You’ve Lost the Weight, Now Lose the Sagging

You’ve done the heavy lifting, so to speak. You’ve lost the weight, whether by exercise and diet moderation or by bariatric surgery. You’ve achieved your goals but now all you see when you look in the mirror is skin — loose, sagging skin and muscle on the face and jowls, the arms, breasts, and all around your torso and thighs. This wasn’t the plan.

The problem is that once skin and muscle have been stretched for an extended period of time the skin and tissues often have lost elasticity (exactly as a rubber band that has been stretched for a long time does) and cannot return to their former level of tautness or contour. Now you’re faced with sagging pockets of skin in these areas:

• Face, neck, and jowls, giving you a droopy, sad countenance
• Upper arms, giving you “bat wings”
• Breasts, causing them to flatten and hang with the nipples pointing downward
• Abdominal area, extending around the sides and into the lower back, giving you an overhang
• Buttocks, groin, and thighs, with hanging pockets of skin

Body contouring to finish the job

Body contouring surgery with Dr. Hetzler can finish the job on your weight loss, removing excess skin and fat and tightening underlying tissue and muscle. Body contouring will match your skin to your new slimmer contour.

Before you even consider surgery, however, you must be sure that your weight loss is complete. Plus, you need to adapt new lifestyle choices to keep the weight off. This is critical because additional weight loss will create more loose skin, even after you’ve had body-contouring surgery. Weight gain will do the same when the weight is lost down the road.

Where are the surgery locations?

Body contouring is not a set procedure. You will discuss your goals with Dr. Hetzler in your consultation and together you will create a plan for the specific surgeries you need. Body contouring may involve these procedures:

• Lower body lift to correct sagging of the abdomen, buttocks, groin, and outer thighs.
• Breast lift to correct sagging, flattened breasts. This may or may not include augmentation.
• Arm lift to correct loose, sagging skin on the underside of the arms.
• Thigh lift to correct sagging of the inner, outer, and mid-thigh areas.

Have you lost lots of weight and are still not happy with your contours? Call Dr. Hetzler at 732-219-0447 and set up a consultation for body contouring.