5 Things To Know If You're Considering Liposuction

In an ideal world, we wouldn't be so obsessed with how we look and how much we weight that we'd consider altering ourselves surgically, purely for cosmetic purpose. Unfortunately, that's not the world we live in. With standards of beauty become more exacting and impossible to achieve, most of us, women especially, live our lives feeling poorly about ourselves. If you're overweight, the problem is compounded manifold. It's natural then, to be tempted to "solve" the problem of not looking "good enough" in one fell swoop with surgeries like liposuction being peddled endlessly all around us as 'safe' and 'non-invasive'. If you're contemplating it, here are five things to know to help you make up your mind.

Your body is not suddenly going to be transformed

Liposuction is an effective way to reduce the fat cells in your body by the surgical removal of fat, and it will make you look slimmer, but it is not a weight loss tool. Sure, the removal of fat will lead to some weight loss, but liposuction will not suddenly transform your body. If you're severely overweight and keen on losing all your fat through liposuction alone, you will have to go for multiple rounds of it, with an interval of a few months between each surgery to allow your body to acclimatise and recuperate.

Ditch a surgeon who recommends too many kilos of fat removal

Ideally, the maximum amount of fat that can be removed from one round of liposuction is 4 to 5 litres. Depending on how much fat you have, some surgeons might consider it safe to remove 6 to 8 litres. Any surgeon who enthusiastically commits to any more than that should immediately set alarm bells off in your brain because removing too much fat in one go could send your body into shock with serious repercussions. Choosing the right, trustworthy surgeon should be your number one priority, if you're considering lipo.

There will be swelling and pain

Rapid technological development has ensured that liposuction is no longer the cumbersome surgical process it used to be when it first started gaining popularity in the late 80s and early 90s. However, it is not as painless and immediate as many unscrupulous practitioners make it out to be. No matter which method you and your surgeon decide on (there are several available), ultimately, losing several litres of fat suddenly is a big change for your body and it will need some time to get used to it. In the meanwhile, you will experience discomfort in the form of swelling, soreness and pain that can last anywhere between a few days to a couple of weeks.

You will probably have to wear a compression garment

Due to the sudden removal of fat, especially if you're not very young with elastic skin, your doctor might ask you to wear a compression garment to keep the skin from the areas that the fat was removed from become loose or sagging. Wearing a tight compression garment when your body is already sore and swollen can be a painful experience.

The weight can come back

You might lose fat cells, fat and look thinner instantaneously, but there's no guarantee that the weight will not pile back on, unless you follow healthy eating habits and exercise with regularity. The fat cells in the weight you put on might distribute themselves to other parts of the body, where you didn't get surgery, making you look disproportionate, if the weight gain is significant.

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