‘I Couldn’t Even Unseal My Eyes. That’s How Swollen I Was’

Amanda Preisinger feels anxious about her daughter’s impending 13th birthday party. It’s not due to the usual reasons associated with a home packed of clamorous preteen children, but because it’s the first time she will showcase her new face to friends and extended family. “Clearly I’m going to inform everyone as they come in, ‘For your information, this is not the way I appear,’” says the thirty-year-old property agent from south Florida.

How she looks is, well, a little surprising – her face puffed up and preternaturally lifted, as though held together by heavy-duty tape. Her new – and she’s eager to emphasize, temporary – appearance is the outcome of half a dozen aesthetic surgeries, such as an endoscopic mid-facelift, performed by a doctor in Turkey’s Istanbul, last month. “My poor husband became emotional when he viewed me for the initial time because I wasn’t able to even unseal my eyes. That indicates swollen I was,” she explains to me via video call from her home. “I needed to inform him: ‘Honey, I’m okay, I’m not hurting. I just look like someone jumped me.’”

Increasing Popularity of Early Facelifts

Based on cosmetic specialists, Preisinger is one of a rising count of people electing to undergo a facelift in their twenties and thirties – well over a ten years prior to typical surgeons’ usual candidate age of 40 to 60. (Though many specialists are eager to highlight the professional guideline of: “We treat genetics, not years.”) “I have individuals in their late twenties asking for facelifts,” says London-based aesthetic plastic surgeon Georgios Orfaniotis, a former NHS consultant who specialises in the head and neck. “It’s a very significant procedure, and I’m a bit concerned when I observe people choosing it as a personal preference.”

Understanding the Rhytidectomy Surgery

A facelift, also known as a facelift, lifts the tissues in the face that start to sag as we grow older. “Human faces are structured a little like onion layers,” explains based in Kent facial plastic surgeon Marc Pacifico. “Dermis and adipose on the top, then a stratum of supportive tissue known as the SMAS. Think of the SMAS as the soft tissue skeleton of the face. And that is what ages us; that is what becomes lax and drags the skin down with it.”

You risk performing surgery on individuals that have underlying problems. It’s not a practice for an conscientious surgeon to pursue

Previously reserved of moneyed older people, “filler fatigue” – when excessive use of injectable gels stretches the face and causes looseness in the skin – alongside the common adoption of weight-loss drugs, low-cost surgical travel, and the development of novel, famous-figure-promoted operative methods are attracting a different type of customer towards this major operation. Statistics show an eight percent rise in facial lifts over the last year in the UK; while a study revealed that the portion of youthful candidates is growing, with one-third of procedures now performed on patients aged thirty-five to fifty-five.

“People are asking now to appear as the best version of themselves and naturally the techniques are following,” comments Orfaniotis. Currently, the operation du jour is the deep plane facelift, a technique promoted by figures including reality TV star Kris Jenner, to style creator Marc Jacobs.

Advanced Lifting Method

While a conventional rhytidectomy involves lifting the superficial layer, the comprehensive lift loosens the underlying structures beneath it, enabling doctors to reshape the face by moving the deeper tissue, and preventing the tight, stretched look sometimes wrought by older methods. “We’re not putting stress on the dermis because we’re targeting deeper, to the deeper tissue,” explains prestigious London plastic surgeon Rajiv Grover, who focuses on the advanced method. “It is the deeper tissue that is repositioned. The dermis comes with it as a passenger.” Lifting the entire soft tissue layer as a single unit results in a authentic-appearing and more durable outcome. It also means that the surgery is no longer being used for the express purpose of anti-ageing – or revitalization, as the cosmetic field terms it – but for “beautification” and contouring, too. “We’re getting numerous requests from patients aged late twenties to mid-thirties for this purpose,” says Grover.

Individual Experience

Preisinger had not intended on undergoing a facial lift – at minimum not at the age of 30. But long-term using hyaluronic acid dermal fillers in an attempt at “symmetry correction” meant that by the time she reached her late 20s, she was “botched”. “I didn’t undergo this because I wanted to look youthful,” she clarifies. “I underwent it because the injectable ruined my face. I wish I had never done it. If I had avoided the filler, I don’t think I would be where I’m at right now.”

If dermal fillers completely disappear has historically been a point of contention in the cosmetic field. “Studies have indicated that they seldom fully dissipate,” says Grover, “but they migrate and can block drainage pathways. One of the contributors to what we term ‘pillow face’ is additionally the reality that to some extent, the face becomes slightly fluid-filled because its capacity to drain bodily fluid has been reduced.” Though studies into the topic is early-stage, cautionary statements on injectables’ potential impact on the body’s drainage have been released, and additional studies announced. An esteemed facial plastic surgeon, commenting anonymously, mentioned he would never use injectables in a client because of the dangers they pose. “Many surgeons don’t want to discussing this, because the manufacturers who make injectables can be pretty aggressive.” He’s heard stories, he adds, of plastic surgeons facing legal actions after expressing worries.

Choice and Surgery

For Preisinger, after beginning injecting filler, she felt as if she had to keep replenishing it – especially as it started to migrate to different areas of her face. She was only twenty-eight when a local plastic surgeon in the state suggested that a face and neck lift could be what she needed to exit the cycle of treatments. After 24 months, she ended up choosing between a selection of suggested accommodations in the city, texted to her by the patient coordinator at her doctor’s clinic.

Initially, Preisinger had planned for an eyelid surgery – better known as blepharoplasty – but her doctor recommended that a facial lift was the right solution for the looseness she was finding in her face. She booked a brow lift, a cheek lift and a jawline surgery. The day before her surgery, 24 hours post she’d arrived alone in Turkey, she opted to include a lip lift. “Subsequently the surgeon stated, ‘We’re going to elevate the under-eye bags.’ Then he said, ‘I believe if we extract some cheek fat, it will sculpt your face.’ Thus I ultimately including additional procedures,” she says. She spent $22,000 (£16,500) for the half-day operation, including a three-day|