AWARDS
DATABASE
All of the
winners, all of the nominees, all of the awards shows.
Up Next
Oct. 20
•Final date for Golden Globes press
conferences for TV entries
Oct. 23
• Hollywood Awards
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Lasting: Most
patients who do one Thermage treatment don’t repeat it until the results
wear off, in one to two years.
PHOTO GALLERIES
Speaking of fat, which reminds me of stomachs,
thighs and upper arms, Thermage also works on those female trouble
spots.
“It’s not going to
make fat go away, but if a woman has loose skin on her stomach from
lipo, weight loss or after having a baby, Thermage can tighten those
areas,” says Wieder. And it works for crepe chests, saggy upper arms and
wrinkly knees.
I’m gonna hold off on the full body Thermage
treatment. Frankly, my wallet is tightening. The face/neck/eyes tab is
$2,800. But damn the budget. Full anti-aging speed ahead.
Step One of my awards
season prep was done. But with my face tighter, I realized my cheeks
were — dear Lord — really hollow. When I was a baby-faced teen, I
remember longing for sophisticated Dietrich-like cheekbones. Now I want
my youthful apple cheeks back.
Check out Teri Hatcher and Cindy Crawford, then
and now. Hollow cheeks after 40, it happens to us all. So, after five
seconds of rational, thoughtful, careful consideration, I decided to get
my cheeks shot up with Sculptra — a new filler that
stimulates your own collagen to grow, thickening your skin, filling in
the hollows.
The ingredient (poly-L-lactic acid) is injected
into the face to correct lipotrophy, the loss of facial fat due to
aging. Initially FDA-approved for AIDS patients, it’s now been approved
for all patients to correct hollow eyes, sunken cheeks, etc. Results
last around two years.
And I’ve heard rumors that it’s being used on
aging hands because, well, if you’re a woman reading this, you already
know why. And if you don’t, look at your grandmother’s hands. That is
your future.
Wieder began by inspecting my face from all
vantage points, then drawing circles and lines around my cheeks. He gave
me six tiny anesthetic injections in spots where he then injected the
Sculptra. It took about 25 minutes. My eyes didn’t even water. I left
the office with an ice pack that I tossed on the drive home. No
bruising, just slightly fuller cheeks.
The only downside? The $1,200 charge on
my Amex card.
But I did my homework. Wieder advised “Massage
your cheeks gently. Five days, five minutes a day, five times a day.” A
five weeks later, my cheeks, while not exactly sweet 16, definitely look
more like the ones I owned at 35.
Okay, so the cheek hollow situation was solved.
But A-list actresses have to worry about High Def revealing every fine
line, pore divot and sun spot.
And that’s where Fraxel comes in. Or should
come in.
I’d heard about Fraxelfrom a girlfriend who had just had her fifth
treatment from Dr. Randal Haworth (“The Swan”), one of the hot Beverly
Hills surgeons. She claimed that everyone in town was getting Fraxeled
by Hayworth and she should know because she really does know everyone in
town.
What’s a Fraxel? My
friend gave me a brochure that explained the laser treatment resurfaces
your skin by penetrating deep beneath the dermis. Each session — and
you will need five over a period of five months — does a fraction of
your skin cells, hence the name. Imagine your face as a collection of
pixels — like in an enlarged photograph — and you get the idea.
But unlike Sculptra,
there is major downtime involved. “For the first few days, your face is
bright red, like you spent two weeks on the beach in the Caribbean
without sunscreen,” another frequently Fraxeled friend whispered.
Hmmm. That’s slightly
worse than the “bronzed face” effect described in the brochure. After
checking my calendar, I decided that while I probably needed a Fraxel, I
should hold off until I found five consecutive months with one week
with no personal/professional obligations, including taking out the
trash.
Besides, with my
tighter face/neck/eyes and fuller cheeks, I already feel like an
Oscar-seeking Hollywood actress. And I’d like to thank the Academy for
making all this possible. Without the incredible awards season pressure
to look one’s best, I might not have gone to the trouble, discomfort and
expense of all these Oscar Face Race beauty treatments.
Now I won’t dread my
up-close-and-personal interviews with all those suspiciously
younger-than-springtime actresses. And who knows? Maybe they’ll wonder
what I had done. Or maybe they’ll notice that I missed something.
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