CoolSculpting - Round 2

A few more pics…

Now flash forward to February of 2021 for my 3 month follow-up visit at Portland Plastic Surgery where I would take my “after” pictures as a comparison to see what kind of results I’d had. On my own, I didn’t really feel like I’d seen that drastic of an improvement (although my husband was frequently gushing over how great I looked), but I knew that I needed to see the pics to know for sure.
Once again, I was working with Thai, the same nurse I’d seen from the very beginning. More points for Portland Plastic Surgery! She took pics from every possible angle in the same room as previously used with the exact same lighting where I’d had my before pictures taken. And what I really liked is that they have this foam block on the floor with notches cut into it that tells you exactly where to stand and exactly how far apart to place your feet so that your before and after positions are as identical as possible. I really appreciated this because I feel like this really helps you to be able to do the best comparisons possible when looking at the pics.
After the pics were taken, I returned to the room and got dressed, and in less than 5 mins, Thai had the pics uploaded to my private portal so that we could review them together side-by-side with the original before photos.
The results? Well… I have to say they were better than what I expected. I honestly hadn’t noticed much of an improvement at all just by looking at myself. But once I saw the actual photos, there was no denying that there had been some improvement. Was it earth shattering? No. Was it life altering? No. Was I pleased? Sure. The thing I think I was most impressed with was just how much it had smoothed out some of the areas where I’d had cellulite before. It was still there but not nearly as bumpy.
Now I had also been exercising very rigorously and religiously all throughout the 3 months time between my before and after pics, so I’m sure that probably accounted for some of the improvements. But I didn’t lose any pounds during this time, so I’m sure it doesn’t account for all of it.
Overall, I would say that I was pretty satisfied with my second CoolSculpting experience, and I think it’s a good option if you have one or two small stubborn areas where you would like spot reduction. But when you start tacking on multiple contact points all at once, or choose to do several rounds, it gets very expensive very fast, and depending on the level of results you’re aiming for, it might be more cost effective to go with an option like liposuction.
And just to follow-up, I was still really bothered by the unevenness in my hips from my previous negative CoolSculpting experience from a different provider (and which had only gotten worse with time), so I asked Thai about it during my visit, and she told me that fat grafting might be an option for me to fix it, but that I would need to make an appointment to speak with one of their plastic surgeons to know for sure. She recommended that I try to get in to talk to Dr Hayes, so I told her that I would. (More on that later) In the mean time, here are a few before and after pics. You be the judge on if it was worth it or not. And don’t be harsh. My body’s still not where I want it to be.

Fast forward to November 2020 (see my previous CoolSculpting experience from a different provider for full story), and I decided that I would like to try a second round of CoolSculpting in some other areas, but with a different provider this time. I did a bunch of research and had a best friend that had an amazing experience with Portland Plastic Surgery, so I decided to go for a consult there.

On my initial consult, I met with Thai, who is the sweetest, kindest, most beautiful nurse you’ll ever meet. And the greatest part was, she was the same nurse that would be doing the actual CoolSculpting procedure! That was already much different than the first place I went where I initially met with someone different during my first consult than the person who actually did the procedure (and who I didn’t get to meet till the day of). I explained to Thai what had happened during my first experience at the other Plastic Surgeon’s office, and why I was unsatisfied, and she assured me that they did things much differently at PPS. She was so professional and patient with all of my questions and totally put my mind at ease. I decided to go for the whole overhaul (arms, upper/lower abs, flanks and inner thighs), so we would be breaking it up into two separate visits. We discussed the fees which, with the 20% off special that they were running that month, were pretty much in line with what I had paid previously. The difference in price was only because I had added on a few more contact points this time around.

Once the day finally arrived for my first visit (coincidentally the same day I turned 40 - yikes!), I was super excited. And right off the bat, everything was different this time around. Where I wasn’t marked at all before, Thai marked every single area on my body before placing any paddles. And if she wasn’t 100% satisfied with where a paddle was placed, she would remove it and reposition it. I really appreciated this based on my previous experience. She also used the big blue CoolSculpting straps that wrap around you to “lock” the paddles into place so that they can’t accidentally be moved out of position. Another big plus.

Then came the massage at the end once the paddles were removed. Oh, the massage. Let me tell you something… this is unlike any “massage” you’ve ever received. You essentially have a frozen block of fat that is rapidly rewarmed with a deep kneading motion, and it is, how should I put this?…. Less than pleasant. Most of the time, it was still bearable. But for whatever reason, when it came to my upper abs, I was “this close” to throwing in the towel. It was extremely painful, and I had to grit my teeth the whole time and just keep reminding myself, “it’s only 3 minutes, it’s only 3 minutes…” But here’s the thing, don’t let my experience scare you off because Thai assured me that every person is different. She also forewarned me that traditionally arms are very tender for most people, and when it came to my arms, I could have done them in my sleep. No issues whatsoever. So that just goes to show you that you can’t let one person’s experience make you think that yours is going to be identical.

All-in-all, other than the 3 mins where I thought I was going to pass out during my upper abs, the process was definitely bearable, and often times I enjoyed just being able lie back and relax for a bit. A couple hours later, I left the office feeling very pleased with my entire experience. One week later, I returned to finish my remaining contact points and was feeling quite hopeful that I would have much better results this time.