Do you wish you could tighten and smooth your abdominal region? Do you wish you could eliminate excess abdominal skin? If so, look no further than Dustin C. Derrick, MD, the head plastic surgeon at Cosmetic Surgery of DFW for Mommy Makeovers in Fort Worth, TX. A tummy tuck performed by his skilled hand may be just the solution you need. That said, you may need to combine the procedure with others to achieve your desired look.
Are Tummy Tuck Results Permanent?
In some cases, the results of a tummy tuck are permanent. You can expect your contours to remain smooth for a lifetime if you can maintain a relatively stable weight. How much weight you can gain before you start to notice changes in the appearance of your abdominal region depends on your body fat distribution. If you predominantly store body fat in your abdominal region, you may notice your results fading after a mere five pounds of weight gain.
On the other hand, you may not notice your results starting to fade until you have gained 10 or 15 pounds. Additionally, it is possible to need a maintenance procedure if you maintain your weight but develop a ventral hernia in the future. The bottom line is the results of this procedure may be permanent but will be long-lasting if you have a healthy lifestyle.
How Can I Maintain My Weight?
If you’re like most people, you have lost weight successfully a number of times but struggle to maintain your ideal weight. There are several techniques that may help you maintain your weight successfully. That said, it all comes down to consuming the amount of fuel your body needs to maintain its weight based on your activity level.
Some women like to incorporate resistance training into their exercise routine. Other women prefer to perform only aerobic exercises. Regardless, here is a closer look at how exercise can increase your total daily energy expenditure so you can enjoy your favorite treats without gaining weight. Additionally, we’re looking at how to maintain your ideal weight through a healthy diet.
Anaerobic Exercise for Weight Maintenance
Anaerobic exercise is a particularly useful weight maintenance tool for mothers with hectic schedules who may not have time to exercise regularly. At rest, muscle mass burns approximately 2.5 times more calories than adipose tissue. Regardless of whether you anticipate future weight fluctuations, it is highly advisable to perform resistance exercises at least twice weekly. When you perform resistance training, make sure you are balancing your push and pull muscles.
In other words, if you work your pulling muscles, like your lats and biceps, make sure you’re also working the corresponding pushing muscles. If you’re doing lat pulldowns, you should also be doing bench presses. If you’re doing bicep curls, you should also be doing tricep dips. Focusing only on pushing or pulling muscles can create such a strength imbalance that injuries may occur.
Aerobic Exercise for Weight Maintenance
Aerobic exercise is a great way to increase your calorie budget for the day. For both weight maintenance and health, you should try to perform at least 2.5 hours of moderate-intensity exercise every week. If you still have a bit of weight to lose, you should double the guidelines for cardiovascular health, pulmonary health, and weight maintenance.
If you don’t have enough time to get five hours of cardio completed every week, it is advisable to perform 2.5 hours of vigorous-intensity exercise. If you find you enjoy vigorous exercise, you only need to perform 1.25 hours of vigorous exercise weekly once you achieve your ideal weight. A 135-pound woman can easily burn 175 calories in 15 minutes of intense exercise.
A Note on Post-Op Weight Loss
It is important to lose weight slowly if you are not at your goal weight at the time of your procedure. If you lose more than a couple of pounds per week post-op, there is a chance your skin won’t be able to keep up with the significant fat loss. You may experience sagging skin that takes several months to tighten.
To mitigate your risk of developing loose skin after your body contouring procedure, make sure you’re only losing a pound or two of fat per week. In other words, you should operate at a daily caloric deficit of 500 to 1,000. Additionally, you should take special care to remain hydrated and eat collagen-rich foods.
Diet for Weight Maintenance
Aerobic exercise is great for your cardiovascular and pulmonary health. Resistance training is great for looking strong and healthy. However, the easiest way to maintain your weight is to watch your diet. If you don’t have time to exercise, you need to make smart dietary choices. For the sake of your health and weight maintenance, you should not drink soda or store-bought juice.
Such processed beverages are full of added sugars that count towards your daily caloric requirements. That said, these high-calorie beverages are not satiating. In fact, drinking them will cause an insulin response that will make you hungrier. To maintain your weight on days you don’t exercise, calculate your total daily energy expenditure based on your sedentary activity level and make sure most of your calories come from whole, nutritious, satiating foods.
Am I a Good Candidate for Tummy Tuck?
You may be considered a good candidate for abdominoplasty if you’re within 20 pounds of your ideal weight and can’t sculpt your ideal abdominal contours through diet and exercise. The typical candidate for this procedure has weak abdominal muscles and may suffer from consequences of weak abdominal muscles, like ventral hernias, stress urinary incontinence, or chronic lower back pain.
To be considered a good candidate for this procedure, it is very important that you can refrain from smoking or drinking alcohol for several weeks. It is also important that you can adhere to all guidelines regarding both preparation and recovery. Dustin C. Derrick, MD will review all of these instructions with you during your initial consultation.
What if I’m Happy With My Upper Abs?
If you’re only displeased with the appearance of your lower abs, you may be the perfect candidate for partial abdominoplasty. While full abdominoplasty tightens the abdominal walls, partial abdominoplasty does not involve muscle tightening. Rather, it focuses only on removing excess skin and a small amount of excess fat from beneath the navel.
During a full abdominoplasty, the navel is usually repositioned as the remaining skin is tightened. With partial abdominoplasty, the navel is very rarely repositioned. During your initial consultation, Dustin C. Derrick, MD will review the goals you are trying to achieve with your abdominoplasty to determine whether you are a better candidate for full or partial abdominoplasty. If you are trying to correct a medical condition, you will need full abdominoplasty.
What Medical Conditions Can Be Corrected With Full Abdominoplasty?
A full tummy tuck can correct a number of medical conditions. As noted above, full abdominoplasty can treat stress urinary incontinence effectively. Stress urinary incontinence is common among mothers, particularly those who opted for vaginal birth. Full abdominoplasty reverses this condition by strengthening the pelvic floor muscles so you can run, jump, cough, and sneeze without worrying about leaking.
Additionally, we’d like to reiterate that full abdominoplasty can treat ventral hernias effectively. What’s great about full abdominoplasty for the correction of ventral hernias is having a history of ventral hernias significantly increases the risk of developing future ventral hernias. Since full abdominoplasty tightens the abdominal walls, the risk of developing future ventral hernias decreases. You shouldn’t expect this risk mitigation from other corrective procedures.
Can Tummy Tuck Procedure Be Combined With Others?
Yes, abdominoplasty may be combined with other procedures safely and effectively. In fact, it is often part of a mommy makeover, a set of procedures designed to help mothers restore their prenatal body.
What Other Procedures Can Be Performed With Abdominoplasty?
A number of procedures can be performed in conjunction with abdominoplasty. Among the most common procedures performed during a mommy makeover are breast reductions, breast lifts, and liposuction. Here’s a closer look at each procedure.
Breast Reduction
A woman’s body goes through many changes throughout pregnancy and breastfeeding. Some women feel they need breast augmentation because one breast looks smaller than the other after uneven nursing. That said, most women find their breasts look too large after carrying and nursing a child for many months.
There are several breast reduction techniques that may be used depending on your unique aesthetic goals. If you’re only seeking a small reduction, you may only require a vertical incision ending where the base of your breast meets your chest and a circular incision hidden within the dark ridges of the areola. A larger breast reduction will also require an incision hidden within the inframammary fold. The discreet vertical incision will connect the circular incision with the middle of the horizontal incision.
Breast Lift
Some mothers are fairly satisfied with the size of their breasts after pregnancy and nursing but are displeased with the resting position of their breasts. In such cases, a breast lift is ideal. If your nipples rest beneath your inframammary fold, you may be an ideal candidate for a breast lift. That said, most women find they lose half of a cup size after this procedure due to the removal of excess skin tissue.
If you’re on the fence about whether a breast lift could benefit you, mention it during your initial abdominoplasty consultation. Dustin C. Derrick, MD is more than happy to answer all of your questions about the procedure and discuss the pros and cons.
Liposuction
Liposuction is an incredible complement to abdominoplasty because the latter only results in a small amount of fat removal. Contrastingly, the former is a fat removal procedure designed to remove up to 11 pounds of fat at a time. You may be considered a good candidate for liposuction if you are within 30 pounds of your ideal weight and fairly healthy.
You must be within 20 pounds of your goal weight and fairly healthy to be considered a good candidate for abdominoplasty. Therefore, there is an excellent chance you will be considered a good candidate for liposuction if you are considered a good candidate for abdominoplasty. Here are some of the areas liposuction can remove fat from:
- Thighs
- Buttocks
- Abdomen
- Upper arms
- Underarms
- Back
- Chest
- Flanks
- Hips
Learn More About Achieving Your Ideal Contours Today
A tummy tuck can change your life for the better in a number of ways and provide permanent results. That said, some women have a number of cosmetic woes after giving birth. If you’re curious about the benefits of a mommy makeover, please call us today at (817) 562-7979 to schedule an initial consultation with Dustin C. Derrick, MD at Cosmetic Surgery of DFW in Fort Worth, TX.
