I thought one session of contouring injections would fix my side cheeks

When I finally decided to do something about my side cheekbones

I spent months staring at my profile in the rearview mirror of my car, wondering if the shadow under my cheekbones was actually getting deeper or if I was just tired. It’s funny how you start noticing these things after a certain age. I kept hearing about ‘contouring injections’ and how they supposedly melt away that stubborn fat that makes your face look wide. I eventually walked into a clinic in Gangnam that I found through a friend, mostly because they had a package deal that didn’t feel like a total rip-off at the time. I think I paid around 250,000 KRW for a three-session bundle, which sounded reasonable enough to try without feeling like I was making a massive investment.

The reality of the procedure vs what I saw online

I walked in expecting some magical V-line transformation within a week. The consultant was very professional, almost too much so, explaining that my bone structure played a bigger role than just the fat. She brought up things like skin thickness and sagging, mentioning machines like InMode or Morpheus, but I just kept nodding along while thinking about the injection. The actual process was much faster than I expected, maybe 10 minutes tops. I felt a bit of swelling immediately, which they said was normal. But the thing is, looking in the mirror afterward, I felt a weird mix of relief and confusion. My face felt slightly numb, and I couldn’t really tell if anything had changed or if the needle marks were just making me look puffy.

Why I stopped trusting my own judgment in the mirror

After the second session, I started getting a little paranoid about skin elasticity. I kept comparing myself to people I saw on social media who claimed to have ‘fixed’ their face shape with these injections. But then, I noticed a slight dullness in my skin near the jaw, almost like it was losing a bit of that snap-back tension. Was it the injection? Or was I just getting older? It’s hard to tell. I spent a lot of time trying to decide if I should add a lifting procedure like Oligio, which was being pushed quite heavily in the brochures lying around the waiting room. The prices for those were way higher, often jumping up to 800,000 KRW or more depending on the shot count. I didn’t want to get stuck in that cycle of paying for one fix and realizing I needed another one to balance it out.

The lingering feeling of being in between

I finished the three sessions, and honestly, the change is so subtle that my mom didn’t even notice. I see it when I turn my head a certain way under harsh office lighting, but in my bedroom mirror, it looks exactly the same as it did three months ago. Maybe I didn’t have enough fat to begin with, or maybe my expectations were just fundamentally flawed. It’s annoying because I invested the time—roughly two hours of my life including the waiting room and the commute—and I still find myself looking for better angles for photos. I keep wondering if I should have just done nothing, or if I should have gone for the more expensive lifting options right from the start instead of playing around with injections.

Does a perfect face shape really exist?

Now, whenever I see those ads about ‘customized designs’ and ‘individual facial analysis,’ I just feel a bit tired. Everyone talks about personal anatomy, but it feels like a catch-all phrase that justifies why something might not work for you. I haven’t gone back for more, but I haven’t completely ruled it out either. There’s this lingering uncertainty that maybe I missed a step or that I was just a bad candidate from the beginning. It’s not that I regret doing it, but I definitely don’t feel like I ‘solved’ the issue. I still catch myself touching my cheekbones when I’m bored, wondering if it made any difference at all.