GMommy Facelift and GMommy Neck lift

Grandma Skin, Wrinkles, and Crepe

GMommy means grandma. The GMommy facelift and GMommy neck lift is the surgery used here when a long life has left moderate to severe skin redundancy of the neck and the cheeks, facial wrinkles, and crepe skin on the neck. Gravity and ultraviolet radiation are the two exposures that produce those changes. The cheeks lengthen, the neck folds into crepe, and wrinkles sit on the face on top of that extra skin. A fulfilling life is why the face has had decades to change, and the surgery is planned for that degree of change.

Redundancy and texture are different problems, and both have to be treated. Redundancy is skin that is too long for the cheek and the neck it covers. Texture is the wrinkle and the crepe quality of the surface. Excision takes away the extra length. Ablation renews the worn surface. Skin that is still crepey after the sag is removed still looks older. A smooth surface on a cheek and neck that still hang still looks older. The person this operation is written for has both, which is the usual picture after years of sun and gravity.

Moderate to severe is the amount of extra skin named for this lift. A faint line on a cheek that is otherwise snug is a smaller texture problem. Crepe neck skin plus long cheek skin plus facial wrinkles is the grandma pattern. The standing exam is where that amount of redundancy is seen. Ultraviolet exposure shows up as the crepe and the wrinkles. Gravity shows up as the length of the skin. The operation is built to answer both of those findings in the same plan.

An Extended SMAS Lift Plus Resurfacing

The GMommy facelift and GMommy neck lift is an extended SMAS dual plane face and neck lift plus ablative resurfacing. The resurfacing choices named here are a CO2 laser, an Erbium laser, Renuvion J plasma, and a chemical peel. The lift removes slack in the cheeks and the neck. The laser, the plasma, or the peel treats the surface that excision leaves behind. Together they are the plan for grandma skin that is both loose and crepey.

The surgeon excises skin to eliminate redundancy, and the surgeon ablates skin to reduce undesirable texture. Excision comes first, and ablation follows. A peel, a laser, or Renuvion without the lift leaves the moderate to severe redundancy of the neck and the cheeks. A lift without resurfacing leaves the fine wrinkles and the crepe neck skin. The combination is what completes care for this pattern of aging.

Dual plane, in this operation, means those two layers. One layer is the skin that will be redraped and trimmed. The other layer is the lining under the skin that will carry the weight. Resurfacing is then added for texture. The grandma lift is that pairing: an extended SMAS face and neck lift, then ablation of the surface with one or more of the tools named above.

How the SMAS Carries the Skin Weight

The extended SMAS dual plane facelift takes the slack out in two layers. The outer layer is the skin. Under the skin is an outer muscle lining called the SMAS. A facelift is also called a rhytidectomy, and in this operation that name means the extended SMAS lift. In the neck, the same lining continues as the platysma. The neck lift carries that sheet with the cheek, so the face and the neck are raised on one lining.

This method places 60 to 70 percent of the weight of the skin on the SMAS. The skin closure is then spared undue tension, and the slack can still be removed. The lining holds the lift, and the skin follows that lining and is repaired lightly. That split of the work is why the closure can heal without a pulled look, and why the redundant skin can still come out.

A StatPearls chapter on rhytidectomy discusses the extended SMAS approach among established facelift methods. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons publishes a facelift overview for sagging of the lower face and the neck. On this operation the lining that holds the weight is the SMAS. The skin is redraped only after that lining has been lifted. The platysma in the neck is the same sheet continued downward, lifted with the face.

Pull the SMAS, Then Repair the Skin

The SMAS is pulled up first, and most of the skin comes up with it. The surgeon then lightly redrapes the skin, trims the skin that is still extra, and repairs the skin. The heavy work is already finished on the lining. What remains for the skin is a light redrape, a trim of leftover length, and a repair of the incision. Keeping the load on the lining is how the GMommy facelift and GMommy neck lift closes the skin without undue tension.

Incision lines heal under minimal tension. A closure that is not strained can settle as a fine scar. Neck lift incisions describe where the neck cut is placed. Neck lift scars describe how those lines are expected to look after they heal. Because 60 to 70 percent of the skin weight sits on the SMAS, the skin edges are not the structure asked to hold the lift.

The face can look natural and presentable as early as one week after surgery, because the skin sits softly when the closure is kept light. Tightness is a trigger for skin growth. Avoiding unnecessary tightness means the skin is not given that trigger. The result is described as permanent, because skin recoil is not expected once the trigger for new growth has been avoided.

A light skin repair keeps the earlobe from being pulled into a pixie ear, because the weight of the lift sits on the SMAS. A tight skin closure is what drags the earlobe downward. This lift puts that drag on the lining instead. Early changes after surgery, including swelling, are described with facelift side effects. What to arrange before the day of surgery is described in facelift preparation.

Resurfacing Removes the Epidermis

The last part of the GMommy facelift and GMommy neck lift is resurfacing of the texture that remains after the lift. Fine wrinkles and crepe changes sit in the outer skin. Erbium laser resurfacing, CO2 laser resurfacing, Renuvion J plasma, and a chemical peel remove that outermost layer, the epidermis. New skin grows there and is meant to look and feel younger. The change patients describe is a youthful sheen on the face and on the neck.

Those ablative treatments can be combined when the crepe needs more than one of them. A laser can be paired with a peel, or Renuvion can be used on the neck while a laser treats the cheek, when the exam shows texture in more than one pattern. They renew the epidermis. The SMAS lift is still what removes the redundant sheet of cheek and neck skin. Sheen without a lift leaves the sag, and a lift without sheen leaves the crepe, so the grandma plan uses both.

The photographs show a 61 year old woman who had a facelift and a neck lift, one view from the front right and one from the front left. They show the cheek and the neck after redundant skin has been lifted and the surface has been treated. A GMommy makeover is the body surgery planned for this same stage of life, and the face and neck lift here is its own operation.