A single mum who struggled to look at herself in the mirror has shared how she paid £2,550 for surgery abroad – and says she now looks “10 years younger”.
Lucy Miller had spent years feeling self-conscious about the bags under her eyes – with people constantly asking if she was “tired” or “had been crying”.
The 42-year-old forked out £3,000 on various treatments like expensive creams, rollers and salmon DNA injections – but nothing worked.
Fed up with always looking like she “hadn’t slept for a week”, Lucy decided to take more drastic action.
Dipping into her savings, she started researching surgical options.
A procedure that takes just 30 minutes has now stripped a decade from her appearance.
“My eyes made me feel very self-conscious,” the personal trainer and fitness model, from London, told Need To Know.
“I bought all the concealers and eye creams, and the roller you put in the freezer.
“I planned my sleep and beauty around days out and events.
“If I had an event, I would go to bed early, thinking it would make a difference.
“But it only made it worse – I was adding to the heaviness of my eyes.
“I remember looking at my reflection in the mirror and thinking: ‘What’s wrong with my eyes?’
“They were puffy and I looked like I hadn’t slept for a week.
“People would constantly ask if I was tired or if I’d been crying.
“It was the one thing I couldn’t control.
“As a single mum, dipping into my savings to have surgery brought a huge sense of guilt – but it didn’t feel like a cosmetic need to me.
“This is something that impacted my confidence almost every day.
“Everyone tells me I look so much younger now.
“I’ve de-aged myself by 10 years.”
Lucy booked in to see a specialist in Brussels who would get the “fat pockets” around her eyes removed.
This is a procedure called lower lid blepharoplasty, a type of eyelid surgery used to tighten the skin and soft tissues to provide a more youthful appearance.
The Londoner caught the Eurostar to the Belgium capital and paid £2,000 for the private procedure, plus £550 for a Eurostar ticket and overnight hotel stay.
It was particularly difficult to leave behind her children; daughter Lacie, 11, and son Elliott, eight.
She said: “I went on a Tuesday morning, visited some markets and took in the sights, and then had the surgery first thing Wednesday morning.
“It took just half an hour – I was back on the Eurostar home that afternoon.
“As a single mum, I didn’t have much time to recover and rest.
“It was hard.
“I wish I could have stayed a bit longer but my kids needed their mum.
“When he saw my eyes after surgery, Elliott ran and locked himself in his bedroom.
“He couldn’t face being around me.
“My daughter was a diamond and didn’t leave my side.
“I had to take them to school in the middle of winter with sunglasses on and my head down.“
The recovery was also rough.
The mum-of-two struggled with swollen skin and stitches for weeks – but she says it was all “worth it”.
Lucy had the procedure done in December last year and is now fully healed.
She added: “I’m a lot more confident.
“I have two children, so if I can walk out of the house and not feel like I need makeup or look tired, it saves me a lot more time.
“My face feels a lot fresher.”
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