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

Amanda Preisinger is nervous about her daughter’s upcoming 13th birthday party. It’s not due to the usual reasons related to a home packed of clamorous preteen kids, but since it’s the initial occasion she will showcase her recently altered face to acquaintances and extended family. “Obviously I’m going to tell all guests as they come in, ‘Just so you know, this is not the way I appear,’” states the thirty-year-old real estate agent from south Florida.

Her appearance is, admittedly, a somewhat startling – her face swollen and preternaturally lifted, as though secured by heavy-duty tape. Her new – and she’s keen to stress, short-term – appearance is the outcome of six aesthetic surgeries, such as an endoscopic mid-facelift, conducted by a doctor in Istanbul, Turkey, the previous month. “My poor husband became emotional when he saw me for the initial time because I couldn’t even unseal my eyes. That’s how swollen I was,” she tells me via video call from her house. “I had to tell him: ‘Babe, I’m okay, I’m not hurting. I just appear as if someone jumped me.’”

Growing Trend of Early Facelifts

According to cosmetic specialists, Preisinger is one of a rising count of people choosing to undergo a facelift in their twenties and thirties – well over a decade prior to typical surgeons’ typical patient age range of 40 to 60. (Though many specialists are keen to emphasise the professional guideline of: “We address heredity, not age.”) “I have 28-year-olds requesting facelifts,” says based in London cosmetic surgeon Georgios Orfaniotis, a former NHS consultant who focuses on the facial area. “It’s a major surgery, and I’m a somewhat worried when I see individuals opting for it as a personal preference.”

Explaining the Rhytidectomy Surgery

A facelift, also known as a rhytidectomy, elevates the tissues 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 facial plastic surgeon Marc Pacifico. “Skin and fat on the top, then a layer of connective tissue known as the SMAS. Think of the SMAS as the soft tissue skeleton of the face. And that is what causes aging; that’s what becomes lax and drags the skin downward with it.”

You endanger performing surgery on individuals that have underlying problems. It’s not advisable for an conscientious surgeon to follow

Previously reserved of moneyed older people, “filler fatigue” – when overuse of dermal fillers stretches the face and leads to looseness in the dermis – combined with the common adoption of slimming medications, low-cost surgical travel, and the advancement of new, celebrity-endorsed surgical techniques are attracting a new kind of patient towards this major operation. Statistics show an eight percent rise in facial lifts over the last year in the United Kingdom; while a study found that the portion of younger facelift patients is increasing, with 32% of facelifts now conducted for patients aged 35-55.

“Patients are now requesting to appear as the optimal form of themselves and obviously the techniques are following,” says Orfaniotis. Currently, the trending procedure is the comprehensive facial lift, a method evangelised by figures including reality TV star Kris Jenner, to fashion designer Marc Jacobs.

Deep Plane Technique

Where a more traditional rhytidectomy involves elevating the SMAS, the deep plane facelift loosens the facial ligaments underneath, allowing surgeons to restructure the face by moving the deeper tissue, and avoiding the taut, pulled look sometimes wrought by older methods. “We avoid placing tension on the dermis because we’re going below, to the deeper tissue,” explains Harley Street plastic surgeon Rajiv Grover, who specialises in the deep plane technique. “It is the underlying layers that is repositioned. The skin comes with it as a passenger.” Lifting the entire soft tissue layer as a unified block results in a more natural-looking and more durable result. It also means that the surgery is not just being used for the express purpose of youth preservation – or revitalization, as the aesthetics industry describes it – but for “beautification” and facial restructuring, too. “We’re getting numerous requests from patients aged late twenties to mid-thirties for this purpose,” notes Grover.

Personal Journey

Preisinger had never planned on undergoing a facelift – at least not at the thirty years old. But years of using injectable gels in an effort at “facial balancing” meant that by the time she reached her late twenties, she was “botched”. “I didn’t undergo this because I desired to appear youthful,” she says. “I underwent it because the injectable harmed my face. I wish I had never using it. If I didn’t have the injectable, I don’t believe I would be where I’m at right now.”

If dermal fillers completely disappear has long been a point of contention in the cosmetic field. “Studies have indicated that they seldom fully dissipate,” states Grover, “but they migrate and can obstruct lymphatic channels. A contributing factor to what we term ‘pillow face’ is also the fact that to some extent, the face gets somewhat waterlogged because its capacity to remove lymphatic fluid has been diminished.” Although research into the area is early-stage, warnings on injectables’ possible effects on the body’s drainage have been released, and further research announced. One highly regarded face specialist, commenting on the condition of anonymity, says he would never use injectables in a patient because of the dangers they present. “A lot of surgeons avoid talk about this, because the manufacturers who make filler can be quite forceful.” He’s been told accounts, he adds, of plastic surgeons facing court orders after raising their concerns.

Decision and Procedure

For Preisinger, after beginning injecting filler, she felt as if she needed to continue adding more – especially as it started to migrate to different areas of her face. She was just 28 when a nearby cosmetic doctor in the state proposed that a facial and neck surgery might be what she required to exit the injectable hamster wheel. After 24 months, she ended up selecting from a list of recommended hotels in Istanbul, sent to her by the patient coordinator at her surgeon’s office.

Originally, Preisinger had planned for an eyelid surgery – commonly called blepharoplasty – but her doctor advised her that a facial lift was the right solution for the laxity she was experiencing in her face. She arranged a brow lift, a cheek lift and a neck lift. The day before her surgery, 24 hours post she’d arrived solo in Turkey, she decided to add a mouth enhancement. “Then he said, ‘We’re going to lift the under-eye bags.’ He added, ‘I think if we extract some cheek fat, it will sculpt your face.’ Thus I ultimately adding two more surgeries,” she says. She paid $22,000 (£16,500) for the half-day operation, plus a three-day|