Cosmetic Treatments

Smile lines come with the territory of living your life: smiling, laughing and, yes, aging. For some people, they’re part of the charm. For others, they’re something they’d rather soften. The good news is there’s no one-size-fits-all way to treat them. From subtle surface tweaks to more intensive treatments that target deeper folds, there are plenty of options to address what you want.

Perimenopause brings more than just hot flashes—it can quietly change the structure of your skin from the inside out. That transition into menopause “lasts for about 10 years and can be quite debilitating, especially early on when estrogen levels are dropping,” says Duxbury, MA plastic surgeon Christine Hamori, MD. The good news: there are meaningful ways to ease those changes.

It’s no secret—I’m a huge Ultherapy PRIME fan. After seeing noticeable results just three months after a single treatment, I’m ready to be its poster child. But while the technology—and your provider—do most of the heavy lifting, there’s a third, often overlooked factor that plays a major role in results: your lifestyle and how you care for yourself before and after treatment.

Sagging skin: One day, it just seems to appear. But in reality, it doesn’t happen overnight. Many of us spend our early years with cherubic faces, which then start to chisel out in our late teens and early 20s. Eventually, our skin starts to lose collagen — which is the structural framework in our skin that helps keep the complexion firm — in our mid-to-late 20s, with production decreasing by about 1% per year after age 25. This gradual decline isn’t noticeable at first, but by the mid-thirties, wrinkles, sagging, and a loss of firmness can become obvious.

Peptide stacking is having a moment on TikTok right now, with creators talking up its promise of multi-targeted benefits, from fitness performance to skin goals. “In general, peptide stacking refers to combining two or more peptides in one treatment to achieve specific aesthetic and/or health goals,” says New York dermatologist Jody A. Levine, MD. That helps explain the rise of the Glow Peptide Blend, a provider-administered, injectable peptide stack that’s gaining traction on the platform.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words—and in the case of my before-and-after Ultherapy PRIME photos, taken three months apart, it really does speak volumes. My jawline looks more defined, my neck appears tighter and my skin overall feels more sculpted and refreshed.