A few years ago, I began to notice
that a deepening of the lines beside my mouth, some call them marionette lines.
It seemed that every time I looked into the mirror my eyes gravitated to these
two lines that were absent in my youth.
I had heard one of the older ladies
at the gym talk about how she goes to a dermatologist every so often to get
injections of Juvederme injections. She laughed and said, “The doc keeps a vial
on hand for me, and a few shots of the stuff fixes me right up.”
She had to be at least ten years my
senior (you never ask how old a lady is). I looked at her face and decided that
she might be right. It wouldn’t hurt to try some of that stuff. After all, I
didn’t want to have a puppet face when I got married in a few weeks.
About a week before the wedding I
set up an appointment with a dermatologist in Douglasville near the school
where I worked. I had lunchtime planning, so I booked the appointment for then.
I could have the procedure then go back to school and teach my last class. I
would have plenty of time.
I told no one about my decision,
mainly because I wanted to see if anyone, including Dave, would notice my improved face. It
would be a true test of effectiveness. Besides, who wants to admit to such
vanity.
The doctor came in and explained the
procedure. I guess I had thought you would just stick the needle in and squirt
a little each side of my mouth. That was not the case. He numbed both sides and
then proceeded to make several injections up and down the lines shooting the
expensive vial of Juvederme into place. I looked at the half-full vial as he
switched from the right side to the left and thought, ‘Gosh there is still that
much left! Gym lady forgot to tell how much this junk hurts!’
Finally, I was finished and sent on
my way back to school. I flipped open my visor mirror to see the doctor’s
handiwork and gasped. My marionette lines had disappeared and were replaced
with considerable swelling and about twenty blood dots where the needle had
been inserted.
I had to go back to school. I had a
class starting in fifteen minutes. What was I going to do? I had thought to
bring some foundation with me as I thought I might need to reapply. I dabbed it
over the blood dots to no avail. Even after the third, cakey coat you could
still see the tiny scabs if you looked closely, and there was no help for the
swelling from the trauma of it all.
‘So much for no one knowing about my
vanity,’ I thought as I opened the hallway door. Classes were changing, and as
I patrolled the masses my two department heads, both women old enough to
understand, came up to me in the hallway.
One smiled and said, “We missed you
at lunch today.”
Feeling the need for a confession I
looked at them both and said, “Yeah, I went to the dermatologist, can you
tell?”
Neither one wanted to say, “Your
face is all swollen and what are those little red dots,” so they said nothing.
I continued, “I had injections to get rid of the lines beside my mouth. I had
no I idea I would look like this afterward, or I would have scheduled it for
after school. It looks bad doesn’t it?”
They both said no I looked fine, and
one added, “If I had the money I would get a face-lift in a minute.”
One thing is for sure that women of a
certain age come together in great understanding of anything anti-aging. As far
as the results, No one even noticed. Dave would have never known had I not told
him. My mom, a fellow anti-ager, couldn’t even tell that I had done it. My bank
account sure could. I was $575 poorer, and that was a fact.
I will say though that after the
swelling went down and the blood dots disappeared, my eyes didn’t focus on my
marionette lines anymore. They had something else to focus on. The crows feet
beside my eyes became more prominent as did the frown lines between my eyes. ‘I
wonder how much Botox costs?’
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