I went back to my doctor. She nodded. She said, "Some women see it bounce back. You might want to slow the weight loss. Try collagen."

I went to my dermatologist. She quoted me $1,800 for a starter syringe of Juvéderm in the cheeks and temples, and another $1,200 for under the eyes. Six-to-twelve months later, I'd be back for a refill. She said, kindly but plainly, "At your stage of volume loss, you're looking at roughly $5,000 a year, ongoing."

That is not a typo. Five thousand dollars. Annually. For the rest of my life. To maintain a face I already had a year ago.

I called a plastic surgeon. He talked about Sculptra, then about a breast lift, then about Morpheus8, then about whether I might be interested in a "BBL redux" because the muscle was gone with the fat. He wasn't wrong about the procedures. He wasn't lying about the prices. He was just doing math that everyone in his industry is doing right now.

Last year, the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons reported that breast enhancement surgeries jumped six percent, tummy tucks jumped six percent, liposuction jumped eight percent, and thigh lifts jumped twenty-four percent.Brachioplasty — the surgery to remove the loose skin under the arm — jumped thirteen percent. The aesthetic medicine industry is in the biggest single-year boom of its entire history.

Why?

Because tens of millions of women are coming off GLP-1 medications and discovering the same thing you did: the weight came off, but so did the part of them that held them up. And the only answers the system has on hand are expensive, surgical, and recurring.

I want you to hold that for a second. Because every single thing I am about to tell you exists in opposition to that math.