My Plastic Surgery Journey - Part I

After many years of contemplation, I finally went ahead with my plastic surgery procedures. It took me almost a year to research on where and when I should do my surgeries. I was overwhelmed by all the choices available and was lost as to which doctor I should go with. After browsing through forums after forums and looking through YouTube and google, I have decided on JW Plastic Surgery Center in Korea. I am not sponsored to write this blog. The reason why I would want to blog about my plastic surgery experience is because I wish my blog will be able to help a confused soul like how I wish it would have helped me. To be honest, there are so much information I would love to share but I honestly do not know where to start. If any of you confused souls out there have any questions regarding plastic surgery, feel free to ask through the comments and I will try my best to reply asap. Enough with the blabbering, let the adventure begin :)

THE TRIGGER

I had very puffy monolids, especially in the morning, which always cause me to feel like I have cried my heart out over kdrama or something the previous night. See my pic below from 2010. Gosh I feel old looking at this photo lol.

I found out about double eyelid stickers/glue and I was addicted to it ever since. I couldn't remember when did I start using double eyelid stickers, but I just remember that I have been using it for a really long time. This photo below is me with eyelid stickers

I had one eyelid that became double eyelid due to the long-term usage of double eyelid stickers, but the other eyelid remained single. My eyelids became wrinkled, irritated and saggy due to constant pulling and tugging of the eyelid stickers. It was such a pain in the ass to waste so much time on the double eyelid stickers every time when I'm getting ready to go out. I also had a flat nose which was super unflattering and my glasses will always slide down as I didn't had a bridge to support it. I just didn't wanna deal with all these anymore and decided to gather up my courage to bring my ass to a clinic to get my eyes and nose done, once and for all.


THE RESEARCH

From the very beginning, I already knew I wanted to go to Korea to do my plastic surgery as the cost was fairly reasonable and the doctors there would know the facial features of an asian better. I was researching mostly on Purseblog forums, YouTube, RealSelf and of course, google. I actually contacted many people from Purseblog and asked them many questions. I am really thankful to those people who answered my endless questions :) Shout out to GB who introduced me to a bunch of people who were going to Korea around the same time for plastic surgery through KakaoTalk. So for those of you who are interested in doing plastic surgery, Purseblog forums will be a good place to start. Do not be afraid to contact people from the forums as there are many kind souls who are willing to share what they know as well. One thing that I like about using purseblog is that I will be able to know more about clinics in Korea that does not have as much exposure as those that does a lot of marketing to attract foreign customers.

Many plastic surgery clinics now have a youtube channel, you can search on youtube for their videos and see which clinics you feel more comfortable with. You can get a visual understanding of how the before and after looks like etc. However, do keep in mind to look for clinics that are more suitable for you and your features. Also, I personally like doctors who are able to create different kinds of eyes/noses over those who just create factory looking ones. I was also told by my Korean friends that I should look for doctors who were good with revision surgeries as those surgeries requires more skills. There are also many kind YouTubers out there who vlogs about their plastic surgery journey and you can get to see the recovery process etc.

Realself is a very good platform to research on things that are more towards the medical stuff, such as side effects, which kind of implants are better, what you can or cannot do before/after surgery etc. I downloaded the RealSelf app and would just type in any medical related questions when it pops up in my head. I sound like I am an advertiser for them but anyways, you get the point lol. So to break it down easier about researching on these platforms:

Purseblog - Getting to know other people's personal experience
YouTube - Visual understanding of the surgery
Realself -  knowing the medical information about a surgery

FYI: I almost used the service of docfinderkorea, a medical tourism agency that takes care of all the research and bookings of clinics for you. I even gave them all my information and was all ready to use their service. But after weeks of consideration and asking around, I have decided not to use them and went ahead to do it on my own.

THE DECISION

I have decided to go with a clinic that has doctors who can speak English. I did not want to risk getting lost in translations especially in such situation where I am doing a surgery that will change my face forever. I was torn between two clinics, April31 and JW. Both clinics had the eyes and nose that I like. There were some other very good clinics that I liked as well, but they were only either good with eyes or noses, and I didn't wanna do my surgeries separately in different clinics. For example, Item clinic is really good with eyes and cocoline is really good for their nose surgeries. After contacting both April31 and JW, I have decided to go with JW as they had a more reasonable pricing. April31's quotation was crazy high, which was a bit of a turnoff as I felt that they were just in it for money. The pricing for foreigners and locals will be different as well. However, I do not understand why would they charge a foreigner higher as we would have to pay for plane tickets and lodging to do plastic surgery in Korea, whereas a local wouldn't need to have those expenses. But oh well, what can I say. So I went ahead to pay my deposit of 1000USD (500USD per surgery) for my eyes and nose surgery to secure a surgery date with JW. I honestly recommend you to pay the deposit before heading to Korea. There were many people whom I knew that went to Korea without paying a deposit to secure a surgery date in advance, they weren't able to get the doctors that they truly wanted during their trip as the doctors were fully booked for the week/month etc. At first, I was worried that after paying the deposit, I might not be able to negotiate a better price upon arriving the clinic. However, I still manage to negotiate to a price that I had in mind. Also, for JW, you can get a certain percentage of the deposit refunded if you change your mind within a certain timeframe. For example, 90% of the deposit 3 days before surgery, 50% of the deposit 2 days before surgery and 20% of the deposit 1 day before surgery. Paying a deposit would also secure a complimentary airport pickup and drop-off :)

I decided to use Dr. Man Koon Suh for my rhinoplasty and Dr. Hong Lim Choi for my blepharoplasty for the following reasons:

- Able to speak fairly fluent English
- Appeared on many interviews (Dr Suh appeared on BBC news)
- Dr. Suh was invited to many Plastic Surgery meetings all over the world
- Dr. Choi had a PhD in Department of Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery
- I like the results of their previous patients
- My gut tells me so lol

Okay, I shall stop here for my part one of the journey as it is getting really lengthy.
In the next blog, I will include my plastic surgery journey in Korea :)