Diary of A Liquid Face-Lift
Looking to rejuvenate without going under the knife, Bazaar publisher Carol Smith decides to give the filler phenomenon a shot
By Carol Smith
Trunk Archive
A few years back, a friend wrote in a story for New York magazine that I was going to have a luxury face-lift that spring. "All told, it will cost her $30,000, including recovery in a fancy hotel and a private nurse attending to her every need." That was 2008, but as it turned out, I had no luxury—or, for that matter, budget—face-lift that year, or any year thereafter. Why? It's not because of any moral high ground I've sought, and it's certainly not because in my 60s I've calmly embraced getting older. The fact is, I'm afraid something will go wrong: that my daughter will have to tell people that her mom died getting a face-lift or—almost as awful—the surgeon will make a mistake and I won't look better, I'll actually look worse.
But I'm not afraid of nonsurgical procedures, and am a regular customer of Botox and Fraxel. At lunch one day when the subject—as it increasingly does—turned to face-lifts, a friend began talking about Dr. Yan Trokel and his nonsurgical face-lift, the Y Lift. She raved about the purported instant results and explained that he rebuilds the foundation of your face by injecting liquid fillers. I immediately went home and Googled; the before-and-after pictures on Dr. Trokel's site were most impressive. Still, I'd seen enough touched-up pictures to be skeptical.
So I called for a consultation, and several days later went to see Dr. Trokel at his offices on East 67th Street in Manhattan. The very phrase "Y Lift" bothered me—it sounded like a gimmick. I was reassured, however, when the first thing he did was draw a big "Y" on one of the many gorgeous faces in this magazine and explained that "a classically beautiful face has high, wide cheekbones and a defined jawline and chin. As we age, we lose volume." He added, "Everything—muscle, bone, fat—starts to shrink underneath the unshrinking skin, which has nowhere to go, so it falls. What we associate with youth is not tautness but fullness, which is why the Y Lift is all about structural volumizing. It will bring back the way you used to look." The only risks were swelling or mild bruising. Sold: I signed up, and went back the next day, bringing for support my college roommate, who has witnessed me aging firsthand for four decades now.
After taking pictures and drawing on my face to better guide him, Dr. Trokel gave me four shots of Novocain. He then made four tiny needle holes, one next to each ear and two along the jaw, and inserted what he told me was a "blunt, modified surgical instrument." Although that information did little to comfort me, I felt no pain when the doctor went to work. This particular tool, he said, lets him get in deep enough to lift the muscle and put the filler right on top of the bone. He injected Juvéderm, a hyaluronic acid filler that he said offers good longevity, is reversible, and metabolizes in the body naturally. My face absorbed 12 syringes.
As Dr. Trokel worked on my face, he explained that it was crucial to begin with the cheeks and work down to the jawbone. ("The face is hung from the top down, like a chandelier; you have to start lifting from the top.") He filled both cheeks, and then stopped to mold and contour the filler with his hands. Next, he moved to the jawline and repeated the procedure. At no point did I feel the least bit of pain, only pressure. I was done in a half hour, and emerged with just one tiny bruise.
My college roommate was allowed back in to see the results, and I could see from her reaction that she was impressed. My whole face looked better: My cheekbones were higher, and I could see where he had filled in my temples to make my face appear wider. But it's my jawline and chin that improved the most dramatically. Dr. Trokel said that the results would last for up to two years with touch-ups occasionally. (Total cost: $2,000 to $5,400.)
As for the recuperative downtime spent in a "fancy hotel with a private nurse," well, an hour after we'd entered Dr. Trokel's office, my roommate and I walked out and down the block to a busy restaurant. And while I might not have been feeling 35 again, I was very happy to be looking out at the world from a younger, more attractive face.
Yan Trokel, M.D.
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