"Lust, Liberation, and Fat"

I just spent a week with my parents in Omaha and timed the trip around my son Brandon’s band, The Steed, touring the Midwest. My 81-year-old mother, or my son’s Hip Grandma Bunny, went to listen to the Rock Alternative and loved it. She dances to Polka music in the kitchen every morning… are you developing a picture here? She is, by the way, bored with magazines these days as they all seem to talk about looking young, bla, bla, bla and I think, “wow, that must be true”. I will feel the same way when I get to my 80’s, but for now I will try to stay healthy and diligent with sunscreens and good practices…

I mentioned I was going to have the LipoDissolve procedure this week and she gave me the anticipated… “Why, you don’t have any fat?” In truth, I don’t have enough of an issue to worry about, and many don’t, but there is always that area that you just can’t target easily. Anyway, I need to describe these treatments and I do have some dreaded areas of irritation. I am honestly irritated, first by own lack of discipline, and then of course there is time and gravity. But take a look at the legs… it was just a mere 20 years ago. Where are they now? Drat!

So… I was raised Catholic, went to church 6 days a week and my mother was married by 4 priests and a Bishop. (Yes, I have lots of childhood material….) Now she is watching, nearly round the clock, the Catholic TV Station. Did you know they had one?

It’s Bishop Sheen in an old black and white show from the 50s. I am drawn in by his casual manner and humor. He sets everything up, lays it out and ties in genuine humor. Just when you forgot who he was… he hits it out of the park with “LUST“. He was talking about how we blow through life with little regard for the season and then later lust for our youth. His brilliance is timeless, and so is his message. This is before cosmetic surgeries and procedures, Botox and Retin-A products. Doesn’t matter, our sense of loss is timeless and universal. To “Look & Feel Young” is priceless. There you have it; it’s all about how you feel.

I get together with my great friend Jeannie talking about aging parents, I lament; the loss of awareness and faculties seems unfair. To work at being better all your life and then in these years things start slipping. She always says the right thing. “It’s not about how we are in our old age, it’s about the legacy we’ve created”.

Then she laughs and says, ”Finally, after all these years, I can find my cheekbones, I feel liberated!” My mother in her 80’s, liberated from the superficial and Jeannie finds her cheekbones…

Jeannie has lost over 100 lbs., more than once. The rest of the conversation wrapped around all the cosmetic stuff - what works and where to focus etc… I tell her what I am about to tell you, “Fat can be dissolved with the right cocktail injection.”

Jeannie has another 30 lbs. to go, and I have a few inches.

Go in to Sōna MedSpa for a consultation. They identify the areas to make sure you have enough fat to work with, describe the treatment and how to prepare. For me, it is the upper inside of the thighs, tummy and the infamous “saddlebags”. Do you believe I am revealing this to you? I shudder as I type.

Now, they will tell you it is 6 times on 2-week intervals, and it hurts. It is good that they tell you, so you can make a better decision with no surprises.

Remember - No alcohol before you go, because it thins the blood.

Bring in a restrictive garment to wear out of the office. They recommend Spanx, but Top Drawer Lingerie, (Up Town Park between Woodway and Post Oak,) has it, as well as a product they say is better -The Body Wrap -so that’s what I take with me. Very cool, seamless flow, not your mama’s girdle! You will need that because it is going to bloat or swell in the area that is treated, and this helps with the “comfort” in the first 48 hours.

When you go in for the treatment, they will weigh you, not that it is a weight loss treatment, but just to monitor every aspect of this. They’ll mark off the area with a white soft pencil and they’ll take “before” pictures.

You pop up on the bed and they will give you the injections (shots) in a grid- type formation, about 1/2 inch apart. Now, that’s a lot of shots, yes…but it goes pretty fast, though. They will pinch the skin to pull it up for the shot and that also reduces some of the smarts of the needle. I found the more fat, the less it hurts. As they go closer to the area nearing the hipbone with less fat it seemed a little more intense.

Finished, after pictures, girdled and out the door with instructions not to take a hot bath for 48 hours. Cool showers at first. You will bloat and bruise for several days.

Drink lots of water. They like FIJI, because it has silica that helps the fat bond and leave the body more efficiently. They give you a sample of 1% Hydrocortisone and of course you likely have something at home - not Neosporin, but Polysporin is recommended for the tiny needle injections, if you want, as an antibiotic-type topical.

As I leave the office the girls at the front desk all chime in with where they did it and how it works. One says, “You will be miserable for a couple of days and have some bruising.” But, she says, it’s so worth it. Now after 2 treatments she has lost 3 inches. She is ecstatic! If I haven’t told you before, I love these ladies. All of them are just fun, smart and caring.

I come home, ready to just be in terrible shape, wishing I had been better about keeping in shape. I’ll never eat another donut, I resolve to get serious. I toss the chocolate and pull out my list of resolutions.

I took Tylenol PM and went to bed. I Woke up with some, but not that much, swelling. It looks like a cake when you take it out of the oven, kind of higher in the center. It is just rounded fullness in the area of injections. It doesn’t hurt unless I tap or hit that area and the bruising is quite minimal. Everybody is different, but for the first 24 hours I can tell you it is the actually experience, and after that it is just one more little thing in life to go through in order to get there.

Relieved, I put away the resolution list until ‘08 and think about what to wear tonight that is a bit more forgiving.

My nurse is 25, funny, beautiful and bright, just married 3 months. She came to Sōna after working in the Pediatric ICU. This is a much happier place, as you would imagine. We laugh and crack up basically through the whole thing. I am a bit of a baby but make fun of myself and anyone standing outside the door would wonder what’s so funny in there.

Now as if it were not enough that I share my fat story, I will even share the pictures when we can see the before and after…. Liberation! That’s if the shame of it all isn’t too much to BARE.