious I might cry at moments. And I got nothing but authentic sympathy and compassion from Dr. Casas. At first I didn't know if it was just talk, but luckily it was more. She was very patient with me, she did extra free treatments to speed up the healing of the insertion marks, and she gave me a solid discounts on another expensive treatment I wanted, to make up for the fear I was experiencing. 

Most wisely she asked me to be patient - let's see how things go and don't be scared, we will fix it and get it right no matter what. And patience was the answer. It took much longer than Cellfina had promised, but with patience (and Dr. Casas extra treatments), all the marks went away and the results finally showed up. And indeed, Cellfina does a great job at its task. 

I do hope that Merz is now providing relevant information for darker skinned clients, I'm sure they are. But this review is mostly to thank Dr. Casas, way after the fact. I'm grateful that even when I was in tears or frustrated Dr. Casas didn't just shake me off and say "this is the risk of aesthetic treatments, etc etc." She really never abandoned me, she did everything she could to get me my result, get me happy and she stuck with me over the long term. Bravo.

Photos are in my "Worth It?" section, I don't know if I've posted my final result ones but I should, I'm almost cellulite free now... if I could stop eating peanut butter cups I might actually get there lol.

I know this is going to sound in contradiction to everything before. It turns out that for people with darker skin, the insertion marks take WAY longer to fade. I'm a light skinned Indian, so if you are anything comparable, just plan mentally for the insertion marks to take double or triple the time to fade. I also have to say, I am now 2.5 years post procedure and it really is looking so smooth back there. Again I'm in shock, cuz for a year it was like I had ruined my own backside. But no, now things look really good! Not like, Gigi Hadid good, but I mean massive improvement. So my conclusion is that the questions to ask yourself are how many insertions you will have (my doc generously did a ton, not knowing the marks would take longer on me), can you tolerate slower resolution of the insertions if you have more melanin, and are you patient for results! I'm happy now but for 2 years I was really in fear.
*Just so you have all the info, other factors: I work out a lot now (pure barre, hip hop dance, strength training, and I'm about to try some boxing based stuff, yah!!! :D). Also, I now eat a lot fewer carbs, so I have also lost between 4-7 pounds. I wasn't going to bother updating but I figured I had to, since I was so worried in my earlier posts. I'll add photos when the light is right!

cellulite is still there, totally irregular, and the dark marks are horrible. They treated some irregularity with Ultherapy, zapped the marks with IPL and now zapped them with Fraxel (about 3 weeks ago, so some of the redness might be that). But still, it is 8 months out and look what I have to show for this. Legs I can't expose. Depressed.