Christa D'Souza has never really liked Botox. But was she simply having it done in the wrong part of her face?
Of all the treatments I’ve tried out, the one I like the very least might have to be Botox. I’m sure it’s me, not it; but every time I have had it done it’s always disappointed. Plenty of friends have had their brows unfurrowed by the stuff and look absolutely marvellous. I’m thinking of one friend in particular who literally looks 20 years younger than she actually is, all because of Botox (or Bore-tox as some people pronounce it).
Me, however; like I said, perhaps it is something to do with my face, but my forehead always ends up looking and feeling slightly prehensile, like I’ve got a very, very heavy weight pressing down on my lids. So then, especially on this ‘less is more’ mission of mine: no more Botox. Not even baby ‘Botox’. On me it just doesn’t work.
Or so I was explaining to Dr Michael Prager , the fashion world’s favourite go-to man for this sort of thing, on a visit to his Wigmore Street practice. Though THE man for Botox, he agrees it isn’t The Answer, not at all. Indeed in a study he personally conducted with 100 volunteers who were shown photographs of ten faces, some Botoxed, some not, NO ONE thought those with the Botox looked better. Quite the opposite in fact.
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A qualified GP who trained in his native Germany and then went on to specialise in clinical cardiovascular research in South Africa, Prager, aka “Dr Natural”, sure knows his stuff. He’s also frightfully good looking, but not in that spooky fixed way that male “derms” who’ve been, as it were, pilfering in the candy box too much, often are. The polar opposite of Dr Fred Brandt (Madonna’s derm), if you like.
Wrinkles, he goes on, are not the problem; it’s even-ness of skin that counts. Plus a good jawline, which brings us to the state of mine, looking so “Deputy Dawg” today, I have to keep stopping myself from slapping it with the back of my hand. And this is where, says Prager, Botox actually could be effective for me. “Go like this,” he says, exaggeratedly pulling down the bottom half of his mouth (imagine the look you pull when you say “yikes”). “Yes, you see if you can do that, you are more prone to having a sagging jaw, almost regardless of your age.” Well bring it on “Dr Natural”, I say and so he does, about 10 little pricks applied to my jaw and my neck in total.
Three days later, and whoa, is he right; and yet for the life of me I cannot quite define why. Is it tighter or do I just look better, which is precisely the way you should feel after Botox, should you not?
At last. Someone who really gets it, who really knows the meaning of ‘less is more’. Except of course now that I have found someone I 100% trust, what d’you know? I want more! Softly softly catchee monkey, but I just want to say he also does something called non-invasive ultrasound lipolysis. Readers, all I am saying is that bikini season will soon be upon us. Watch this space.