Rearranging the fat

How long after transitioning to maintenance did it take your body to rearrange the leftover fat and get over that haggard kind of look?

I am curious because my face has started looking really drawn lately.  A few people in my group mentioned that the same thing happened to them and that for a few months my body would be shifting things around.  I have to admint that my new found vanity (maybe not vanity but definitely a pride in appearance) doesn't like looking old or with bags under my eyes - definitely not at 41.  

6 weeks to LBL! 

 Sadly, I got so haggard that I had to have fat transferred to my face.  Good news is that you're 20 years younger than me.  Things will continue shifting for you and you should look better and better!

It's taken 6 months, but I'm seeing some redistribution, now.  Sleep and being properly hydrated help, as well. 
 

I'm like Lee--I couldn't stand the saggy jowls, droopy neck and deeper wrinkles so I had a facelift three months after I got to goal.  Now I'm 19 months post-sleeve and my body is moving things around.  My thighs have tightened up a bit and my waist is smaller although my weight hasn't changed since January.  Also, I'm 57 and figured my poor face had been stretched too long to snap back very much.  My surgeon said the excess skin he cut away covered my entire ear--imagine how baggy that was when it was on my face!  From my gastric bypass friends, they look ghastly for about the first 2 years and then start looking less haggard.  I say give it to the 24-month mark.

I'm just starting to see some shifting and I'm 6 months ahead of you. So it may be a little while still before it starts happening to you.

I do see something in you that I saw in myself, which was continuing to drop well past goal. I'd recommend you react more quickly and aggressively to it than I did so you don't end up 30 pounds down and find yourself agonizing over whether to deliberately regain some (talk about scary).

 You are right.  I am still a bit scared of my weight and I have been upping things very slowly the farther I get from 600 calories.  I have even backed off of 1200 from being afraid of gaining.  Thanks for the advice - I am listening!

 Im almost 2 years out and I think this is finally happening...it takes some serious time and patience but it does happen. My arms also have lost that gangly teenager look...my husband just said to me this weekend..*isnt it nice that you no longer look SICK thin, now you just healthy thin* Well thanks for the kinda sorta compliment, but I know he is right...and just because it all takes adjusting too..even though my weight has been stable for more then a year now, when these shifts have happened I sometimes now worry that Ii look fatter!! I swear...we sometimes are never happy!!! 

You are only 41, your skin still has some elasticity left, give it time...until then..Mary Kay sells a nice line of mens products..im a rep hit me up! (IM JOKING...well half joking!) but really...get some good products for your skin, take good care of it and try and wait it out..take a long time for fat to travel from your ass to your eye sockets!

I looked the worst from 7-12 months post op....for me the thinness & shortness of my hair was the worst then, making me look much older...I also did have deep bags and thin skin under my eyes and just looked drawn and sunken in...

From 12 months +, I started to improve....I still have bags, but they seem less noticeable...and in the last month or two (I'm 15 months out) my hair thickened up and has lengthened, so I feel a lot better about my appearance...

But, I still look much older than my fat face pictures taken only a year ago..      :(
I think the fat was taking away my wrinkles!  Oh well, at least my body looks much better than pre-op!

I had complications in the beginning, so I really did look haggard for the first 4-5 months. It was a gradual process. I hit a normal BMI at 5.5 months and my ultimate goal at 7.5 months. I don't remember, when my face started filling back in, but it may have around the 10-12 month period of time. By the 11th-12th month, my hair was coming in thick again, like it was pre-op, but even healthier. Must of been all that protein.

I am older, so my skin hasn't bounced back as well, but some of the face droopiness has lessened. I still need a face lift, but I don't look sunken. My fat has redistributed during the past year and some of my arm wrinkles and body sagginess have lessened, but I need plastics. I am glad that I have waited, so that my body had a chance to do its own thing. It is time to have the plastics done, since I can't really see the full results of all the weight training and exercise that I have done over the past 2 years.

Early on, when I used to read about fat redistribution, I really didn't "get it" until it started happening to me. Even though my weight is within a pound or two of what it was last year, some of my pants fit me differently in the waist and hips. So for me, it started after the one year mark and I had been at goal for about 6 months.

Gail

Oh yes. The fat filling the wrinkles thing.

Everything  on the body is heading south.