Selasa, 25 Februari 2014

KOREA BEAUTY TRIP- After surgery photo shoot (sneak preview)

These are some pictures taken during my photoshoot.

DAY 14 POST SURGERY












Official pics will be up around next month, can't wait to see them! 

Following are some pics i took after the photo shoot, i love how natural i look with the make up applied on me. I can't apply such natural make up on my own... I should go take up some tutorials and learn more.






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Senin, 24 Februari 2014

KOREA BEAUTY TRIP- Plastic Surgery adventure Part 3 (Day 7-13 post op)

DAY 8 POST SURGERY



Went to Everland with my friends and I managed to put on contact lens without any difficulty, I tried to avoid pulling up my upper eyelids and only pulled down my lower eyelids to get the lens into my eyes. 

Look at my smile when I show my teeth. I look like a toothless woman! My upper lip seem to have vanished when I smile like that. My friends are not used to my new look and said that I am still looking very unnatural. Sobz.

DAY 9-14 POST SURGERY





Things are starting to get better, my eyes are less purplish but left eyelid is higher than my right. 

Went back to the clinic again on day 11 to remove stitches on my ear. It was done and finished in less than 5 minutes. The consultant dropped by and was amazed by how fast I healed! I told her that my chin is too sharp for my liking and she said that it will go down in time to come. She also explained that my nose is deviated and that my left eyelid is higher due to the fact that they are still healing and healing at different speed. One side is healing faster than the other and they will look normal soon, so I gotta wait to see the results.

My face seem to be changing subtly everyday..

DAY 12 POST SURGERY
 I decided to visit Changdeokgung palace and also tried on some eye make up for the very first time after surgery. 

I applied eyeliner and falsies. Wanted to apply mascara but realized that I didn't bring it with me. (Gives me a very good reason to get a new one!!)

My eyelids felt numb when I applied the eyeliner, it wasn't painful but just very weird and I didn't really like that feeling, perhaps I'm just not used to it yet and probably it's not completely healed that's why I felt this way. 



My eyes look pretty much the same as before with make up on. I guess the double eyelids are very obvious when I have no make up on. My nose bridge is still swollen and my chin too sharp. 

Really they hope they subside fast and soon, and I hope to smile like before real soon too! 

DAY 13 POST SURGERY
With the help of make up, i finally look more normal. I tried applying CC cream to my face but because of the dry weather in Seoul, my skin was very dry and I couldn't apply any cream/foundation. So I could only apply moisturizer to my face and eye make up.


                                   















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KOREA BEAUTY TRIP- Plastic Surgery adventure Part 2 (1-6 post op)

DAY 1 POST SURGERY

Today I made an appointment with the clinic (pls email me to enquire more about which clinic i went to) to have my surgery at 11pm. Reached at about 10.30pm and the staff brought me into the consultation room and gave me a bag of medicine (consisting of pain killers and antibiotics), ice pack and gauze to reduce swelling and lists of what to do and not to do after surgery (will write about these in details in another separate post).

After this, I was brought to another room to have a final consultation with Nicole before my surgery. Nicole showed me before and after pics of their patients and asked me what kind of nose I want. I told her that I wanted a more defined nose with a higher bridge but I wanted it to be natural, she assured me again that dr yoo is very good at making his patients look natural. This was exactly what I wanted. 

I was then ushered by the nurse to the recovery room and operating theatre on the 4th level. Dr Yoo was a little late and Bonny kept coming into the recovery room to check on me and apologized continuously for making me wait.

Last look of myself before surgery 

Finally after about 30 mins, I was ushered to the operating room. About 5 nurses were attending to me, adjusting the positions of my hands and legs, wrapping my head with towel, preparing the sedation, basically preparing me for the surgery. The last thing I remembered was Bonny telling me that they are putting me on sedation and I asked her how long would I take to fall asleep, she said one minute. Soon after that I fell asleep.. (I think it took slightly longer than a minute lol)

When I regained consciousness, I felt the surgeon operating on my eyes, I could feel the sewing and removing of thread but I couldn't feel any pain. He asked me to open and close my eyes a couple of time and asked me to sit up twice so he could take a better look at my eyes and see if both sides were balanced. Soon after this, it was over!!!

As the nurses helped me up and brought me back to the recovery room which was just next door, I felt a little intoxicated, like i was a little high on alcohol, drowsy but still aware of what's going on. 

They then asked me to rest for an hour and put an ice pack over my eyes. Before they did that they have me a mirror and I saw what I became!!



There was a piece of gauze in one of my nostril because it was still bleeding from the surgery. These pics were taken about 5 minutes after surgery.

The bruise on my eyes got so bad it's not blue black, it's literally jet black!! Ok I'm exaggerating, more to charcoal black. 



Not only does my face suck, my hair sucks too.

Soon then I drifted in and out of sleep. At 4pm, the nurse came into the room with a tray of corn soup and soya milk. 


My upper lip was still very numb from the anasthetic, I couldn't feel anything and I couldn't open my mouth too wide cuz of the bandages. I had a little bit of difficulty finishing the soup. And suddenly.. I saw little splatters of blood on the blanket and Abit on the wooden retractable table. 
I asked the nurse where the blood come from cuz I checked the mirror but couldn't see where, she said my nose. So I used a piece of tissue and gently cleaned the sides of my nose and openings of my nostrils. 

Then it happened again, the blood when into my corn soup. 
I gave up drinking it and finished up the soy milk. 

I felt well enough to go back to my hotel and left the clinic. I even strolled along the streets outside the clinic with my bandaged face for a while. They said this was a very common sight in Seoul and indeed, no one even took a second look at me. 

DAY 2 POST SURGERY

Face is slightly more swollen now and I didn't sleep well the night before because of blocked nose and I'm not used to sleeping facing the ceiling, I'm always sleeping on my sides. And it was advised to sleep facing the ceiling on elevated pillows to help in deswelling for one month!!!

Didn't really feel much pain, only slight pain that only lingered a while around my ear area. 

The only disturbance and discomfort was that I couldn't breathe thru my nose which is making me rather annoyed cuz I can't sleep. 


DAY 3 POST SURGERY 
I went back to the clinic again this afternoon at 12 noon for follow up. The nurse removed my bandages and pasted small translucent square stickers on the areas I had fats grafted. 

Most importantly, she cleaned the insides of my nostrils and airway is cleared, I can breathe properly thru my nose again now!! Last night was a torture, I couldn't sleep at all, I had a running nose and wanted to sneeze but I tried my very best to control this which made me so uncomfortable, the mucus was all stuck at my nostrils and I was almost chocked many times. But now after the nurse cleared my nose, I finally caught a proper rest! 

Lastly, she gave me an antibiotic jab, I feel so much better now.



Here are some pictures of me after removing the bandages: 



My eyelids are still very swollen and purplish, so are my checks, my lips especially my lower lips are thin and receded due to the swelling on the other parts of my face and I was told they will be back to normal once swelling subsides. 

Now, I don't look like super Mario's gf anymore, instead, I look more like Avatar's gf! Hope the swelling and bruising subsides fast...

After a good nap on day 3, I was well enough to get out for dinner. I'm so thankful I'm in Korea in this undesirable and scary state. The Koreans treat this as nothing and I didn't receive any weird stares at all from them. Instead, they didn't even take a second glance at me with those terrible bandages, bruises and swelling all over my face. for an instance, I thought I was invisible. If I was in singapore, I would probably be on stomp by now for walking around in public like this...

DAY 4 POST SURGERY 
i went back to the clinic for removal of the bandages. I was left with only the nose splint, eye stitches and ear stitches. 

And off I flew to Jeju Island!
The custom officer saw me with the cast in my nose and made me sign a form declaring that I am fit enough for the flight and that they will not be responsible should anything happen to me on board. 

I was really feeling very well and normal, no pain, no discomfort. 



I could smile but not as wide as before due to face swelling. 

DAY 5 POST SURGERY

Swelling continues to subside. I went sight seeing, did lots of walking, ate like normal. In general, I feel very normal and didn't get tired easily too. My friends were surprised and said that I don't behave like someone who just had surgeries done. 



Found a hair salon opposite our hotel in Jeju and went for hairwash at 12,000 won. It was equivalent to finding a gem! I had difficulties washing my hair on my own as water wasn't supposed to touch my face especially my eyes and my nose. 


DAY 6 POST SURGERY

My face is still swollen but the swelling around my eyes have subsided significantly. The bruises around my eyes have changed from black to light purplish. 

DAY 7 POST SURGERY
Went back to the clinic to get my stitches and nose splint removed.

I read somewhere that removing of stitches is very painful and I was rather nervous so I asked the nurse about it and she assured me that it's not gonna be pain. 

And true enough, its like ant's bite! I was worried for nothing, in fact I feel eye brow plucking is more painful than this. But it also depends on your threshold for pain I guess. 

The nurse said I can now put on make up, wash my face like normal (but not too rough), apply moisturizer and resume my normal skincare routine.


This was how I looked after removal of the splint and stitches. 

I wasn't very pleased at first. My dark eye circles were so obvious and eyelids were still purplish due to swelling, my nose seems a little deviated, I still can't smile properly, my lips are still receded and my chin seem too sharp. I look like I got beaten up. 













                                                                                                           









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KOREA BEAUTY TRIP- Plastic Surgery adventure Part 1 (Before surgery)

This post will be a more detailed post about my plastic surgery experience in Korea.

WHY DID I CONSIDER PLASTIC SURGERY?
Well, i am actually rather satisfied with my natural looks, but there are some imperfections which i thought i could improve on.

1) My nose, i thought my nose was rather big for my face. My friends like to laugh at my bulbous nose and said that I am Super Mario's girlfriend/ Jackie Chan's daughter. (They are well known to have bulbous noses as well). I always dreamt of having a nose with a higher bridge.

I did fillers in Thailand some time last year (will post a separate post on fillers soon) and I was actually quite pleased with the results of how augmented my bridge was. The initial thoughts of having a permanent nose job then crossed my mind and I started to do some subtle research on plastic surgery ever since.

2) My eyes- I love my eyes and I am very thankful that I am blessed with naturally big eyes like my mum. BUT my eyes only look 'alive' when i put on eye make up. Without make up, my eyes look bulgy, my double eyelids are too high up and not defined enough and I look sick and sleepy all the time even though my eyes are big. I hope to correct this problem, I think i have very droopy and lazy eyelids.

A pic of me before surgery:


Check out my onion nose, it looks even bigger whenever I smile.

HOW DID IT START?
My friends and I love travelling and going on holidays. I am very glad to have a few groups of very good friends who are always planning and organizing holiday trips and we travel a few times a year together.

Late last year, we decided on visiting Korea, a country which we have always wanted to visit and have not visited yet. Malaysia Airlines was having a promotion then and we decided to go Korea for 11 days in February 2013!!

And so..... i was thinking to myself, since 11 days is rather long, why not go for a nose job in Korea? I have heard so much about Korea being so advanced in plastic surgery and how common it is in Korea to be under the knife. It was from here that i started my intensive online research on plastic surgery.

I actually considered doing it in Thailand as well because prior to our Korea trip, we actually had another trip to Bangkok. Read more to know how I ended up with my final decision after much hesitations and weighing the pros and cons.

MY PLASTIC SURGERY RESEARCH:
I started reading up on plastic surgery online and in forums. There were lots of information in forums, few hundred pages to read through, I spent a lot of time on the internet, i started my intensive research in December 2013 and I had not much time to decide because my Bangkok trip was in January and Korea trip was in Feb. Thus, I had to decide where I wanted to do it before the 2nd week of January. It was quite rushed because I also needed to book appointment with the clinic/hospital and they may not have availability for me on the dates I'm there. 

The thing about forums is that very little people actually post their before and after pictures. So, I didn't get to see a lot of reviews after plastic surgery, thus, deciding on the place to do it was really quite a tough job.

I sent my close up pictures (front view/2 side views/nostril view) to various plastic surgery clinics in Korea and Thailand for free online consultation asking them what surgeries I should do to improve my facial features and to look better and the cost of their surgeries. Many clinics/hospitals offer online consultations via email and a lot of them reply very promptly. Many of them replied me the next day regarding what surgeries i should do. All of them said I should do my nose. A few said my eyes needed improvement and some said I should also do chin implant for a better profile.

Initially i focused on Thailand's cosmetics surgery. The cost for rhinoplasty is very much more affordable than Korea, the price is very tempting and I saw some pictures on their websites. There are also reviews and pictures posted by some forummers but not many. I also almost booked a ticket to Phuket to get my nose job done with a famous plastic surgeon (Dr Chi from Hatyai, he also have a clinic in Phuket).

However, just before I made this major decision, i contacted my friend Jacqueline Koh, who was also my friend/ex JC classmate. She's a really brave lady who went to Korea to get multi surgeries done at a go in Korea. She gave me some very good advice... Thanks again babe =)))

Then.. i researched on Korea's cosmetics surgery and found out a lot more information about the different clinics. The more i read, the more choices I had and i was very confused because there were too many clinics and too many reviews (but very little pictures) and I didn't know which to choose.

WHY KOREA FOR PLASTIC SURGERY?
I saw so many pretty pictures and videos of girls after their surgeries, they look amazing! and after research, i realised that Korea is much more advanced in plastic surgery than Thailand, they have new innovations and techonologies which Thailand are not using yet. However, price is much steeper in Korea though.

Many clinics like JW, BK, Regen, Grand, Pitangui, Item, ID, April 31, Yonsei Up, Popular, Small Face etc replied my email. 

To find out which clinic i did my surgeries at eventually and for more information about the various clinics, please email me at ilovedawn@gmail.com


CONSULTATION DAY (6th February)
We arrived at Incheon Airport at 7am in the morning, my friends accompanied me to the clinic.

We were amazed by how the reception and consultation level looks like:

The interior was so posh looking and clean, we were very impressed. The staff were very hospitable and served us with drinks and fruits.

The main surgeon graduated from many cosmetic surgery schools mainly overseas and has been featured on many TV programs.

Shortly after, i was asked to fill up my particulars.

Few minutes later, i met the English consultant whom i was corresponding with before the trip. She was a tall, fair and elegant lady who speaks perfect English.

Then, I finally met the doctor in the consultation room .I told him my main concern was my bulbous nose. After examining my face, they suggested that I do these surgeries:

1) RHINOPLASTY
- Bridge Augmentation: Building up the bridge/profile line of my nose. Silicon will be implanted for my case.
- Tip Reduction and Tip Plasty: Manipulation of the arched lower lateral cartilages to increase the projection of the tip. Ear cartiledge (my own) will be used for my nose tip to make it more defined.
- Alarplasty: Reducing the width of the nostrils using closed incisions (stitches will be done on the insides of the nostrils rather than the outside so that there will be no visible scars)

2) Incisional double eyelid and lazy eye correction
An incision is made at the proposed height and skin is removed according to pre-existing anatomical conditions. 

3) Fats graft to smile lines also known as paranasal augmentation
a method to inflate depression 
above the upper jaw from the nostrils to the corners of the mouth. 
Adding volume to these areas straightens nasolabial folds, 
achieving younger appearance in general. This is a semi- permanent surgery as fats will dissolve over the months and only about 40% will remain.

4) Chin augmentation via fats graft
To lengthen my chin making it more proportioned and defined. Using fats graft here would be more natural than silicon implant and same as above, this is also a semi-permanent surgery as fats will dissolve over the months leaving only about 40% surviving.

I was having a running nose at the time of consultation, due to lack of sleep and also the change in climate (it was freezing in Korea, i think temperature at that time was about 0 degrees or maybe less). The doctor was very concerned about my running nose because if my flu persists on the day of surgery, the likelihood of getting an infection was high. Usually after a good sleep/rest, my flu will disappear.

However, we still went ahead and fixed the surgery appointment the next day. My appointment was at 10am and i can't wait!!!

THE SURGERY DAY- THE DAY I SUCCUMBED TO PLASTIC SURGERY

OMG!!! The day has finally arrived!!!!

I reached the clinic at about 945am this morning. Bonny, the nurse brought me into the consultation room and gave me a bag of medicine (consisting of pain killers and antibiotics), ice pack and gauze to reduce swelling and lists of what to do and not to do after surgery (will write about these in details in another separate post).

After this, I was brought to another room to have a final consultation with Nicole before my surgery. Nicole showed me before and after pics of their patients and asked me what kind of nose I want. I told her that I wanted a more defined nose with a higher bridge but I wanted it to be natural, she assured me again that Dr Yoo is very good at making his patients look natural. This was exactly what I wanted. 

I was brought to the 4th level where the operating room and recovery rooms were located. Bonny, the nurse was assigned to assist me. 

I was told to change to the operation clothes and rest in the recovery room while waiting for the doctor who was performing another surgery for another patient.

2 photographers were also there to take pictures of me.



Recovery room was bright and nice, i put my belongings into the locker there.

About 20 minutes later, i was ushered to the operating room which was next to the recovery room.


The operating room was bright and spacious. There were about 5 nurses fussing over me, tidying up my hair, preparing me for surgery together with the doctor. I asked them many questions like how long will the surgery take and how long would it take for the IV sedation to knock me out. Soon after a few minutes, I fell asleep.

I woke up about 20- 30 mins before the surgery ended. I was prepared to wake up mid surgery because that was what i was told. I know that the doctor operating on my eyes but i didn't feel anything because i was numbed. It was so weird, I could feel him stitching my eyes. He asked me to open and close my eyes many times throughout this surgery so that he could measure properly.

After my eyes, he did my paranasal augmentation via fats graft. I could feel him injecting something hard into my smile lines area. Lastly, he performed my chin augmentation via fats graft, these 2 procedures felt about the same, something hard being injected into my chin.

After this, i was asked to sit up, the nurses helped me up and led me to the recovery room. I was given an ice pack to put over my eyes and i slept for about 2 hours.




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