Pre Surgery

Before I talk about the things I prepared for the surgery, I wanna share one super stupid mistake!!!! I was supposed to take June 8’s flight to Korea but I booked the wrong date! I booked the day before and I didn’t realise it until the very last minute~ In the end I had to put on stand-by~ which was crazy!!! What if I couldn’t get a flight?! My surgery was scheduled to be immediately after I reach Korea! And can’t postpone coz the doctor will be going on a vacation the next day. Ah~ Such a stupid, horrible mistake. Fortunately I managed to get a seat for that flight~~ Thank God!

Well, this post I wanna share the things I prepared for the surgery.

I’m that kind of person who swell & bruise easily. Yes, even after simple things like facial, eyebrow, eyeliner embroidery, people always tell me I bruise easily. Even when I was doing ECG for the surgery~ the nurse exclaimed that “wow”~ the suction thingy was only there for a while and my skin turned red. So yeah… if you were me, would you not be kiasu?

So that’s exactly what I did. I was suppppeer kiasu.

I bought everything that’s recommended by people online for post surgery swelling & bruising.

I prepared Sinecch (which is actually Arnica Montana), Bromelain (which is actually Pineapple extract. If you read online, some of them said eating pineapples help, but crap where am I supposed to find fresh pineapple? So I bought this), more Arnica montana in case my swelling take very long to go down. Arnica montana gel to reduce bruising under the skin. And kelo-cote scar gel for my double eyelid to heal better.

Where did I get all these from? I ordered these from makemeheal.com
I spent about $200 on these? Which I think is very very essential for my recovery.
They are very efficient. The stuff were delivered … I think… less than a week.

Oh, as you can see, there’s one more Pien Tze Huang. This is a chinese medicine recommended on ITEM’s blog page. Ya I was so kiasu I added this into my list of recovery items too. Was it necessary for me to be this kiasu? Answer is… YES! Well, I’m typing this blog post the day after my surgery. I can tell you, my swelling is BAD BAD BAD! My head is like an inflated balloon. Fortunately I am mentally well prepared for this so I’m not so scared / worried 🙂 Just can’t wait for the swelling to go down so I can see the results.

 

Next thing that I wanna share is payment for the surgery. The good thing about choosing ITEM is that I can make payment at the Singapore office! Why I say this is because… 

When the money changer passed me the cash I was like huh?! so scary! I’ve never carried this much cash with me. What if I lose them? I immediately made arrangements to pay at ITEM’s Singapore office. You can trust them, coz well I did! No, my deposit didn’t disappear and my surgery proceeded. 🙂 

From what I know, most plastic surgery clinics in Korea accept cash only. Credit card there will be 10% (or 20%) surchage which is A LOT!!! I think some also accept bank transfers? hmm… whatever it is, when you choose a clinic, make sure you are clear how to make payment. To me, carrying so much cash is really stressful!!!

Next, cold compresses to reduce swelling. I bought the pink cold pack from Daiso (only $2!) and the round ball I bought it from my facial beautician long time ago. Put it in the fridge and take it out to massage your face~ it’s super shiok! 

Next, prepare lots of wet wipes coz the first few days you can’t wash your face / bathe. Haha!

Next… Food! 

This is really important, coz I’m alone. I can’t predict whether I’ll be fit to go outside to get food or not so I prepared some first… just in case. I think again, from here you can totally tell how kiasu I am. I read that pumpkin soup is very good for post surgery swelling but I can’t find any in NTUC Fairprice. i also checked beforehand that ITEM clinic doesn’t provide pumpkin soup. So in the end I got those baby food! haha! I haven’t try it~ will update here if it is nice~ Basically just some soft food here to make sure I won’t starve. I also prepared some meal replacement from LFI.

 

But it’s just that sometimes drinking too much meal replacement can be very boring~~ so yeah… got to prepare more. You can imagine how heavy my luggage was? haha! Ok! I’m done with this post! Next one, will be about my surgery and experience at ITEM. 🙂

The Big Decision to go for Plastic Surgery

Hi! ^_^ Well… this blog is created solely for my plastic surgery experience in Korea.
I am not a blogger, and this is not some famous blog with lots of hits & visitors, so I’m not sponsored by ITEM Clinic. I’ve not gone for my surgery (so I don’t know if I’ll be writing good things or bad things about them?). Rest assured everything I share here is truthful. I just find this experience so amazing that I wish to record all the little details in this blog.

Some time around April / May 2013, I made one of the biggest decision in my life.

That is, to do mandible reduction and to fix the ptosis (sagging eyelid) problem on my right eye.

I am 27 years old this year. All my life, I’ve wanted to get these two things fixed, but I was too afraid. In the past, plastic surgery wasn’t so common and the technology wasn’t so good. Especially for mandible reduction! It was scary to read about people who die from their jaw reduction surgery.

I did some research online. Like many others, I ended up at purseforum, cozycot etc where there are SOOOOO many posts by so many people. Sometimes, the more information we see, the more confusing it gets!

After reading Peggy Heng’s blog

http://www.thydowager.com/2012/09/plastic-surgery-before-and-after.html

and Jacqueline Koh’s blog
http://www.jacquelinekoh.com/2011/09/plastic-baby-part-2-face-surgeries.html

I gained more confidence to just go ahead with it! It was nice to read blog posts which are so detailed about the whole process. Made me feel much more informed about what I was getting myself into.

The next big question was, so which clinic?

Yup, of coz, also because of Peggy Heng’s blog, I decided to just go ahead with ITEM Clinic. There really isn’t many reviews about ITEM Clinic, except that the doctors used to work at BK. That’s all. But it was nice to know that they have a representative in Singapore, so it was really easy getting consultations.

You can check out http://www.itemcliniceng.com/

The Singapore h.p. number there belongs to their Singapore rep.
Book an appointment with her for consultation and they will do the rest for you!

I chose ITEM also because the blog page http://itemclinic.blogspot.sg/
was very informative.

http://www.divaasia.com/article/17795
This family also went to ITEM

And recently, there’s one more blogger who went to ITEM too!
http://www.myfatpocket.com/huirong/seoul-part-2-transformational-day-my-big-day/

I’ve never been to Korea and there isn’t anyone who can accompany me for this plastic surgery trip, so needless to say I am very nervous…. and very lost indeed. I’ve never traveled on my own! Fortunately, the Singapore reps for ITEM Clinic were very nice! They recommended me a hotel, helped me with airport transfers and all that. Really put me at ease.

I’ll end here for now. The next post will be about preparation for the surgery! ^_^