Before<before surgery>After<after surgery>I never thought I’d have revision surgery in my life..
I had surgery in 2014 with the non-incisional method and epicanthoplasty, but after 2 years, the eyes slowly started coming undone and became sleepy-looking eyes? I don’t know how it looked to others, but since I see my own face the most and up close, I think it felt more stressful. More than anything, whenever I took photos, I could see the asymmetry... Even friends who have no interest at all in cosmetic surgery or appearance said without malice, “Now that I look closely, your left eye and right eye are different, that’s interesting”..^^ I thought it might get awkward if I said they were eyes that had double eyelid surgery, so whenever that happened, I just said, “I’m stressed because of my eyes~” and moved on.. Then I finally felt like I couldn’t take it anymore and decided on revision surgery.. Rather than mentally preparing and making a decision, I’m the type to suddenly get hooked on something and immediately put it into action
For my first surgery, because friends said incisional scars remain and swelling lasts almost a year, I insisted that I absolutely! wanted to get surgery with the non-incisional method, and I think that became the root of the problem. What I learned while going to revision consultations was that even though I had double eyelids, my eye-opening strength was on the weaker side... Selfies were okay, but when I saw photos taken by others, especially my left eye couldn’t use strength well, so compared with the right eye, less of the iris was exposed (commonly called sparkle in the eyes). My eye-opening strength was already not good to begin with (I don’t think it was quite ptosis at the time of my first surgery), and the eyes that had been operated on non-incisionally had their lines come undone and became even heavier...
Since revision surgery naturally makes you more cautious, I mainly went around to eye-specialized hospitals + revision surgery hospitals + private clinics (this was optional) for consultations.... I kept going to hospitals that vaguely said things like, “Since your eye-opening strength is lacking, let’s definitely do ptosis correction~” but there was one hospital that uniquely put my photos up and asked if I could see that the sparkle in both eyes was different, and explained that the reason the amount of left iris exposure was smaller was because the eye-opening strength was weaker than the right eye, so I decided on this place...
In a way, it was such an obvious and simple basic process, but there were so many hospitals that didn’t even explain this much, so I think it felt new to me. While doing that, the director held my eyebrows and had me open and close my eyes, and carefully looked several times. They said the left eye-opening strength was definitely weak... Maybe to make sure the director’s diagnosis wasn’t wrong, they checked several times, and it felt like they were making it more certain, and the director explained calmly in a soft tone, so I think I liked that too.
Anyway, I learned that my eye-opening strength wasn’t very good, and with the thought that there should be no third surgery, I decided on incision + ptosis correction. I also didn’t like that the inner corners of my eyes looked blocked, so I decided to get epicanthoplasty too. Since I was having surgery anyway, I wanted a prettier line different from the first surgery, so I asked for a more glamorous extended line and for the space between the upper eyelids to look narrower.
What I kept emphasizing until the day of surgery was to make the eyes that had come undone large and clear again, and for the ptosis correction, I asked that it look natural without overcorrection. Director Ollo and the consultation manager accepted all my pickiness.... I’m really thankful and sorry ^_
When the swelling was going down, I was very anxious because it still seemed like my eyes were uneven, but they said that because the eye-opening strength on each side is different, the ptosis correction was tied with different strength, so the swelling could also be a little different (because the left side is weaker, they tied the left eye a bit more strongly). They said once the swelling goes down, it will naturally match, and let’s wait a little longer. The director wasn’t saying it just to soothe me urgently without confidence, but was really calm, so I felt reassured. They’ve probably seen many cases like this and knew it would settle well, so I think that’s why they were so confident.
Considering I had incision, ptosis correction, and epicanthoplasty, I really had little swelling or bruising, and by one month, the swelling had mostly gone down so that it didn’t look like I had double eyelid surgery at all, and it seemed to have settled well. Since it was incisional, they say I need to watch the fine swelling for a few more months, but I’m already sufficiently satisfied with my eyes now!! As I wanted, my eyes got bigger, and I think the ptosis correction turned out well without overcorrection, so I feel good~~ They said they’ll watch the responsible follow-up for a long time, so I’m planning to go back in a few months and ask how much fine swelling remains. I hope everyone succeeds with revision surgery at a hospital they like!