A few years ago, Alison underwent plastic surgery hoping to enhance her appearance, but the experience didn’t go as planned. Speaking with People magazine, she admitted she had chosen a “cheap” option, which unfortunately led to complications.
“I left saying, ‘Never again. This will never happen again,’” Alison recalled. She had a facelift but afterward, she was unable to close her eyes properly. “I was told that the doctor (I saw) at the time gave me Botox and that’s why. It took three months. One of my eyes was open, so I had to patch it, put some lube on it, and it’s probably not going to come back.”
Finding a Trusted Surgeon
Alison, now 67 and a former nurse, did not want to be stuck with unsatisfactory results. She recommended a trusted plastic surgeon, Dr. Oren Tepper, to a friend and then visited his clinic in New York City herself. Alison said she “trusted him right away.”
Before her surgery with Dr. Tepper, Alison felt like she looked “80-85,” although she simply wanted to look her age—not drastically younger. “I want to look natural,” she said. “I’m not a movie star or a Kardashian. I have to have wrinkles. I have to look my age. My face has to match my body.”
The Medical Perspective
Dr. Tepper explained that Alison’s prior surgery hadn’t delivered good results from a medical standpoint. “She felt like she took the step of surgery, but she didn’t look any better,” he said.
His approach involved a stronger facelift with reshaping around her mouth and lower eyelids. “I think the most effective thing was adding volume to her face,” Dr. Tepper noted. Alison’s face was saggy, partly due to her natural facial structure rather than weight loss or other causes. Adding volume helped restore a youthful appearance.
Fat Grafting: A Natural Solution
To add volume, Dr. Tepper used fat grafting—taking fat from Alison’s thighs and implanting it into her face. He emphasized that this method is preferable to artificial fillers because it uses the patient’s own cells, which the body accepts better and typically requires only one treatment.
He performed a “boomerang lift,” implanting fat in a boomerang shape into her cheeks and under her eyes. Additional fat was added to her temples to soften the appearance of prominent bones that contributed to an aged look. Fat grafting also helped improve her eyelids, addressing problems she had under her eyes.
Surgery and Recovery
The surgery lasted about four hours and went smoothly. Recovery was also uneventful, with normal swelling that subsided within two months. Alison said she quickly returned to normal life, and although she didn’t immediately go back to New York City, she wasn’t concerned about being seen.
“No one’s going to look at you anyway,” she laughed, “No one cares — you’re in New York.”
Support and Personal Satisfaction
Alison’s family supported her throughout the process. Dr. Tepper praised her husband for being very supportive, noting that couples vary widely in how they handle the journey, but Alison and her husband “went through the whole process together.”
“My husband is going to love me no matter what,” Alison said. “But I did it for myself because I was sad. Now I will age gracefully. I am very happy with this amazing experience and I look much more my age.”
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