Eileen was bothered by the bump on her nose especially on her profile.
She was bothered by a constant stuffy nose, especially problematic in the morning where she feels that it was stuffy and “dripping” throughout the morning. At night time she had difficulty sleeping and was stuffy at that time as well. She had tried numerous medications for this from her primary care doctor.
In addition to smoothing down the bump, we straightened her nose and decreased the width of her nose to have it better match the other very nice features of the cheekbones and facial area. We performed a septoplasty and also treated her turbinates to help her with the breathing difficulties.
Q: Do you like your nose now that you have had surgery?
A: My nose looks beautiful, and so natural, which is the best thing that I like about it.
Q: What prompted you to seek the surgery in the first place?
A: I had a huge bump on my nose since I was 12 years old, and I just hated it all those years.
I didn’t want anything super fancy, I wanted the bump gone – that’s all. I’m so happy that it looks so natural.
Q: Has anyone noticed that you’ve had the surgery done?
A: People don’t notice, they just say that something looks different about me. They’ll say that I look so beautiful and ask what I did. Even my own mother, who didn’t know that I had the surgery, said how beautiful I looked when I sent her pictures of myself after the surgery. She called me [after getting the pictures] and said “See, and you thought you needed a nose job.” She had no clue because it isn’t so noticeable from the front view.
Even a lot of my guy friends didn’t notice it until I showed them pictures [from before the surgery].They didn’t even notice the hump until I pointed it out in pictures. Of course, now they are all hitting on me! They are all over me!
But I said, just because I’ve got a new nose doesn’t mean I’m a new girl.
Q: What would you recommend to people considering this type of surgery?
A: I would make sure that they definitely want to do it. You know, it’s like I said, it’s been something that I’ve wanted to do since I was 12 years old and I’m 30 now, you know. If you think you’re still going to want it in five years, then I would say to do it now. You know, if you’ve wanted it for five years and you think you’re going to want it in another five years, just do it. It’s something that I wish I did five or 10 years ago.
Q: What was your experience like as a patient?
A: It was my first surgery ever. I had never even broken a bone, never had surgery, so I was a little bit nervous about that. But this is something that I want; the ends justified the means for me. To tell you the truth, I woke up from surgery and it really wasn’t anything. I mean, yeah, I was a little packed and swollen but I took the advice of several people and stayed on top of my pain medication the first two days. I really didn’t experience such pain with it. I had bruises around my eyes but other than that it was nothing.
Q: What was your recovery period like?
A: Oh my goodness, I was bored and ready to do stuff on Friday. I had the surgery and Tuesday and I was ready to go out on Friday. I still had some bruising and swelling, but I wanted to do dishes, I wanted to clean – I was ready to get stuff done!
The medications really help with the swelling and discomfort, and I ate tons of pineapple because I heard it was a great anti-inflammatory. I ate a whole pineapple before surgery and then another two during that week.
Q: What was your experience with the office staff and the staff at the operating room?
A: It was great! Everybody was fabulous from the time I came for the first consultation all the way until I was at the operating room. The anesthesia people were great at the hospital, and Dr. Sullivan came in and drew a map of China all over my face – oh, yeah, it was great. I walked myself right down to the OR and jumped on the table and the next thing I knew I was waking up.
Q: What kinds of suggestions would you make to other people considering this type of surgery?
A: Everything is pretty mapped out here – the process is pretty good. I wasn’t apprehensive or worried about anything I had to do because you get everything beforehand; i.e., the scripts are filled and ready at home for you. I would say, make sure you have someone there to take care of you. I really needed my friends those first couple of days so that I could rest.
View before and after pictures of rhinoplasty (nose job) procedures >