5 Mos out and Suddenly There's Skin EVERYWHERE
I had no idea there would be this much sagging skin. I can live with the Rocky-The-Squirrel arms, and my upper belly is still tight, but Holy Cow... what the heck happened to my thighs!!! They suddenly look like the legs of a 90 year old woman.
I still have 45 pounds to hit my goal. After that - is there still hope that some of that skin will tighten up? Is there some timeframe to go by that will tell me when 'this is as good as it's going to get', so I can make a decision about plastics?
The skin will most likely not tighten up without the aid of a surgeon. Wish I had better news...sorry.
I know I should get plastics. ( remember...melting candle syndrome? ) Between my bat wings, my flying squirrel sides, my flappy tummy and saggy ass and legs...well, it ain't pretty. I make the old lady from Titanic seem sleek and nubile. That being said, I'm still being wishy-washy about actually going through with surgery. ( I may not end up being able to easily afford it anyway. My poor geriatric Chevy Suburban needs some major work done on him. )
If you do weight training/toning exercises, the muscles you build should help the skin "drape" better. I uh..haven't really done that, so I can't speak on results. I do good just to go walking these days.
I woke up in between a memory and a dream...
Tom Petty
It may change a little, but not much. My face looks better than it did the first 2 years, but otherwise I needed plastic surgery.
Laura in Texas
53 years old; 5'7" tall; HW: 339 (BMI=53); GW: 140 CW: 170 (BMI=27)
RNY: 09-17-08 Dr. Garth Davis
brachioplasty: 12-18-09 Dr. Wainwright; lbl/bl: 06-28-11 Dr. LoMonaco
"May your choices reflect your hopes and not your fears."
What they said. The skin on your face may tighten up a bit as time goes by, but once you are done losing you aren't going to see much change over time in the other areas. That is partly because the face usually has less extra skin than the other areas (so a very small amount of tightening is actually noticeable) and -- to a MUCH lesser extent -- because most people give their face more attention in terms of moisturizers.
The other thing to remember is that the skin on your face (and even on your arms, probably) is in much better condition than the skin on your thighs. Most of us end up with very thin, very wrinkled, stretched out skin on our inner thighs. That is also one of the reasons that the complication rate in thigh lifts is so high. The skin is in terrible shape and has limited blood flow, and so the chances of having problems with healing are much higher (and some plastic surgeons won't even do thigh lifts).
Sorry, I wish we had better news for you.
Lora
14 years out; 190 pounds lost, 165 pound loss maintained
You don't drown by falling in the water. You drown by staying there.
When I asked my husband if he thought my saggy skin looked bad, he said, "Not anywhere as bad as the extra hundred pounds you used to have" !! So I don't worry about my saggy skin lol
HW 264 SW 234 CW 149 5'4"
on 7/13/15 7:15 pm
Picture a balloon that has been overly inflated and then when you let the air out. Blahhhh.
Congratulations on that saggy skin folds. They are war scars from a battle you won! Later on, if you can afford it have some plastics.
"The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue." --- Dorothy Parker
"You may not like what I say or how I say it, but it may be just exactly what you need to hear." ---Kathryn White
on 7/14/15 5:55 am
The skin thing does suck. If you have the money and you want plastics do it. I try to pick out the good things I see in the mirror. How much better I feel and look. We have a tendency on beating ourselves up. Just remember you are beautiful.
Thank goodness for shape wear.
Thanks so much for all your replies. You're right - not much good news on that front. It just seems that I remember my teacher and one of our speakers in our classes saying something about giving it 6 months after weight loss to see if some of the skin will snap back. I don't expect all of it to tighten up (good lord... that would take a miracle!)... but I keep remembering something about giving it 6 months.
Oh well, you're right - good battle scars and worth the fight!!!