The dreaded jowls — the jowls, the jowls, the jowls. 

Let us talk about jowls. Jowls, my friends, are truly the bane of my existence, not just as an aging female in this world, but also as a medical cosmetic provider who sees up to 20 patients a day, every day of the week. This area is one of the hardest areas of the face to target as you age, not just with creams, at-home devices, minimally invasive procedures in-office, but even with going under the knife. Even when you get a facelift, this area of the face is very hard to fully address.

What exactly are jowls? 

There are many different things happening as we age that lead to jowls. Think of your face as a couch:

• We have our bone structure (the frame)

• We have fat and the muscle (the cushion)

• And then we have the skin (the fabric surrounding it all).

As we get wiser in life, the first thing to happen is our cushion starts to get less plump. As this is going on, our bone structure also starts to shift: the bony part around our eyes gets a bit wider, our cheeks get a bit thinner, our jawline becomes a bit narrower, and to top it off, our skin becomes a bit more lax. Sun damage, age, tugging, pushing, pulling, expressions, life takes a toll on the fabric. 

Basically, when we age things start to shift, and eventually throughout the aging process, we kind of fall and that's when we start to notice the jowls. The interesting part is, based on my explanation, you would think that this comes last. It does not.

When do you start to notice jowls?

There are three peaks of aging in life that I have noticed from my patients:

1. The first peak happens in your early 30s, maybe late 20s, where you notice over the course of 6 months, something is not quite the same with your face.

2. The second peak of life happens in your late 30s. You’ll notice pulling, heaviness, flatness and you’ll notice it over the course of a month. It's a little bit more drastic, and happens a little bit faster.

3. And the last peak of life is in your mid-40s. That doesn't mean you end there; it just means that change happens overnight. My patients will tell me, "I don't recognize myself anymore." and this is something that I've noticed time and time again, over the course of 10 years of doing cosmetics.

The jowls become noticeable in between the first and that second peak. You may not notice it at first, but you definitely notice it when you hit the second peak of life. 

You can either decide to do something about it, or just to accept it as it is.

Watch this video where Dr. Shereene Idriss talks about things you could do at home, in-office, and beyond to help you help yourself with those dreaded jowls.