Hi, I had facial contouring surgery last Friday, and now that Saturday and Sunday have passed, I’m on day 3. I’m in my late 20s, and I’ll start by talking about what made me decide to get facial contouring surgery. My cheekbones had honestly been a major source of stress since high school. Still, up until now, I tended to have some facial fat, so they didn’t actually look that prominent. But over the past 1-2 years, I dieted and also got procedures that reduce facial fat, like InMode, Shurink, and jaw Botox. As I got older, my facial fat started to go down compared to my body weight, you know? Maybe because of that, my cheekbones started to look more prominent. I always really disliked how my cheekbones stood out whenever I took photos, and I could see them a lot in the photos I took during my trip to Japan in December too. So at that time, almost impulsively, I searched for 3-4 plastic surgery clinics, booked appointments, and started going to consultations. I actually went to 5 places in total, but there wasn’t any place that really won me over... haha So I just excluded the place where the consultant felt too much like a scary tough older girl, searched hard for side effects, and chose a place with a long career history. Going to consultations was good because I learned about facial bone asymmetry I hadn’t known about. And one thing I felt was that they seem to give more detailed consultations to people who have already decided on a surgery date to some extent. At the first two places I went to, I wasn’t fully set on surgery yet and had booked impulsively, so I said the surgery date was undecided. Then both director doctors were kind of... how should I put it, I think they only gave me general textbook-like explanations. From the third place on, I told them the times when I could have surgery, and from then on they told me various things like the asymmetry of my face on CT. Even thinking about it myself, I think that can’t really be helped..! If someone is still wondering whether to have surgery or not, what more can they tell you? In common, 4 places recommended one facial contouring procedure, cheekbone reduction, and 1 place recommended two facial contouring procedures, cheekbone and chin tip. For the chin tip, it’s true that I have a recessed chin, but closing my mouth wasn’t as tense as expected, so they recommended it to the extent of “think about it once?” Anyway, I decided on one procedure, cheekbone reduction, and went in. Honestly, even until I lay down in the operating room, even until I got the injection, I wasn’t that nervous.. More precisely, rather than being nervous, I don’t think it felt real lol Even lying on the operating table, I wasn’t shaking or anything like that. I was watching the medication go in, with them saying it was a sleepy injection, and when I came to my senses, the surgery was already over and I was lying in the recovery room lol From here, I’ll tell you the things I’ve felt up to now.
D-day (surgery day 1) First, my last memory was watching the white anesthetic fluid enter my arm, and when I woke up, I was on a recovery room bed and my friend was next to me. I felt extremely nauseous and my throat hurt. As you know, after facial contouring surgery, you can’t sleep lying down for a while. You can’t sleep lying down and have to sleep somewhat upright, but because my neck wasn’t supported well, it was so hard. And the nausea was severe, my throat hurt, and I had a lot of phlegm. It felt a bit like being sick with the flu? My throat hurt, and how should I put it, I had a severe floating, spaced-out feeling. I wasn’t hungry.. maybe because I ate a lot the day before. I couldn’t do aaaaaanything. The surgical area and my throat hurt.. I felt nauseous and queasy.. And when I get an antiemetic injection, I get a bit of a restless feeling, and similarly I felt somewhat uncomfortable.. I endured that for 4 hours. After 4 hours, they said I could go home, so I came home. When I came home, Hard parts: 1. Nausea 2. Pain 3. Saliva kept flowing out (sticky saliva) 4. Discharge came from all the mucous membranes of my throat and nose, so inside my nose and throat felt completely full of phlegm Even when I tried to sleep because it was hard, I woke up every 2 hours. I woke up, took medicine, wiped away saliva.. Seriously, maybe because of the sympathetic nervous system, my saliva was incredibly sticky My mom took me home and left, and I tried somehow to find a comfortable position and fall asleep. It was truly a hard time. Before surgery, I hadn’t thought about pain like this.
D+1 (surgery day 2) What was interesting was that as time passed, the pain and things kept improving moment by moment. As I repeated waking up and going back to sleep, by Saturday morning, the nausea had improved a lot first. That alone made me feel like I could live a bit The pain was still pretty bad though, so in addition to the prescribed medicine, I took more Tylenol. And after taking a nap and waking up, the pain had gotten a bit better again. So it was interesting that as time passed, it improved quickly and became bearable.. Saliva didn’t really flow much anymore.. My throat still hurt, but it was improving. Instead, my throat became hoarse, so sometimes my voice wouldn’t come out. I guess this can happen after general anesthesia. What was interesting was that even while I was very swollen, when I briefly took off the compression bandage, I could see that my protruding cheekbones had gone in. And until then, I had kept sleeping and waking every 2-3 hours, but as my condition gradually recovered a lot over Saturday, I was able to sleep through the night on Saturday night.
D+2 (surgery day 3) When I woke up after sleeping through the night, my face was the most swollen it had ever been lolololol The pain had improved a lot, but now it felt painful because I was so extremely swollen.. Until yesterday, I was so exhausted that I couldn’t even think about walking, but my condition had improved a lot, so I went out at dawn and took a short walk. My voice also started coming out a bit again. And honestly, I think walking is the most effective thing for swelling. After walking for about 1 hour, I could see the swelling improving in real time. But when I lay down again, I could feel it coming back up. The pain improved much more, and my throat still hurts a bit, but it’s really gotten much better. Will my condition improve even more tomorrow? I wrote down what I felt up to day 3 after surgery, as it came to mind. I hope it helps people who are having surgery soon.
For now, things I felt: - Because the neck isn’t supported well, it hurts a lot > a wedge pillow is essential I bought a firm neck pillow too, but unexpectedly it hurts, so I’m not really using it now. I’m regretting that I should have bought a softer neck pillow. Sauce bottle > more than I expected..? If you have it, you use it, but even without it, I could eat and drink fine with a paper cup and a Baskin-Robbins spoon. Toner pads and Bioderma cleansing water > using them well. They’re useful for removing design pen marks on my face. Tylenol > I didn’t think much about the pain, so I only had some I’d bought for menstrual cramps, and I regretted it right away. It hurts... I immediately bought 2 more packs of Tylenol. Tylenol is absolutely, absolutely essential. Cotton swabs > needed when disinfecting the wound area.
When eating!!! New Care gets old really fast. It’s only my second day drinking New Care, but I’m already sick of it I bought like 24 packs, when am I going to finish all that And I’m eating porridge, but beef vegetable porridge <<< this is uncomfortable because I can’t chew the bits and they kind of get stuck. Next time, I’m going to eat pumpkin porridge or just drink New Care. And the antiseptic mouthwash tastes really bad I want 2 weeks to pass quickly so I can brush my teeth comfortably~~ Anyway, this is my review up to day 3 and what I’ve felt so far. I really don’t think it’s an easy surgery. These are the things I felt up to day 3, and if I had known this kind of pain....... I honestly don’t think I would have been able to decide so easily. Still, I’m in my late 20s now, and this was something that had caused me tremendous stress almost since high school, so I don’t regret my decision so far. I hope my review helps a lot!