‘My Eyes Were So Swollen I Was Unable to Even Unseal Them’

Amanda Preisinger experiences worry about her child’s upcoming 13th birthday party. It’s not due to the typical causes related to a house full of loud adolescent kids, but because it’s the initial occasion she will showcase her recently altered face to acquaintances and relatives. “Obviously I’m going to inform everyone as they arrive, ‘Just so you know, this is not the way I look,’” states the 30-year-old property agent from Southern Florida.

Her appearance is, well, a little startling – her face swollen and preternaturally lifted, as though secured by industrial-grade tape. Her new – and she’s eager to emphasize, temporary – look is the result of six cosmetic procedures, such as an endoscopic mid-facelift, performed by a surgeon in Turkey’s Istanbul, the previous month. “My poor husband became emotional when he viewed me for the first time because I couldn’t even unseal my eyes. That indicates puffy I was,” she tells me via video call from her house. “I needed to inform him: ‘Honey, I’m fine, I’m not in pain. I just appear as if someone attacked me.’”

Increasing Popularity of Early Facelifts

Based on plastic surgeons, Preisinger is one of a growing number of people electing to undergo a rhytidectomy in their 20s and 30s – well over a ten years before most doctors’ usual candidate age of 40 to 60. (Although most surgeons are eager to highlight the professional guideline of: “We treat heredity, not age.”) “I have individuals in their late twenties requesting facelifts,” says based in London aesthetic plastic surgeon Georgios Orfaniotis, a ex-NHS doctor who specialises in the head and neck. “It’s a major procedure, and I’m a bit concerned when I see individuals opting for it as a personal preference.”

Understanding the Rhytidectomy Surgery

A rhytidectomy, also known as a rhytidectomy, elevates the ligaments in the face that begin to droop as we age. “Our faces are structured a bit like onion layers,” says Kent-based facial plastic surgeon Marc Pacifico. “Skin and fat on the surface, then a layer of supportive tissue known as the superficial musculoaponeurotic system. Think of the SMAS as the structural foundation of the face. And that’s what ages us; that’s what loosens and sags and pulls the skin downward with it.”

You endanger performing surgery on individuals that have deeper issues. It’s not advisable for an ethical plastic surgeon to pursue

Previously reserved of moneyed older people, “filler fatigue” – when excessive use of dermal fillers stretches the face and causes laxity in the dermis – combined with the widespread use of slimming medications, cut-price surgical travel, and the development of novel, celebrity-endorsed operative methods are driving a different type of patient towards this major operation. Statistics show an eight percent rise in facelifts over the last year in the UK; while a study found that the portion of younger facelift patients is increasing, with 32% of facelifts now conducted for individuals aged 35-55.

“People are asking now to appear as the optimal form of themselves and obviously the methods are following,” comments Orfaniotis. At present, the operation du jour is the comprehensive facial lift, a method evangelised by everyone from Kardashian matriarch Kris Jenner, to fashion designer Marc Jacobs.

Deep Plane Technique

Where a more traditional facelift involves elevating the SMAS, the deep plane facelift loosens the underlying structures beneath it, allowing doctors to reshape the face by repositioning the deeper tissue, and preventing the tight, stretched appearance occasionally caused by older methods. “We’re not putting stress on the skin because we’re targeting deeper, to the underlying structures,” explains Harley Street plastic surgeon Rajiv Grover, who focuses on the advanced method. “It is the deeper tissue that is adjusted. The skin follows along as a passenger.” Elevating the entire soft tissue layer as a unified block results in a more natural-looking and more durable result. It additionally implies that the procedure is no longer being used for the express purpose of anti-ageing – or rejuvenation, as the cosmetic field describes it – but for “beautification” and facial restructuring, too. “We’re getting numerous requests from patients aged 28 to 35 for this reason,” notes Grover.

Individual Experience

Preisinger had never planned on undergoing a facial lift – at least not at the thirty years old. But long-term using injectable gels in an attempt at “symmetry correction” implied that by the time she entered her late 20s, she was “botched”. “I didn’t do this because I desired to appear youthful,” she says. “I did it because the filler harmed my face. I wish I had never using it. If I didn’t have the filler, I don’t think I would be in this situation right now.”

If dermal fillers completely disappear has historically been a point of contention in the cosmetic field. “Studies have indicated that not only do they rarely fully dissipate,” says Grover, “but they migrate and can obstruct drainage pathways. A contributing factor to what we call ‘puffy appearance’ is also the fact that in a sense, the face becomes somewhat fluid-filled because its capacity to drain bodily fluid has been diminished.” Though research into the topic is preliminary, cautionary statements on dermal fillers’ potential impact on the body’s drainage have been released, and further research initiated. One highly regarded face specialist, speaking on the condition of anonymity, mentioned he would never use fillers in a client because of the dangers they present. “Many doctors avoid discussing this, because the manufacturers who make filler can be pretty aggressive.” He’s heard stories, he says, of plastic surgeons facing court orders after raising their concerns.

Decision and Procedure

For Preisinger, after beginning using injectables, she felt as if she had to keep replenishing it – particularly when it began moving to different areas of her face. She was only twenty-eight when a local plastic surgeon in the state proposed that a face and neck lift could be what she needed to exit the injectable hamster wheel. After 24 months, she found herself selecting from a list of suggested accommodations in Istanbul, sent to her by the clinic assistant at her surgeon’s office.

Initially, Preisinger had scheduled an eyelid surgery – commonly called blepharoplasty – but her doctor recommended that a facial lift was the right solution for the looseness she was experiencing in her face. She booked a brow lift, a cheek lift and a neck lift. The eve of her operation, one day after she’d touched down alone in Turkey, she decided to add a mouth enhancement. “Subsequently the surgeon said, ‘We’re going to elevate the under-eye bags.’ Then he said, ‘I think if we remove some cheek fat, it will contour your face.’ So I ended up adding two more surgeries,” she says. She paid $22,000 (£16,500) for the half-day operation, including a three-day|