About the Natural Needle Lift
The Natural Needle Lift was created to naturally balance the face and soften fine lines and wrinkles without making the face look “done” or unnatural.
My goal with creating the Natural Needle Lift, decade by decade, was to create a formula that I could follow for my clients that was still customized to each person’s unique face. People tend to seek similar results around the same age, but everyone is different, and everyone ages differently, so the Natural Needle Lift was developed to create a treatment protocol to address the signs of aging at each decade utilizing injectables in the most natural way possible, working with the client’s own face to maintain their natural beauty. Facial injectables are never one-size-fits all, so this gives me the opportunity to be creative while educating the client on what we are doing and ideally maintaining a more affordable price for it.
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In recent years, there’s been a notable uptick in younger girls coming in asking for treatments in general, as well as all clients asking me for a specific treatment or product, versus explaining what they were hoping to achieve and letting me recommend a plan to achieve it. Aesthetic medicine is the only practice in medicine where patients come in wanting a prescribed treatment that they might not be a candidate for, and social media has made this more pervasive. Just like anything else people see on social media, many people now view cosmetic treatments as “shoppable,” with a desired treatment being a google search away, which is a stark difference to how one would access a cosmetic procedure 15 or 20 years ago. Overall, I think an openness about cosmetic treatments can be a good thing and help better educate consumers, but social media is often targeted at people who don’t need injectables and can spread misinformation or push the message that a treatment can be one-size-fits-all.
How To Treat Signs of Aging
As a provider in aesthetic medicine, my approach to how to treat signs of aging is focused on prevention and preservation from a holistic standpoint. While there are small treatments that you can do to address early signs of aging - like Baby ‘Tox, neurotoxins or even a custom facial - a detailed, specific treatment plan is more effective at addressing the aging process versus small fixes. After several years in the medical spa world, I have curated a specific treatment plan that is made to provide a natural refreshed look without overdoing it. My signature treatment, The Natural Needle Lift, was created for those looking to achieve facial symmetry and youthfulness without compromising their unique features. While I do offer a Natural Needle Lift procedure across multiple age groups that involve a medley of different treatments, my Natural Needle Lift 20’s and 30’s are focused on delivering natural looking results. Involving a light dusting of Baby ‘Tox, a Lip Flip and a Light Lip Fill, The Natural Needle Lift 20’s prevents permanent signs of aging that may potentially develop during a patient’s 20’s, but also lets patients maintain their natural look.
The Natural Needle Lift 30’s, while more targeted, also aims to add a natural oomph to a patient’s face; halting and reversing the signs of aging, while adding a natural makeup-free contour that can be attributed to the Baby ‘Tox, Lip Flip, Light Lip Fill and bio-stimulating filler that naturally enhances contour to the cheeks, chin and/or jawline, stimulating the body to produce its own collagen.
When To Treat Signs of Aging
In our 20’s, collagen is still naturally being produced at a good rate and deep-set wrinkles are unlikely. The most common complaint I see from girls in their 20’s who are seeking neurotoxin injections is that their makeup is starting to settle into little lines and creases in and around the forehead, and I would use ‘Baby Tox’, a light dusting of neurotoxin injected across the forehead, to relax those lines. This is also preventing the lines from getting deeper as they first start to form.
As part of the Natural Needle Lift 20’s, I also add some lip filler and sometimes a lip flip, or a little bit of neurotoxin injected along the upper lip, to keep the lip from curling under and correcting a gummy smile, if the client needs it. While this is a treatment that has recently been more popular or trendy, it is something that most women desire, so if their faces can take it, I’ll give a bit of a fuller pout.
Oftentimes for girls in their early 20’s, the desire to receive neurotoxin injections or lip filler is born out of seeing someone they follow on social media get it. If someone comes to me and truly doesn’t need the treatment they’re asking for, or is asking for more than I think their face can take while maintaining its natural beauty, I won’t do it. Most 20 - 22 year olds don’t really need neurotoxins, even preventatively. At this age, I try to push a good skin care routine and emphasize sunscreen. As opposed to administering a neurotoxin, educating younger patients on the most effective way to use sunscreen and how to limit harmful UV exposure is how my practice approaches the topic of aging in your early 20’s. I always say the canvas needs to be good before I can paint on it. It wouldn’t make sense for me to go in and inject and enhance a face if the skin isn’t being taken care of properly.
While preventive and conservative methods are our go-to for our patients in their early 20’s, for our patients in their late 20’s and especially into their 30’s, we do use light and strategic cosmetic treatments to tackle signs of aging. Early 30’s are when most people start to notice more permanent signs of aging and start to seek treatments to address what they aren’t loving. A key indicator that I look for when choosing to administer anti-aging treatments is if the wrinkles/fine-lines that appear are deep set.
At this age, I like to start using biostimulators to encourage natural collagen production, in addition to a bit of neurotoxin and lip filler, similar to what I do for girls in their 20’s. Depending on the changes in their face my client is looking to address, I may use a CaHa biostimulator to add some instant fullness along with natural collagen stimulation, or if they don’t need the fullness, I’ll use just a PLLA biostimulator to keep encouraging the collagen production over time and create a long-term, natural result. A lot of people notice the contours of their cheekbones, chin and jawlines changing or lessening, and this is where I would go in to add that fullness back with a CaHa biostimulator. My focus around this age is facial balancing as people begin to notice these changes. Using Caha biostimulators to restore some volume can also lessen the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles in the areas I inject it, while it gets that collagen building at the same time, to keep them from re-forming.
Anti-Aging Trends
Although there has been a drastic change in the way we as a culture discuss cosmetic treatments, we have started leaning towards a more natural look. The signature “look” of the 2000’s and 2010’s was dramatic makeup and pillowy results with cosmetic treatments, as well as dramatic cosmetic makeovers on celebrities. Now, on the heels of the “clean-girl” aesthetic, which plays on a simple, natural makeup look, more and more people are searching for natural-looking treatments that make one’s face look “snatched.” We can see this best displayed in trending treatments like the fox eye lift, which lifts the eyes towards the temple, giving an upswept appearance, and the buccal fat removal procedure, which hollows out the face, giving a contoured appearance. While these treatments are trendy for creating a makeup-free, contoured look, they can lead to the face aging more quickly, as we know that loss of volume in the face and reabsorption of fat into bone is a part of the aging process that fillers were actually created to reverse. I think trends are shifting to be even more natural than that. The more injectors can educate their clients, and especially the younger ones, on what treatments were created to do and how the aging process works, the more people will prefer a conservative approach to cosmetic treatment. My philosophy is all about maintenance, maintaining natural beauty and never creating an obvious or intentionally “over done” face.
