Did FFS just ruin my face?

[GlobalPessimum]

Hello folks.

It's now two full months since my FFS and I gotta say, I'm not liking it. The problem is that I got a lot of sagging skin under my chin and around my jaw and that's making my face look weird and unnatural.

But let me backtrack a little. I had the usual whole-face work done: forehead, jaw, chin. I've always thought my chin was too long, so I wanted it fixed. The rest kind of followed from that. I was hoping to see my face as feminine at last.

So I went to one of the doctors who specialise in FFS around my neck of the woods (I don't want to name names, at least not before I get the chance to talk to the guy, in a few months' time. He has a good reputation in any case).  I got the work done, then I went back home and waited patiently for the swelling to go down. And when the swelling went down- oh. my. god.

That's when I would normally expect to be looking at my face in the mirror amazed at my own femininity. I'd be taking loads and loads of pictures, documenting the changes every day. I would even consider getting an Instagram account, I'd be so beyond myself with joy. I'd be going to sleep with a smile on my face every single night. Boys would smile at me more. Girls would glare at me more. Everything would be rosy and golden with sugar on top.

Except- not really. I don't look more feminine than before. Instead, I look a lot older and butt ugly, because I suddendly have bulldog jowls and a double-chin that wouldn't be out of place on the face of a cartoon fat-cat banker. I swear I've seen people three decades older than me who don't have that much loose skin hanging off their jaws as I do now. In profile, I look like my grandmother. I'm pretty sure that was not the kind of facial feminisation I asked for!

I understand that I have to be patient. Oh, I do. I'm being patient. Like I say, all the swelling is pretty much gone by now. And I can't see anything else changing besides the swelling, so it's pretty hard to believe thigns are going to get any better. I compare my pictures from one month ago and today and it's exactly the same thing. I have a sort of triangle of flesh hanging off the middle of my jaw and a little pouch of fat under my chin.

What's this? I knew it's possible to get some skin sagging after jaw and chin work but I've looked at many, many before-and-after pictures and I can't see anyone having such a big problem as I'm having. Am I just really unlucky? Or is it something that goes away after a while and I should just relax and, well, be more patient?

Come on ladies. Share your stories with me. Has anyone else had that much hanging flesh before? Does it ever go away on its own? Will I have to go under the knife again?

Edit: I know you'll want to see what that looks like so here are a couple of pictures:

[Dena]

I haven't had that type of surgery however if you are young, it's possible that your skin may shrink to some degree much like a woman's stomach returns to normal after having a baby. It may take a while and you will need to discuss this with your doctor to learn what you can expect.

[yuna]

I'm so sorry to hear that!! It's beyond my imagination how difficult and painful it must have been for you.

If it helps at all I have heard about people who lost a great amount of weight in a short period of time suffering from temporary sagging skin. IIRC they said depending on the patient's age the skin may be elastic enough to compensate for it. However I don't know very much about how it would play out for skin in the face/neck area. Could it be that the body is prioritizing tissue growth instead of reduction due to the recent surgery? I hope what's happening to you is your body is being too occupied with healing to fine tune the unnecessary tissues...

I wish you all the best, and I have my fingers crossed that your skin will go back to normal soon!

Yuna


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[jentay1367]

I would like to suggest you post some photos...if not of your entire face, at least the problem areas. This way other women that have had comparable procedures can share if they feel your results are out of the norm. I understand you're nor interested in divulging names, but where may your "neck of the woods" be? It may help others in the area not make the same choice should it turn out you actually have an issue.

[GlobalPessimum]

I would like to suggest you postsome photos...if not of your entire face, the problem areas. This way other women that have had comparable procedures cancshare if they feel your results are out of the norm. I understand you're nor interested in divulging names, but where may your "neck of the woods" be? It may help others invthe area not make the same choice should you actually have an issue.

I posted some pictures, see my updated post above.

As to my neck of the woods, it really doesn't matter. The doctor in question has a very good reputation and most of his patients seem to be quite happy with their results. Me divulging his name would only serve to needlessly upset any women preparing to have surgery with him.

[jentay1367]

I certainly don't mean to undermine your concerns. But I've watched some friends heal and after two months they looked no better and probably worse than you. This kind of surgery can take a very long time for all the swelling to subside. I know what it's like to obsess in the mirror just as most women here do as well. I really don't think it's going to be an issue. It's at the very least too early to make the determination.  I'm sure others will chime in soon, I just wanted to say that it looks like typical swelling from FFS. Give it some time and see if you don't notice its going down. I really expected ro see some horrific photos and what you've shown just doesn't seem that bad.
Do what I do and have a scotch and some xanax. I'm joking of course.....okay, no I'm not.

I think it's going to be okay, hon. I  really do.

[EmmaLoo]

It looks like straight up swelling if you ask me. Not surprising at all considering you had bone work done.

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[GlobalPessimum]

Thank you ladies for the encouraging advice.

I hope you're right and it's all just swelling that'll go down eventually. I thought so too, at the start, but then I started looking at the pictures people post of their recovery from FFS and I couldn't find anyone looking like that. I appreciate that people proably don't post the bad pictures, but I've seen plenty of side-on and three-quarters pictures like the ones I posted above and even at one month I've never seen anyone with such a big wonky patch of skin in the middle of their jaw.

Besides, the post-op advice I got from my doctor was that most of the swelling will be gone after three weeks- and indeed it seemed to. My face looked like a tomato for the first couple of weeks, then it slowly deflated and now it looks normal, except for those weird bits under my chin and in the middle of my jawline.

So, really, I don't want to be precious, it's just I really have no idea what I should expect. I'm not even sure I understand what's the difference supposed to be between swelling that'll go down and sagging that'll just get worse. I was hoping someone here had some experience with the latter, so they could enlighten me. I was particularly interested in hearing from ladies who might have had to have some revision afterwards, particularly a lower face lift to show off their new jawline.

I should say I'm worrying so much because it seems like I'll really not be able to afford any such revisions myself. So if this jowly, double-chinny look doesn't go away on its own I'm going to be stuck with it for the long run and that'd really suck.

I certainly don't mean to undermine your concerns.

That's quite alright, I didn't take your comment as undermining anything and I'm very grateful for your encouraging words. I really hope you're right, too.

[Jujubee]

Sorry  t hear you're not in a good spot. I'm three weeks post op from forehead type III and waiting for swelling to go down. There's not much but I would like for it to go down to the point where I can see a dramatic difference from my male forehead to a female one. It's close but with my life savings gone to fix it I want it to be better.

Now about your pics, I hope you don't mind me saying that you have really great skin, very girly lips and nose and I think if you do need a mini lower face lift, maybe that's the unintended consequence that we all enter into even while a lot of us blow all savings we had and also go into debt. I need a lower facelift too to feminize my face more and it bothers me every day. Not as much as my manly forehead did... but it still annoys me. I will be getting a second job just a part time job, from which all proceeds will go towards my facelift. And I'm only 39 years old.

Maybe that's something you can consider. If the swelling doesn't go down. I hate the fact that we have to focus so much on our appearance. But that's the human race and we're in it.

Hope this helps!! JuJu

[jentay1367]

I truly believe it will go down. When your Doctor said "most", if you think about it, most of it has. But for you to look like you envision? That's going to take time. Really invasive facial surgery can take 6-9 months for total recovery. Patience, grasshopper. Lol

[GlobalPessimum]

Sorry  t hear you're not in a good spot. I'm three weeks post op from forehead type III and waiting for swelling to go down. There's not much but I would like for it to go down to the point where I can see a dramatic difference from my male forehead to a female one. It's close but with my life savings gone to fix it I want it to be better.

Now about your pics, I hope you don't mind me saying that you have really great skin, very girly lips and nose and I think if you do need a mini lower face lift, maybe that's the unintended consequence that we all enter into even while a lot of us blow all savings we had and also go into debt. I need a lower facelift too to feminize my face more and it bothers me every day. Not as much as my manly forehead did... but it still annoys me. I will be getting a second job just a part time job, from which all proceeds will go towards my facelift. And I'm only 39 years old.

Maybe that's something you can consider. If the swelling doesn't go down. I hate the fact that we have to focus so much on our appearance. But that's the human race and we're in it.

Hope this helps!! JuJu

Thanks for your comment Juju. Yes, I get it, I should be happy with what I got and if I managed to ruin it with my FFS choices, then tough but that's life and everyone else is in the same boat.

By the same token I'm just as worried and uncertain about the outcomes of my FFS as any other person. Hearing from others who had similar experiences would really help me calm down a bit, even if it turns out I do have to stay like this for a long time.

[GlobalPessimum]

I truly believe it will go down. When your Doctor said "most", if you think about it, most of it has. But for you to look like you envision? That's going to take time. Really invasive facial surgery can take 6-9 months for total recovery. Patience, grasshopper. Lol

You know, in my mind I'm this very cool-headed person who always faces facts with absolute detachement. At this point in time that person would realise she has no other options but to wait and see, so she'd forget about the whole affair and make a mental note to think about it again at the half-year mark.

... in practice of course, I'll just go nuts if I don't talk about it with someone.

[thylacina]

Are your double chin and jowls fatty tissue like the more usual sort of double chin? i expect you could probably tell whether or not by feeling it with your fingers.

If so, there are tv ads for some sort of injections called "kybella", which promises to rid you of that problem. They only promise to fix double chins, but i looked up using it on cheeks, and some clinics say "yes" to that too.

i've watched every episode of "Botched". For their guest patients who get facial surgery, they sometimes tell them to wait up to 2 years. And those guest patients generally get less done to them than you've just had.

Isn't it worth waiting for? You wouldn't want to be like their average patient of the week. " ... I didn't quite like the results of the 1'st surgery, so then there was surgeries 2-5, which only made things worse, and now I look like the Phantom of the Opera ... "

If you were to edit your posts this thread and add "before" shots in the same poses, maybe everyone would say you are now much improved?

[jentay1367]

You know, in my mind I'm this very cool-headed person who always faces facts with absolute detachement. At this point in time that person would realise she has no other options but to wait and see, so she'd forget about the whole affair and make a mental note to think about it again at the half-year mark.

... in practice of course, I'll just go nuts if I don't talk about it with someone.

That's what were here for babe. Sounding boards. Hard to be rational about the face you've wanted to look right your whole damned life. If you think about it, for you to have looked in the mirror and seen perfection after a lifetime of dysphoria? Well.....It doesn't even sound right when you say it. The fairy tale of FFS is just like HRT. These changes simply don't happen over night. This is not the stuff of fairy tales. It's all hard work and patience. Or is that patience and hard work?  Anyways..I'd kill to have your beautiful skin. Where'd I put that oil of old age?

[katieanna]

Patience...

In the lower face, the swelling tends to be slow to dissipate.  Upper face swelling can also 'collect' in the lower face, causing distorted results.

Give it time.  Six months from surgery.  That'll give the swelling time to subside, and also let your brain get used to the new face.

On the subject of FFS disappointment - yes, it exists.  We see online these dramatic changes from male to female after FFS, yet we don't realize that these are great results and carefully curated pictures.  Think of online examples of FFS like photos that accompany recipes: they look far better than the results when we cook things ourselves.

Your results don't seem abnormal at all.  Your expectations are off - like many of us are when it comes to the realities of surgery and HRT.  FFS is a bit of a misnomer: it feminizes, but definitely doesn't make feminine.  A masculine face will be made less masculine rather than made feminine.

A side note - you did go to a known FFS surgeon, right?  And not a local guy who claims to do FFS but really does boobs and tummy tucks and facelifts for rich stay at home moms?  There's guys in every city who claim to do FFS but rarely deliver good results.  If you went to a no-name surgeon, ignore my advice above, because you might have genuinely poor results.

[GlobalPessimum]

Are your double chin and jowls fatty tissue like the more usual sort of double chin? i expect you could probably tell whether or not by feeling it with your fingers.

If so, there are tv ads for some sort of injections called "kybella", which promises to rid you of that problem. They only promise to fix double chins, but i looked up using it on cheeks, and some clinics say "yes" to that too.

i've watched every episode of "Botched". For their guest patients who get facial surgery, they sometimes tell them to wait up to 2 years. And those guest patients generally get less done to them than you've just had.

Isn't it worth waiting for? You wouldn't want to be like their average patient of the week. " ... I didn't quite like the results of the 1'st surgery, so then there was surgeries 2-5, which only made things worse, and now I look like the Phantom of the Opera ... "

If you were to edit your posts this thread and add "before" shots in the same poses, maybe everyone would say you are now much improved?

I think my double chin is mostly fat. It's hard to tell because the muscle underneath is still very stiff, like rock-hard, so it's not easy to feel. I had some liposuction there, to prevent this sort of thing exactly, I guess it could have been worse. The jowls seem to be skin, rather than fat. There might be a bit of swelling in the muscle there, it's hard to tell.

Edit: I've read about Kybella. I'll give it a try if things don't sort themselves out after a few months, but not too soon, like you say.

It's definitely worth waiting. I'd really rather avoid any more surgery. I think I've had too much of it already. The one thing that really bothered me with my face was my chin that was too long. But, since I was getting that done I thought I might as well get the works so I don't have room to fret later about what I haven't had done.

Of course, here I am now fretting about what I did have done... :/

[GlobalPessimum]

Patience...

In the lower face, the swelling tends to be slow to dissipate.  Upper face swelling can also 'collect' in the lower face, causing distorted results.

Give it time.  Six months from surgery.  That'll give the swelling time to subside, and also let your brain get used to the new face.

On the subject of FFS disappointment - yes, it exists.  We see online these dramatic changes from male to female after FFS, yet we don't realize that these are great results and carefully curated pictures.  Think of online examples of FFS like photos that accompany recipes: they look far better than the results when we cook things ourselves.

Your results don't seem abnormal at all.  Your expectations are off - like many of us are when it comes to the realities of surgery and HRT.  FFS is a bit of a misnomer: it feminizes, but definitely doesn't make feminine.  A masculine face will be made less masculine rather than made feminine.

A side note - you did go to a known FFS surgeon, right?  And not a local guy who claims to do FFS but really does boobs and tummy tucks and facelifts for rich stay at home moms?  There's guys in every city who claim to do FFS but rarely deliver good results.  If you went to a no-name surgeon, ignore my advice above, because you might have genuinely poor results.

Yes, I went to one of the well-known FFS specialists. He has many, many before-and-after pictures on his website's galleries and the vast majority look better in the "after" pictures than in the "before" so I felt reassured he knows his stuff. And I still think he does, don't get me wrong.

To be honest, I expected to be a little disappointed, or at least not as excited as I say in my first post above. I certainly wished that FFS would be a radical improvement to my appearance and my life, and that I would experience the raw joy that many women show after FFS, but I didn't really expect that. I thought it would probably be kind of meh, really. Like, you know when you see a before/after picture pair and think "well, she looks the same". That's what I was expecting and that's what I pretty much got.

I think that's why I'm focusing so much on the things I don't like. The changes I got are very subtle overall and the most noticeable ones are the bits I'm unhappy about.

I've seen some women who look strikingly different after the operation, and I can only imagine how great they must feel. I wish I could feel that way but I guess, that's just not me. But- who knows, maybe when it all settles down those subtle changes will get a chance to shine through and I'll have more to be happy about.

So, yeah, patience. I gotta learn to be happy with what I got. I think I've been really bad at that for my entire life.

[GlobalPessimum]

That's what were here for babe. Sounding boards. Hard to be rational about the face you've wanted to look right your whole damned life. If you think about it, for you to have looked in the mirror and seen perfection after a lifetime of dysphoria? Well.....It doesn't even sound right when you say it. The fairy tale of FFS is just like HRT. These changes simply don't happen over night. This is not the stuff of fairy tales. It's all hard work and patience. Or is that patience and hard work?  Anyways..I'd kill to have your beautiful skin. Where'd I put that oil of old age?

Thanks.

I think the skin thing is just the lighting in my pictuers. Sorry. 

[Axolotl]

I don't think I will ever get FFS and would recommend that people only get it as a last resort.  That being said, here is my interpretation of what happened:  The jaw-line problem you're experiencing is caused by swelling, and could likely resolve itself if you keep taking things like Advil and proper nutrition.

I had an electrolygist appointment where I got lidocane injections as an anesthetic.  It made me have swelling that took weeks to subside, as well as marks on my face from the electro itself that took something like 4 months to fade away.  It's delayed my electro progress by 6 months.  So, you get the idea.  Good luck.

PS - The solution for the electro problem I described is to have the hair growth change from HRT before continuing electro, in order to avoid marks.

[Jujubee]

In reading old ffs posts, swelling and esp jaw and chin work swelling moves from north to south and seems to plague many for quite some time. You seem to be cautious and analytical and you may be waiting for the other shoe to drop. Many of us do that, given our history. But
Please just hang in there!