I spent £7k on ‘mummy makeover' surgery but I look better fat – it feels like I'm ripped in HALF from painful stitches
The mum-of-two did her research and picked a surgery in Izmir, Turkey, which also offered her a back lift at an all inclusive price of £6.9k.
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She flew out in February this year, but when she came round she knew she'd made a "big mistake".
Now two months post- surgery, she says she can't stretch for fear she will "rip in half" and says she had gathered skin and her stomach is as "hard as a block".
Chantelle, an administrator from Southampton, Hampshire, said: "I'd built it up so much and I was so excited to go.
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"I couldn't wait to see the results. I 100 per cent wish I hadn't done it with this clinic.
"I'm regretful of going with this clinic. I wish I'd researched more.
"Now I have to tell people I'm devastated with how my body is.
"I looked better with the fat. I should have known by the deal that it was too good to be true."
Chantelle flew to Istanbul, Turkey, back in September 2020 for a gastric sleeve and was delighted with the results after it helped her drop from 15st and a size 18 to 8st 7lbs and a slender size eight.
But she still struggled with the excess skin it had left her with.
She said: "I was looking in the mirror and seeing droopy boobs and rolls of fat.
"I didn't feel attractive. I wanted to look nice."
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Chantelle wanted to do something for herself and decided to look into surgery abroad after her success first time around.
She chose to look into a different surgery as the medics from the initial clinic had left.
Chantelle said: "I trawled the internet for places to go. I didn't see any negative on this Facebook group.
"It was just so positive and they sent me pictures of stunning women. I thought 'bloody hell, can I have that body?'"
It was only after she'd paid her deposit Chantelle started to notice some negative comments but she still flew out in February with her husband, Marc, 50, a maintenance worker.
But Chantelle felt uneasy and said she felt "rushed" to sign the paperwork to get her into surgery.
She said: "It was a case of you need to hurry up. It's like a conveyer belt.
"When I came round I was in a mess. I was freezing cold. I thought 'I've made a big mistake'."
Chantelle stayed in Turkey for a week before flying home.
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She was initially excited to see the results but two months out she feels unhappy with her healing journey.
Chantelle said: "I'm now able to lie on my side in bed and if I have move in bed I feel like I'm going to rip in half.
"I can't open my garage to park my car - I can't stretch.
"I have skin that looks like dog ears above my pubic bone. It's like a zip.
"I have flaps of skin and three rolls of skin sewn up - it's just been sewn up and gathered.
"My stomach is hard as a block. My body has completely healed but my breasts are all crusty.
"I feel hollow in places."
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Chantelle says she has been in touch with the clinic and they have told her to "trust the process" and to "exercise".
She said: "My scarring is there - it's like a roadmap. I asked for a flat stomach not for three rolls."
Chantelle was told healing can take from three to six months but she doesn't feel her results are going to change.
She now wants to warn other women before they make the same mistake she did.
She said: "Trust your gut."
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The clinic said: "While we aim to give patients ample time to read and sign these documents, the pre-operative schedule-including tests and consultations-may create a sense of urgency for some individuals on the day of surgery.
"Post-operative recovery varies per patient, and swelling, tightness, and temporary asymmetry are common in the initial stages.
"We advise patients that full healing can take months, and we provide detailed aftercare instructions.
"Terms like "dog ears" or "gathered skin" often describe normal transient swelling or suturing techniques that improve over time.
"However, we always encourage patients to voice concerns during follow-ups so we can assess and reassure or intervene if medically indicated.
"Our team remains available post-operatively to guide patients through their recovery. While phrases like "trust the process" may stem from managing early-stage expectations, we prioritise addressing concerns with clinical evaluations when needed.
"We regret that this patient feels dissatisfied and invite her to contact us directly so we can review her case in detail and provide personalised support."
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The Guardian
14 hours ago
- The Guardian
‘Being short is a curse': the men paying thousands to get their legs broken
It was on his honeymoon in Kuala Lumpur, looking out of his hotel window at the silvery points of the world's tallest twin skyscrapers, that Frank decided it was time to become taller. He had recently confessed to his new wife how much his height had bothered him since he was a teenager. As a man dedicated to self-improvement, Frank wanted to take action. He picked up the phone, called a clinic in Turkey that specialises in leg lengthening surgery – and made a booking. 'I had a lot of second thoughts – at the end of the day, someone's going to break your legs,' he says, propped up on a hotel bed in Istanbul, his legs splayed in front of him, bracketed by a brace on each thigh. His wife, Emilia, tends to him, fetching painkillers and ice packs for the wound sites where the braces puncture his legs. For the first two weeks after surgery, Frank needed her help to get on and off the toilet, but now, six weeks later, it's largely only to get off the bed. The bleep of an alarm interrupts our conversation: time to insert a key into the metal bracket on the side of Frank's thigh and turn it, forcing apart the rods that have been inserted into his femurs. New bone grows into the gap in his thigh bones, one agonising millimetre at time. Each turn of the key dictates how much the patient can grow, and Frank is aiming for five turns each day rather than the four recommended by his doctors, to gain a precious extra quarter of a centimetre. It means more suffering, but Frank is all about putting in the work to get what he wants. 'Time to grow!' Emilia says, with a little laugh, as the alarm sounds. At 5ft 6in (1.7m) tall, slightly under the average male height worldwide, Frank, 38, feels he has lived life 'as a short man'. But speak with any patient at the Wanna Be Taller clinic in Istanbul, where Frank chose to undergo leg lengthening, and it becomes clear that shortness is relative. Men over 6ft have had the procedure. One tells me he needed surgery to 'correct' his bow legs and decided to add some height at the same time. A slim blond woman – a rare example of a female patient here – who was 5ft 3in before surgery, looks me square in the eyes as she deadpans that shortness 'is the last acceptable prejudice in society' to explain why she underwent the procedure to gain two inches. (The clinic also offers leg shortening surgery, though this is far less common; only nine patients have so far had it done, mainly women.) Frank, meanwhile, is determined to become taller than Emilia – who is 5ft 5in – by gaining 9cm, just above the 8.5cm doctors told him is the maximum his muscles and tendons can safely handle. This would make him 5ft 9in. His dream is simple: being average height. Five turns of the key daily means he stands to gain just over a millimetre a day for 10 weeks. It's not without its challenges: 'Sometimes the nerve pain wrecks me.' Frank prides himself on being a self-starter: he has the words 'self made' tattooed across his knuckles and a likeness of his hero, Arnold Schwarzenegger – in his view, the ultimate self-made man – on his thigh. Arnie's face is slowly being stretched as Frank grows. 'I'm making my own height, choosing how tall I want to be,' he says. 'I am very ambitious: if I want something, I go for it. Until I do it, it almost torments me.' To the casual observer, leg lengthening looks like a form of medieval torture, and earlier that day I watched as a physiotherapist gently lifted each of Frank's new legs while he groaned with pain – straightening his hamstrings feels impossible, as if they might snap. He is in recovery from the first of two surgeries: this one broke his femurs to insert metal rods and add fixators. The second will remove the fixators after he has completed the key-turning process, in three months' time. Some patients choose to have their shin bones broken instead, or in addition, in a bid to be even taller. If having your leg bones cut in half sounds painful enough, the true agony comes afterwards. Ensconced on the periphery of Istanbul, in a hotel built from what looks like plasterboard and fake gold leaf, about 20 leg lengthening patients spend their days obsessing over their muscles and tendons, making sure they stretch to accommodate their new bones. This means daily physiotherapy to learn how to walk again, blood thinners, massages and a lot of painkillers. While there are few global statistics on the number of people opting to have this done each year, one Indian market research firm estimated the global limb lengthening industry will balloon by 2030 to be worth $8.6bn (£6.4bn). 'I always tell them, 1cm is not more important than your health,' says Serkan Aksoy from Wanna Be Taller, who supervises Frank's physio. Most of their patients are men, and Aksoy has to dissuade many clients from trying to gain too much height. From the clinic's perspective, the risks come from patients not adhering to a strict aftercare routine, but problems and even deaths do occur. Blood clots, joint issues, failure to grow new bone tissue, blood vessel injuries, scarring and chronic pain are all potential complications, as well as 'ballerina syndrome', where the achilles tendons fail to stretch adequately, forcing the feet into an exaggerated arch and preventing the patient from walking. Last year, a patient who had flown in from Saudi Arabia died from a blood clot 16 days after undergoing leg lengthening surgery. When I ask Wanna Be Taller about this, they say an investigation by the Saudi authorities found no fault with their surgeon. Even though Frank chose a cheaper option, involving external fixators rather than an electronic internal device, the $32,000 (£24,000) price tag – including months in a hotel and physiotherapy – has put a major dent in the funds the newlyweds had planned to use as downpayment for a mortgage. When I ask about this, Emilia describes how months of travel across Asia gave them a new perspective. The couple began to think they were placing too much importance on material things rather than aiming for true contentment. 'Having food, a comfortable bed – that's real happiness,' Emilia says. 'After that, if it's buying a house, we'll go for it. And if it's breaking your legs and being tall, go for it.' The idea that breaking bones can provide a way to shorten or lengthen a limb is widely attributed to the Soviet surgeon Gavriil Abramovich Ilizarov, who developed the 'Ilizarov technique' in Russia in 1951. This involved adding external metal rings around a broken bone to stabilise it, held in place by metal pins or wires. If the patient wishes to grow, the frame can be used to draw sections away from one another; Ilizarov found new bone grows between them, adding length. His technique has since been adopted globally. While more sophisticated techniques are now common, the principle remains. Today, leg lengthening is even available on the NHS at a specialised clinic within the Royal National Orthopaedic hospital. Even so, a spokesperson for the RNOH's limb reconstruction unit tells me the 100 or so patients they treat annually are there to recover from injury or correct deformities – and patients lengthening both legs are rare. The same spokesperson lists their concerns about patients going overseas for 'a procedure with significant risks and an arduous physical therapy requirement'. These include clinics downplaying the dangers while overplaying 'the cosmetic benefits', and a lack of proper aftercare. The NHS routinely treats patients with problems after surgery abroad, and a study conducted by the RNOH 'revealed a significant cost burden to the NHS' for treating botched cosmetic leg lengthening. China's health ministry banned cosmetic leg lengthening in 2006, fearing the dangers to patients in a growing and unregulated industry, but the practice has persisted elsewhere. Private treatment in the UK can cost upwards of £50,000, with some surgeons charging £240,000 to lengthen two bones in each leg. What makes a growing number fly to Turkey from as far afield as Australia or Japan is lower prices. Frank can reel off a list of negative experiences stretching back into adolescence that he believes stemmed from his height. There was the pain of his friends suddenly becoming taller than him after he stopped growing around the age of 15. There were the kids at school who taunted him for his height; a longtime online fan of his artwork who remarked, on meeting him, that Frank was 'shorter than I expected'; or the guys who randomly shoved him in the street a few years ago, tearing out his headphones. They wouldn't have done that to a taller man, he reasons. In Frank's view, tall people don't realise their privilege. 'It's hard to explain if you're not a short man yourself, but in modern society it's almost a curse,' he says, as he carefully keeps watch over his pain medication and blood thinners. Then, of course, there were all the stinging dating experiences before he met Emilia, such as the woman 6in smaller who showed up for coffee and immediately said he was too short for her. Experiences like this, he says, are standard for his short male friends. The dating app Tinder even recently trialled a feature that lets paying users set a height preference. 'Even tall men are having problems now,' he says. 'The new fashion is 6ft 4in, otherwise you're a piece of shit.' All of this wore Frank down before he stumbled across a YouTube video a few years ago, showing leg lengthening surgery. Our conversation inevitably drifts towards issues of masculinity. A recent study showed that young men in the UK now outspend women on minimally invasive 'tweakments' such as Botox injections – which some practitioners now jokingly refer to as 'Brotox'. Then there's the growth of the so-called 'manosphere', which deifies the ripped torso of Joe Rogan or Photoshops Donald Trump on to a picture of a bodybuilder. Surely when we're talking about male height, we're really talking about masculinity – and power? Frank bats it away: he doesn't have any time for those toxic alpha male types. 'This surgery isn't about that – I don't think it's about being more masculine, it's about being average height,' he says. Not long after our conversation, Frank woke up one night in 'some of the worst pain I've ever felt'. He tried to scream while struggling to breathe, but the four huge ice packs on his legs did little to dull the pain. After clinicians rushed him to a nearby hospital, he was treated for a pulmonary embolism – a blood clot that travelled into the arteries of the lung. A representative from Wanna Be Taller later tells me Frank and the Saudi Arabian patient are the only two of their 700 clients who have experienced a blood clot following surgery. Frank, it turns out, needed a higher dose of blood thinners. But while a blood clot is a rare side-effect, the fate of the Saudi patient shows that it can be fatal. Even from his hospital bed, in agonising pain, Frank had continued to turn the key on his fixators. But after speaking with his doctor, it turned out his nerves and tendons had been stretched to their limit – he was unable to straighten his legs. It was time to remove the fixators early, cutting off his growth. He had grown 7.3cm, putting him just under his 5ft 9in goal. Frank is determined he won't be treating shorter men any differently now, but one interaction with another patient has stayed with him. 'I saw him as a short man for the first time. Not in a bad way, but I saw why people perceived me as a short man – and I felt tall compared with him. Now, every time a woman comes near me, they're shorter,' he says, with undisguised glee. 'It's worth it at the end, if you see the difference between me and her,' he says, pointing at Emilia. Some names have been changed.
Daily Mail
15 hours ago
- Daily Mail
Plastic surgeons reveal what could be behind Tom Brady's changing appearance
It's often said that Tom Brady has aged like fine wine, and on his 48th birthday this month the retired quarterback looked as suave as ever. To mark the occasion, the NFL shared 13 photos of the football legend showcasing his remarkably youthful features over his two-decade career. Now, plastic surgeon Dr Smita Ramanadham has analyzed the images to reveal whether he may have had any subtle work to enhance his features. 'With Brady, he is very much an example of plastic surgery done right,' she said. 'You want surgery where you can't quite tell what it is you got, and that is the case here. 'We can't stop aging no matter what we do, but I don't see those changes with Brady that I see with everyone else, even myself, and that makes me suspicious.' 'I think he's definitely had some 'tweakments,' small procedures, either surgical or nonsurgical, to maintain his looks so that he ages gracefully, but no major work.' She suggested he had likely received a barely-there surgery to remove skin around the eyes, a subtle nose job to slightly refine the nose, and Botox and fillers for lines. But much of his youthful appearance was down to his workout regimen and strict diet, she suggested. Since retiring, he has lost 10lbs and continues to avoid refined sugars, salt, caffeine, white flour and dairy. Other surgeons previously suggested to after looking at images of him that Brady had also received a facelift. Dr Ramanadham said this was possible, but added that the shift could similarly be down to his fitness regime, diet, skincare regimen and filler. Dr Ramanadham, who runs a clinic in New Jersey, based her analysis on pictures of the star over the years and did not examine him in person. Brady has not publicly addressed whether he has undergone plastic surgery. Daily Mail reached out to representatives for the football player but did not receive a response. Rumors about potential cosmetic enhancements, including Botox, a facelift and buccal fat removal, where fat is removed from the cheeks, have circulated for years. They were reignited in September 2024, when the NFL posted an Instagram video of Brady that triggered further comments about his youthful appearance. After viewing photos of the sporting legend, Dr Ramanadham was quick to suggest he may have had an upper bletharoplasty, or surgery to remove skin above the eyes. The skin is more prominent in his early photos from the 2000s, and would be expected to gradually droop over time in normal aging. But in photos, it stays in the same place. 'Really, the only way that could happen is that if he had a small upper bletharoplasty,' she said. 'He doesn't look like he has the super awake eyes that can result from the procedure, but there is no way he would have looked this way now, with virtually no change in the skin, without something being done.' Dr Ramanadham also pointed to Brady's nose, which she said appeared to become slightly more refined over the years. This suggested to her that he may have received a nose job, or rhinoplasty. She said: 'His nose appears to be more refined. As we progress through the years, his nostrils get slimmer and his nose tip definitely looks more refined.' NFL stars can break or fracture their noses on the field, which can then lead to them being referred to surgeons for cosmetic work. Brady injured his nose in a 2012 game against the Tennessee Titans, suffering a bloodied face after he was tackled from behind while holding the ball. He did not confirm whether he broke his nose at the time, but told reporters that he needed 'some scars' to boost his career. Dr Ramanadham said the tight skin around Brady's jawline was also unusual because the skin tends to sag in this area as people age. Brady is shown above early in his sporting career in 2001, left, and 2002, when he was about 24 and 25 years old The tight appearance suggested, she said, that Brady had used Botox or fillers injected along the jawline to boost its definition. Brady has also lost a significant amount of weight over the years, which could also be contributing to the tighter appearance. He has focused on fitness since retiring from the NFL, saying in a September 2023 episode of the SiriusXM show 'Let's Go!': 'Yeah, I'm down about 10lbs, but I'm actually very fit right now. 'I haven't had the stress that I had while I was playing, so that's allowed me to focus a little bit more on my physical health.' He added: 'It's just nice to feel good, to wake up every day and know that I'm taking care of myself in a different way.' Previously, surgeons told after looking at images of him that Brady had received a facelift to tighten his jawline. Dr Tijion Esho, a cosmetic surgeon and founder of Cultskin in the UK, said at the time that Brady's appearance was similar to that 'typically seen after a full face lift which is still in the process of healing'. While it is possible that he had a facelift, Dr Ramanadham said it was also possible that an excellent maintenance regimen and skincare routine could have contributed to the appearance. Overall, she said that it remained difficult to tell which procedures Brady had received, which is 'exactly what happens with excellent plastic surgery'. 'I am definitely less certain about these procedures compared to those of other stars,' she said.
Daily Mail
a day ago
- Daily Mail
Top surgeon warns of 'conveyor belt' clinics in country where men eager to avoid balding on the cheap walk out with 20-inch scars, 'porcupine' beards and necrosis
A top hair transplant doctor says it's 'better to be bald' than have a botched surgery – and shared patient horror stories of necrosis, infections, 20-square-inch scars, 'porcupine' beards, weird hairlines and a transplant so bad the recipient killed himself. Dallas surgeon Dr. Abraham Armani shared exclusively with Daily Mail pictures of the dire outcomes he had to fix from 'conveyor belt' clinics in Turkey, where millions go to get cheap cosmetic procedures. And in an interview, the award-winning doctor warned about what red flags to look out for when picking a hair transplant doctor. 'In pursuit of the cheapest options, patients often end up paying a lot more ultimately. Not just in monetary terms, but also emotionally,' Dr. Armani said. 'I always tell my patients it's better to look bald or balding than to look like you had a bad hair treatment,' he said. He told Daily Mail that between 10 percent and 20 percent of his patients came to him for corrective procedures after a bad surgery elsewhere, often abroad. Dr. Armani, who has worked as a hair transplant specialist for 20 years, said he isn't touting for business, as he already has a full calendar and a patient waiting list. 'I'm trying to be a patient advocate and see less of these patients coming into our office,' he said. He said one of the worst cases he dealt with was 'a young patient who had a beard transplant in Turkey.' Sharing a photo of his implanted beard, he said: 'You can see the angles that the hairs were transplanted into, they're almost perpendicular to the skin, so it looks like a porcupine. 'That poor young patient,' the doctor added, 'He actually committed suicide because he was so traumatically affected.' He shared photos of another patient who had the skin on a large portion of his scalp die, a process called necrosis, because a surgeon had planted too many hairs too close together. 'In hair transplantation, essentially you're creating a tiny little hole, harvesting hairs from the back and transplanting them one at a time,' he said. 'If you put those way too close to each other or go too deep, you're compromising the blood flow to that area. If the skin doesn't have enough blood, it's going to die. 'Then, even if you put hair in it, the hair may not survive because it's a scar. 'You can give a patient antibiotics and hopefully get rid of an infection, but if the skin is dead, it's dead. There's no bringing it back to life. That's irreversible.' He said that poor hygiene at cheap clinics was a common problem that led to infections and even permanent disfigurement. 'I had a patient that came to us from Houston. Good-looking, handsome,' Dr. Armani said. 'He was overseas and saw an advertisement for a hair transplant. 'He got an infection post-operatively. They didn't treat the infection correctly. He had a second procedure with a second infection. On the back of his head, he had a scar that was literally three to four inches high, about six inches in the horizontal direction. 'I removed the scar as much as possible and then implanted hairs within the scar at the back. I would say it looked maybe 50 percent better. But a lot of these things you can't fix 100 percent. 'You end up paying twice for something that could have been avoided.' The Dallas doctor said some of the greatest risks for infection come in clinics performing several transplantation surgeries at once. Dr. Armani says his office performs a single transplant a day, in a four-hour painstaking process moving hairs one by one, and that any more is generally unsafe. 'Hair transplantation, when done correctly, takes a very experienced doctor and a whole group of highly experienced technicians, an entire day. Most reputable clinics do one procedure for one patient per day,' he said. 'So the chances of you getting a good quality hair transplant at a cheap cost is almost zero.' To contrast, he shared a picture of a foreign clinic with '15 people getting simultaneous hair transplantation in one room under no sterile technique.' 'Hospitals and clinics are some of the dirtiest places on earth. You find microbes and other types of infections in these facilities. So you have to be very careful.' The surgeon warned that 'black market clinics' may even have inexperienced assistants perform the surgery, with little oversight from seasoned doctors. He added that he has known patients who died from complications due to transplantation surgery at rogue clinics. 'If you give too much of the local anesthesia, if you don't properly preplan the surgery, things can go wrong, including death,' Dr. Armani told Daily Mail. 'We turn away about 20 percent of our patients who want to have hair transplantation because they don't qualify. 'Most clinics in Turkey, you fill up paperwork online, give them the credit card number, and they don't really care whether you are going to safely be able to go through the procedure.' Dr. Armani has worked as a hair transplant specialist for 20 years and has a full patient waiting list, such as this patient who received a successful surgery from the doctor He pointed to statistics showing Turkish clinics are performing around 2,000 procedures per day, and claimed that in order to do so they must be putting 'profit over patient safety'. Dr. Armani said another common botched surgery he sees is 'poor hairline design'. 'We had one guy last week, I felt so bad for him,' the surgeon said. 'A good-looking, muscular guy with a beautiful girlfriend. But he wouldn't take off his hat for the first 10 minutes of the consultation.' When the man finally removed his hat, the doctor said what he saw was 'horrible'. 'Hairs were implanted in the wrong direction, there was over-harvesting in the back, and poor hairline design,' the surgeon said. 'They put a feminine hairline on a masculine male with muscles. It was rounded off like a heart shape. Females have a heart-shaped hairline that's more low and curved. 'I told him if I can make it 50 percent better, I'm happy.' Another blunder in hairline design involves surgeons putting hairs too far forward, or doing too much work on a young patient that leaves embarrassing gaps as they age and grow, Dr. Armani said. 'You have to plan for a procedure that's going to look short-term and long-term. What's going to happen 10, 20, 40 years from now?' he said. Another common hairline design mistake occurs when surgeons place hairs too far forward or perform excessive work on young patients, leading to visible gaps as they age - a flaw not visible in the aftermath of this patient's surgery by Dr. Armani to address his receding hairline and balding 'You don't want to be 70 and have a hairline that was designed way down here when you were 25 years old. That's going to look horrendous.' Dr. Armani gave a list for prospective patients to look out for when considering a transplant, including: A board-certified specialist in hair transplantation, doing no other procedures A doctor with 10-25 years of experience; any less is inexperienced, and any more risks an older doctor using outdated methods Experienced staff; his lead technician has 'over two decades of experience' Clinics taking just one patient a day A clinic offering both the main types of transplant: Follicular Unit Transplantation (FUT) or Follicular Unit Extraction (FUE) No pushing of expensive, unproven products he called 'lasers and potions and lotions and snake oil' A rigorous selection process that turns away medically unfit or too young patients Long-term planning for the transplanted hairline to age well 'If you're going to rush into something, choose the wrong person, wrong doctor, wrong procedure, you're better off not doing it at all,' he told Daily Mail. 'I warned young patients against hair transplantation and made a lot of enemies in my field. I showed up at conferences and people were giving me the evil eye, because they're trying to make this as common as possible. 'But I have suffered personally from other procedures that were not done correctly, so I think that has made me a little bit more sensitive to this kind of subject.
