THE ENVELOPE-L.A. TIMES.COM (2006) – THE ENVELOPE


AWARDS DATABASE
All of the winners, all of the nominees, all of the awards shows.
 
Up Next
Oct. 20
•Final date for Golden Globes press conferences for TV entries
Oct. 23
• Hollywood Awards
Lasting
Lasting: Most patients who do one Thermage treatment don’t repeat it until the results wear off, in one to two years.
PHOTO GALLERIES
Ageless 
actresses gallery
Speaking of fat, which reminds me of stomachs, thighs and upper arms, Thermage also works on those female trouble spots.

“It’s not going to make fat go away, but if a woman has loose skin on her stomach from lipo, weight loss or after having a baby, Thermage can tighten those areas,” says Wieder. And it works for crepe chests, saggy upper arms and wrinkly knees.

I’m gonna hold off on the full body Thermage treatment. Frankly, my wallet is tightening. The face/neck/eyes tab is $2,800. But damn the budget. Full anti-aging speed ahead.

Step One of my awards season prep was done. But with my face tighter, I realized my cheeks were — dear Lord — really hollow. When I was a baby-faced teen, I remember longing for sophisticated Dietrich-like cheekbones. Now I want my youthful apple cheeks back.

Check out Teri Hatcher and Cindy Crawford, then and now. Hollow cheeks after 40, it happens to us all. So, after five seconds of rational, thoughtful, careful consideration, I decided to get my cheeks shot up with
Sculptra — a new filler that stimulates your own collagen to grow, thickening your skin, filling in the hollows. The ingredient (poly-L-lactic acid) is injected into the face to correct lipotrophy, the loss of facial fat due to aging. Initially FDA-approved for AIDS patients, it’s now been approved for all patients to correct hollow eyes, sunken cheeks, etc. Results last around two years.

And I’ve heard rumors that it’s being used on aging hands because, well, if you’re a woman reading this, you already know why. And if you don’t, look at your grandmother’s hands. That is your future.

Wieder began by inspecting my face from all vantage points, then drawing circles and lines around my cheeks. He gave me six tiny anesthetic injections in spots where he then injected the Sculptra. It took about 25 minutes. My eyes didn’t even water. I left the office with an ice pack that I tossed on the drive home. No bruising, just slightly fuller cheeks.

The only downside? The $1,200 charge on my Amex card.

But I did my homework. Wieder advised “Massage your cheeks gently. Five days, five minutes a day, five times a day.” A five weeks later, my cheeks, while not exactly sweet 16, definitely look more like the ones I owned at 35.

Okay, so the cheek hollow situation was solved. But A-list actresses have to worry about High Def revealing every fine line, pore divot and sun spot.

And that’s where Fraxel comes in. Or should come in.

I’d heard about
Fraxelfrom a girlfriend who had just had her fifth treatment from Dr. Randal Haworth (“The Swan”), one of the hot Beverly Hills surgeons. She claimed that everyone in town was getting Fraxeled by Hayworth and she should know because she really does know everyone in town.

What’s a Fraxel? My friend gave me a brochure that explained the laser treatment resurfaces your skin by penetrating deep beneath the dermis. Each session — and you will need five over a period of five months — does a fraction of your skin cells, hence the name. Imagine your face as a collection of pixels — like in an enlarged photograph — and you get the idea.

But unlike Sculptra, there is major downtime involved. “For the first few days, your face is bright red, like you spent two weeks on the beach in the Caribbean without sunscreen,” another frequently Fraxeled friend whispered.

Hmmm. That’s slightly worse than the “bronzed face” effect described in the brochure. After checking my calendar, I decided that while I probably needed a Fraxel, I should hold off until I found five consecutive months with one week with no personal/professional obligations, including taking out the trash.

Besides, with my tighter face/neck/eyes and fuller cheeks, I already feel like an Oscar-seeking Hollywood actress. And I’d like to thank the Academy for making all this possible. Without the incredible awards season pressure to look one’s best, I might not have gone to the trouble, discomfort and expense of all these Oscar Face Race beauty treatments.

Now I won’t dread my up-close-and-personal interviews with all those suspiciously younger-than-springtime actresses. And who knows? Maybe they’ll wonder what I had done. Or maybe they’ll notice that I missed something.