Visually, we notice how the microrelief of the skin changes, wrinkles appear, the quality of the skin changes, it becomes less elastic, the relief of the face changes, cheeks disappear, folds (nasolabial folds, jowls), asymmetry appear, noticeable tissue ptosis appears ...
But what's going on inside? What causes visible age-related changes?
This is exactly what my post today is about. Let's analyze age-related changes from the point of view of biomechanics.
Read carefully, delving into every word.
The human body is a biosystem in constant motion.
If the body system is damaged, movement stops, and the system enters an altered state.
For example, it can be a fracture, a birth injury, a curvature of the spine, or a violation of the upright position of the neck, which was, are, and will be in the majority.
If something in the body changes, in response to this change occurs COMPENSATION.
The body tries to adapt to the changes and move on.
Body aging is a COMPENSATORY process of constant accumulation of various damages in tissues.
Damage to the tissue can happen very easily. For example, in childhood, hitting your forehead on the corner of the table, which in adulthood will lead to the drooping of one of the eyebrows. You can cut the lip, and get asymmetry. And you can get an allergy to the introduction of a filler, which will lead to inflammation and further scarring of tissues, and later this scarring will cause lymph stagnation and edema formation ...
Let's take a closer look at how this happens...
- There was a muscle OVERSTRAIN.
(Spasm, trauma, mimic patterns...)
- If there is an overstrain, the TONE of a muscle changes.
(The muscle contracts, and becomes stiffer)
- The tone of the muscle will change, and the length of the muscle will change.
(The muscle will become not only stiff but also shortened)
- Consequently, the tissue TENSION will also change.
Remember that facial muscles are attached to the skin with one of their ends or both ends.
Imagine if a muscle becomes hard and shortens, what happens to the area of skin to which it is attached? That's right, it pulls up to the opposite muscle attachment. Volume is created where it should not be. For example, when we smile, we contract and shorten the zygomatic minor and major muscles, one end of which is attached to the zygomatic bone, and the other is woven into the nasolabial fold. As a result, our mouth is stretched, and the cheeks become more voluminous.
- When tissue tension changes, the POSITION of tissues (muscles, bones, joints) changes.
Another example is the muscle that lifts the upper lip and wing of the nose begins at the lacrimal canal and is attached to the skin of the wing of the nose and upper lip. With its spasm and shortening, the face takes on a squeamish look. As if a person constantly smells something bad and says “Phew..” (this is why in the Facelift Naturally app we call these muscles F-muscles, just to make the name shorter), the ridges of the nasolabial folds near the nose deepen and become more voluminous, and bunny lines appear on the nose itself.
- Naturally, in such a situation, freedom of movement is violated and, at the same time, a COMPENSATORY PATHOLOGICAL MOTOR STEREOTYPE will be formed.
What's this? This means that the body will rebuild everything around the “problem area”, neighboring muscles will change their tone, bone deformations will occur, and the structure will begin to work differently. As a result, the balance of myofascial structures will change completely, the craniofacial architecture will change, and microcirculation will worsen since the inflow and outflow of blood and lymphatic fluid will be disturbed.
- Violation of microcirculation will lead to LYMPH STAGNATION.
- Stagnation can be called the first phase of TISSUE DAMAGE.
Stagnation prevents normal tissue nutrition. Skin, muscles, subcutaneous fat, everything that is responsible for the beauty and relief of our face, will begin to suffer from a lack of nutrients, from slow metabolic (life) processes, which will inevitably lead to a deterioration in the condition of the tissues and their sticking together - SCARING, which means AGING.
This is how aesthetic deformation manifests itself.
Aesthetic deformation, as you can see, is a combination of various dysfunctions of the position and condition of tissues caused by connective tissue, psychosomatic and biomechanical factors.
That is, we get three groups of factors:
Psychosomatic: violation of myofascial tone, that is, chronic muscle strain, and the formation of typical muscle deformation (patterns) that appear due to our facial expressions.
For example, the habit of lifting the corners of the eyebrows will definitely make your forehead embossed, as it will form a pathological pattern - some of the bundles of the frontal muscle will tense more often, therefore they will be the first to accumulate residual spasm in themselves.
Or the habit of smiling with the corners of the lips down, or expressing other emotions by lowering the corners of the lips, will eventually lead to overstrain of the muscles that lower the corners of the lips, their shortening. And as a result, these muscles will work even when you do not want them to, lowering the corners of the lips, forming wrinkles, and promoting the formation of jowls.
Connective tissue factors: changes in the metabolic environment and changes in the quantity and quality of connective tissue.
These processes occur in the body without our intervention.
To make it clear what I'm talking about, I'll give an example.
Now it has become very fashionable to make yourself corners of youth.
The filler is injected around the angle of the jaw, making them sharper and more massive, lengthening the jawline, and making the face oval and more chiseled. What is the risk?
Fibrous seals form around the corners of the jaw with age, even without the introduction of fillers. As a result, the angles of the jaw are hidden and may disappear altogether, sinking into the tissues of the face. In NJ system courses, we always pay special attention to this area to reverse the process of fibrosis and “dig out” the angles of the jaw.
The filler introduced into this area will aggravate the process of fibrosis. Fibrosis will begin to form around it much faster. Firstly, because the structure of the filler itself suggests this, and secondly because the introduction of any filler will disrupt the microcirculation of fluids, contributing to the formation of stagnation.
This is only the first time the corners look sharp. Give these corners a few years and they will look deplorable. Moreover, when smiling, in front of the fibrous zone a deep fold or wrinkle will form because the tissues due to fibrosis will lose the ability to move naturally, they will “stick” at the injection site of the filler.
The crease, of course, will also be filled with all sorts of fillers, but not a single filler has yet made the face younger.
Yes. The filler can fill in depressions and wrinkles FOR A TIME, but the problem cannot be solved. Moreover, each subsequent introduction of the filler will aggravate the situation. A filler is a piece of garbage in the skin. That is how it is perceived by our body. Everything foreign or unnecessary that the body cannot remove from the tissues quickly, is envelops with a layer of connective tissue, “turning it off” from the life process, so as not to interfere and not have its detrimental effect. The same process occurs around the injected filler. It is also overgrown with connective tissue. But not just fillers...
The proliferation of connective tissue may begin due to trauma.
Biomechanical factors are the formation of a pathological motor stereotype when everything should move correctly, easily, and freely, but something suddenly begins to interfere with normal movement.
What can influence these factors? Ohh, everything.
These are malformations since childhood, scoliosis, shortening of the legs, birth trauma of the skull, which most people have, we just don’t know about it, writing off migraines for stress. These can be surgeries, damage to the facial nerve, stress, pregnancy, and childbirth, malnutrition, diets, negative emotions, fear, anxiety, guilt, ecology, lack of vitamins and minerals, improper skin care, and even incorrect orthodontic treatment, as often I hear that nasolabial folds or some other negative manifestations appeared after braces.
Pathological motor stereotypes (stoop, shuffling gait, lowering of the corners of the lips, asymmetry in facial expressions, etc.) are formed mainly due to chronic muscle strain.
And now let's take a closer look at where chronic OVERSTRAINING of muscles or a violation of muscle tone comes from.
To contract, the muscle receives an electrochemical signal from the central nervous system and its contraction occurs. The signal stops, the muscle relaxes, and it reaches its previous length. That is, the signal is no longer needed to relax. It is only needed for contraction. The natural ability of a muscle to stretch and contract in response to stimuli is called tone. In the phase of complete relaxation, muscle tone should be zero.
What does it mean to fully control a muscle? This means having the ability to contract and relax it COMPLETELY!
When we lose the ability to control a muscle, its tone can increase up to 10%, 20%... This is chronic muscle strain. The central nervous system constantly sends a signal to the muscle for tension, small, but sufficient for its constant insignificant tension. As a result of chronic overstrain, the functional activity of muscles decreases, which leads to the formation of overload in neighboring tissues, do not forget about the compensatory mechanism. As a result, a compensatory pathological motor stereotype is formed. This is when my students cannot clasp their hands behind their backs, because their hands simply cannot do it. The body has long compensated for the stooped back and hollow chest so that the hands now move freely only in front. Or, for example, they cannot lower the corners of the mouth, because the depressants that lower the corners of the mouth have been in residual spasms for a long time and simply do not obey.
The freedom of movement is lost, the position of the body in space changes and position dysfunction is formed.
Let's detail
Let's take a look at how fibrosis develops.
I have already said above that the process of formation of tissue damage is scarring, which develops in three stages:
Stage 1 is inflammation, as a result of which edema is formed.
Stage 2 is fibrosis, the proliferation of connective tissue.
Stage 3 is sclerosis (fibrous compaction).
Inflammation (tissue swelling).
The inflammatory response is the body's defense mechanism when confronted with aggression. Edema and muscle spasm create excessive pressure on the tissue, which is the first stage of tissue tension. This is a self-reversible stage.
Fibrosis (overgrowth of connective tissue).
If the inflammation was pronounced or prolonged, or regularly renewed, then the collagen fibers of the affected connective tissue increase in number, and the collagen tissues stick together. The fibrosis stage is not self-reversible.
Sclerosis (fibrous compaction).
Sclerosis is the last stage of tissue scarring. In fibrosed tissues, the process of vascularization (the formation of new blood vessels) gradually stops, tissue nutrition stops, and as a result, the tissue hardens.
Let's break it down again, what leads to tissue damage and forms a state of dysfunction:
- There is an overstrain of the muscles of the face and neck (hypertonicity aka spasms),
- The muscle is overstressed, and the balance of muscle and bone structures is disturbed.
- The work of the lymph nodes is blocked.
- Excess fluid accumulates, and stagnation occurs.
- Stagnation leads to malnutrition and worse blood circulation of tissues.
- Tissue scarring occurs.
This is premature aging.
I am often asked how I feel about the introduction of fillers, and aggressive laser procedures, such as laser SMAS-lifting. I always explain my negative opinion to it. But all the same, there always remain those who disagree with me, believing that since they are offered such procedures, they cannot be bad, and doctors cannot harm!
I urge you not to take a word, but to independently understand the physiological processes occurring in your body and draw your conclusions. Information is from me, your informed decision is from you. It is only up to you how your skin is going to look in 15 years.
Alex Pina