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*Treatment results may vary
All healed up and still no edema! :)
So I’m about 4 months out from mini-facelift surgery, which also caused the incidental removal of the Bellafill. Looking ever so much better. I can feel my face again! No more wads of Bellafill in my nasolabial folds and chin!
The edema has not returned and I don’t expect it will.
The edema has not returned and I don’t expect it will.
Bellafill finally gone. And so is the edema.
So, end of story: I ultimately came to the conclusion that the only way to get rid of the Bellafill was to have it surgically removed. I went to 4 dermatologists who were all familiar with and most of them offered Bellafill in their practice. None of them seemed to think that there was any reason not to believe that the Bellafill was causing my ongoing edema. There just wasn't anything they could do about it. One of them put me on a supplement called "WaterEase" that I highly recommend if you have edema issues. It certainly helped some. But after more than a year, the edema never resolved.
I could literally grab a hunk of my face and it was squishy. Ultimately, I consulted 3 plastic surgeons, none of whom were aiming to "remove the Bellafill" especially, but there certainly was some improvement to be expected from a mini-facelift, so I opted for that.
My surgeon told me at that he was going to "try" to scrape a little of the Bellafill out. But he never had to. He said that when he made the incisions to do the mini facelift and lifted the skin, that this gelationous "stuff" just oozed out. He said it was obvious that it was Bellafill.
The day of and the day after the surgery, it was obvious that the edema was gone. My face was so much thinner! I looked like me again!
I was told by my injector that the "medical director" at Suneva said that "Bellfill can't cause edema." I had read a trial that is on Suneva's own website that showed one patient with ongoing edema still after 24 weeks that hadn't resolved. So that's not true. Bellafill can cause edema. And not one medical professional that I saw in the past year had any problem whatsoever accept that Bellafill could have caused my edema.
After my surgery, and the removal of the Bellafill, which was not really by design, but Thank God it "removed itself" the edema is completely resolved. It cost me a LOT of money, but more than that, it cost me over a year of my life--running around to doctors, massaging my face, trying this solution and that solution. It also made me feel self conscious and caused me no end of anxiety.
I'm glad that my story had a happy ending. Obviously, not everyone who gets Bellafill gets ongoing edema that requires surgery to resolve. But I did. And the person in the study on the Bellafill website did. Which means that someone else could too. I don't want that someone else to be you.
The photos I'm posting show me the day before the surgery, and the day after. I'm about 6 weeks out from surgery now, so still healing...in more ways than one.
I could literally grab a hunk of my face and it was squishy. Ultimately, I consulted 3 plastic surgeons, none of whom were aiming to "remove the Bellafill" especially, but there certainly was some improvement to be expected from a mini-facelift, so I opted for that.
My surgeon told me at that he was going to "try" to scrape a little of the Bellafill out. But he never had to. He said that when he made the incisions to do the mini facelift and lifted the skin, that this gelationous "stuff" just oozed out. He said it was obvious that it was Bellafill.
The day of and the day after the surgery, it was obvious that the edema was gone. My face was so much thinner! I looked like me again!
I was told by my injector that the "medical director" at Suneva said that "Bellfill can't cause edema." I had read a trial that is on Suneva's own website that showed one patient with ongoing edema still after 24 weeks that hadn't resolved. So that's not true. Bellafill can cause edema. And not one medical professional that I saw in the past year had any problem whatsoever accept that Bellafill could have caused my edema.
After my surgery, and the removal of the Bellafill, which was not really by design, but Thank God it "removed itself" the edema is completely resolved. It cost me a LOT of money, but more than that, it cost me over a year of my life--running around to doctors, massaging my face, trying this solution and that solution. It also made me feel self conscious and caused me no end of anxiety.
I'm glad that my story had a happy ending. Obviously, not everyone who gets Bellafill gets ongoing edema that requires surgery to resolve. But I did. And the person in the study on the Bellafill website did. Which means that someone else could too. I don't want that someone else to be you.
The photos I'm posting show me the day before the surgery, and the day after. I'm about 6 weeks out from surgery now, so still healing...in more ways than one.
Still fighting the edema
So, still seeing a dermatologist weekly at the moment, and have scheduled 2 follow ups with another dermatologist just to see if they have any other possible ideas to help with this edema, and 2 plastic surgeons. My current derm has injected 4 vials of Voluma so far and 2 of Vollure to see if she can help lift my sagging face back up. I'm taking a daily supplement (Water Ease) which helps enormously, but if I forget to take it, I look just like I looked after the Bellafill did its damage. So, the supplement is just keeping the swelling at bay--not actually healing anything. The pockets of fluid alongside my mouth are still therem along with the deep grooves that have formed on both sides of my mouth.
There are now 2 small pockets of edema above MY EYEBROWS where, for who knows what reason, the injector also placed some Bellafill, according to the treatment chart. There are many areas where my current dermatologist says she can't understand why Bellafill would have been injected there.
The worse part is that my entire facial expression has been altered by this process with the Bellafill and I don't look happy like I used to. I look angry all the time as the edema around the eyes and above them has given me an angry look when my face is at rest. I have to focus on what my expression looks like, and I've discovered that looking angry makes you feel angry, weirdly. I find myself worrying about things like how I hold my face so that it doesn't droop. Terrible.
REPEAT ADVICE: Walk quickly away from Bellafill. I wish I had.
There are now 2 small pockets of edema above MY EYEBROWS where, for who knows what reason, the injector also placed some Bellafill, according to the treatment chart. There are many areas where my current dermatologist says she can't understand why Bellafill would have been injected there.
The worse part is that my entire facial expression has been altered by this process with the Bellafill and I don't look happy like I used to. I look angry all the time as the edema around the eyes and above them has given me an angry look when my face is at rest. I have to focus on what my expression looks like, and I've discovered that looking angry makes you feel angry, weirdly. I find myself worrying about things like how I hold my face so that it doesn't droop. Terrible.
REPEAT ADVICE: Walk quickly away from Bellafill. I wish I had.
Provider Review
Bex Laser Aesthetix
Rebecca Baker