I had all the factors that affect dark circles, so my whole life I heard people ask so often, “Are you tired?” or “Are you sick?” On days when I heard things like that, my self-esteem would drop for no reason, and I’d keep thinking about it. Still, when I slept as much as I wanted on weekends, it would ease a bit, so I just lived with it somehow. But now, as I’ve gotten older and even the under-eye fat started protruding, even I thought, ah, this is hopeless.
I had never done anything to my face before, so I worried about it for almost a year and finally went ahead with the surgery this time. Day 1: Well, first of all, this was sedation anesthesia + local anesthesia, so I fell asleep and woke up and it was over. I came home half-dazed and kept sleeping after getting home. I almost drove there thinking it would be like an upper GI endoscopy under sedation, but I took a taxi instead. I think that was a good call... If I’d driven, I was mentally out of it enough to have had an accident.
Day 2: I could tell the swelling had started, but maybe because it was being compressed with taping, I couldn’t really tell.
Day 3: This was the day they told me to remove the taping, so I did. Once the taping seal was released, the swelling suddenly started rising a lot from then on. From this point, I turned into an Avatar Na’vi.
Day 4~Day 6: I was still an Avatar from the major swelling up to this point. I only drank pumpkin juice, and to reduce the swelling, I went for walks twice a day for 1 hour each.
Day 7~Day 9: The swelling started going down noticeably day by day, especially the major swelling. Also around this time, I found out about the 3-piece swelling medication set and started taking it. From then on, I started worrying about going back to work, so I thought I should at least sweat it out and jogged 8 km each time. If I ran too intensely my face hurt a bit, so I ran gently. At this time, the right side of my face had come back quite a lot, but the left side wasn’t coming back, so I started getting worried. I called the clinic and asked if the director shouldn’t take a look, and they said even if they saw me now it wouldn’t mean much, and to come in a month later.
Day 10: I went to work. Even though a lot of the swelling had gone down, there was still swelling, so I went to work wearing glasses + a mask. As soon as people saw me, they asked if I was sick. They asked why my face was so swollen lol. I looked in the mirror and thought it had gone down quite a bit, but I guess not lol
Day 11~Day 14: The swelling is really going down very slightly, and the scar tissue? The hardness also seems to be loosening very slightly.
For now, I still think I’m in the recovery process, and I really think I’ll have to wait at least a month. First of all, my face is uneven right now. The right side seems to have come back quite a lot... The left side has become what they say is one of the side effects, fox eyes, so the lower line of the eye is lifted. I don’t know if it’s swelling too, and they say everyone’s face has a little asymmetry, but the corner-of-the-mouth line is lower, and the cheek fat also looks more saggy.
For now, they said I won’t know whether the fox-eye issue is botched or not until the scar tissue? hardness has all softened, so I’m waiting with a truly prayerful heart. I’m also waiting while thinking the asymmetry is there because the subtle swelling is worse on the left side.
What I felt after touching my face for the first time this time is that the face’s line? contour? even those subtle things are really important to one’s impression. If I only look under the eyes, the dark circles have really improved a lot, so I think the surgery itself went well. (Of course, excluding the fact that it’s uneven right now!)
But it’s true that the line from under the eyes to the cheekbones has become flat. As it became flat, my face became 2D lololol Because of that, the midface looks longer, and the asymmetry also still looks more emphasized, so when I look in the mirror I keep getting startled because I’ve become so ugly. No. Should I say it feels grotesque?
Still, I had lived being fairly satisfied with my face, and even if I wasn’t super handsome, I lived getting reasonably decent evaluations, but at this point my face has become so ruined like this, my mentality is seriously shattered. It got to the point where I wondered if losing weight would make it a bit better, so I lost about 4 kg over around 10 days.
For people with big eyes or a high nose, or people with strong facial features, it may not have much impact, but in my case, it feels like I lost the dark circles and gained ugliness.
For now, I think the asymmetry needs to recover first, so one month... I’m really waiting with a prayerful heart.
Under-eye fat surgery definitely does not seem like a minor surgery.