Amanda Preisinger feels anxious about her daughter’s upcoming 13th birthday party. Not for the usual causes related to a house full of clamorous preteen kids, but since it’s the first time she will showcase her new face to acquaintances and extended family. “Clearly I’m going to tell all guests as they come in, ‘For your information, this is not how I appear,’” states the 30-year-old property agent from south Florida.
Her appearance is, well, a little surprising – her face swollen and preternaturally lifted, as though held together by industrial-grade tape. Her altered – and she’s eager to emphasize, temporary – look is the outcome of half a dozen aesthetic surgeries, such as an endoscopic mid-facelift, conducted by a doctor in Istanbul, Turkey, the previous month. “My spouse teared up when he saw me for the first time because I wasn’t able to even open my eyes. That’s how puffy I was,” she tells me via video call from her house. “I needed to inform him: ‘Babe, I’m okay, I’m not hurting. 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 choosing to have a rhytidectomy in their twenties and thirties – significantly before a decade before typical surgeons’ typical patient age range of forty to sixty. (Though most surgeons are eager to highlight the professional guideline of: “We treat heredity, not years.”) “I have 28-year-olds requesting facelifts,” says London-based aesthetic plastic surgeon Georgios Orfaniotis, a ex-NHS doctor who focuses on the head and neck. “It’s a major procedure, and I’m a somewhat worried when I see people choosing it as a personal preference.”
Understanding the Facelift Procedure
A rhytidectomy, alternatively called a rhytidectomy, lifts the ligaments in the face that start to sag as we age. “Our faces are built a little like layers of an onion,” says based in Kent face specialist Marc Pacifico. “Skin and fat on the top, then a layer of connective tissue known as the SMAS. Think of the SMAS as the structural foundation of the face. And that’s what causes aging; that is what loosens and sags and drags the skin down with it.”
You endanger performing surgery on people that have deeper issues. It’s not advisable for an ethical plastic surgeon to follow
Once the preserve of moneyed older people, overuse of injectables – when excessive use of injectable gels stretches the face and causes looseness in the dermis – combined with the widespread use of weight-loss drugs, low-cost medical tourism, and the development of new, famous-figure-promoted operative methods are attracting a different type of customer towards this major operation. Statistics indicate an 8% increase in facelifts over the past 12 months in the United Kingdom; while a study found that the portion of youthful candidates is growing, with 32% of facelifts now performed on patients aged 35-55.
“Patients are now requesting to look like the best version of themselves and obviously the methods are following,” says Orfaniotis. At present, the operation du jour is the deep plane facelift, a technique promoted by figures including Kardashian matriarch Kris Jenner, to fashion designer Marc Jacobs.
Deep Plane Technique
While a more traditional facelift entails lifting the SMAS, the deep plane facelift loosens the facial ligaments beneath it, enabling surgeons to restructure the face by repositioning the deeper tissue, and avoiding the taut, pulled appearance sometimes wrought by more traditional techniques. “We’re not putting stress on the skin because we’re targeting deeper, to the deeper tissue,” says prestigious London cosmetic doctor Rajiv Grover, who focuses on the deep plane technique. “It is the underlying layers that is adjusted. The skin follows along as a secondary element.” Elevating the whole facial structure as a single unit allows for a authentic-appearing and longer-lasting outcome. It also means that the procedure is no longer being used for the primary goal of youth preservation – or revitalization, as the cosmetic field terms it – but for “enhancement” and contouring, too. “We’re getting numerous requests from clients aged late twenties to mid-thirties for this reason,” notes Grover.
Individual Experience
Preisinger had never planned on undergoing a facial lift – at minimum not at the age of 30. But years of using injectable gels in an attempt at “facial balancing” implied that by the time she entered her late twenties, she was “damaged”. “I didn’t undergo this because I wanted to look young,” she clarifies. “I did it because the injectable ruined my face. I regret ever done it. If I didn’t have the injectable, I don’t believe I would be where I’m at currently.”
Whether injectable substances ever fully dissolve has long been a debated topic in the aesthetics industry. “Studies have indicated that not only do they rarely fully dissipate,” states Grover, “but they migrate and can block lymphatic channels. A contributing factor to what we term ‘puffy appearance’ is also the reality that to some extent, the face becomes slightly fluid-filled because its ability to drain bodily fluid has been diminished.” Although research into the topic is early-stage, warnings on dermal fillers’ potential impact on the lymphatic system have been released, and additional studies announced. One highly regarded face specialist, speaking on the condition of anonymity, mentioned he would never use fillers in a client because of the risks they present. “Many surgeons avoid discussing this, because the manufacturers who make injectables can be quite forceful.” He’s heard stories, he adds, of plastic surgeons being landed with legal actions after expressing worries.
Choice and Surgery
For Preisinger, after beginning injecting filler, she felt as if she needed to continue adding more – especially as it began moving to different areas of her face. She was only twenty-eight when a nearby cosmetic doctor in the state proposed that a face and neck lift could be what she required to finally step off the injectable hamster wheel. After 24 months, she found herself choosing between a list of recommended hotels in the city, sent to her by the patient coordinator at her doctor’s clinic.
Originally, Preisinger had planned for an eyelid surgery – commonly called blepharoplasty – but her surgeon advised her that a facelift was the right solution for the laxity she was experiencing in her face. She booked a forehead lift, a cheek lift and a jawline surgery. The eve of her surgery, one day after she’d touched down alone in Turkey, she decided to add a lip lift. “Then he stated, ‘We’re going to lift the lower eyelid puffiness.’ He added, ‘I think if we extract some buccal fat, it will contour your face.’ So I ended up including additional procedures,” she says. She paid $22,000 (£16,500) for the six-hour surgery, including a three-day|
