Woman, 33, Says Post-Facelift Swelling Made Her Unrecognizable

Instagram/@rubytuesdaymatthews Ruby Tuesday Matthews is giving her 245,000 social media followers an unfiltered look at the aftermath of a recent cosmetic surgery procedure.

The 33-year-old content creator traveled from Byron Bay, Australia, to Seoul, South Korea, for an endoscopic lift, a minimally invasive facelift technique that uses small incisions to lift sagging eyebrows and smooth forehead wrinkles.

Matthews said she initially thought she might also need to undergo a blepharoplasty (eyelid surgery), but her surgeon decided the lift alone could achieve the look she wanted.

“The goal was never to change the way I look,” she wrote in a post on Instagram stories.

“I wanted to keep my face and my features—just look a little more refreshed and awake, while addressing some of the volume loss through my face.” She also explained in a video that she didn’t want to add a “cat-eye” or “fox-eye effect,” and that she just wanted her surgeon to work with her natural features.

Matthews, who posts fashion, beauty, lifestyle, and parenting content, said the surgery took four hours.

She then returned to her hotel to sleep before going to the clinic the next morning to have her drain and tape removed.

Then came an unexpected problem: her iPhone no longer recognized her.

“I literally had to go to the Apple Store in my pajamas looking like this and reboot my whole phone because there was no way it was recognizing my face,” she said.

The swelling only got worse.

“Day one post-surgery and I stupidly thought this was as swollen as I was going to get,” Matthews wrote.

“Little did I know I was about 24 hours away from inflating like a f***ing balloon.” By day three, Matthews said, “My face has never been this swollen.” She described the sensation as “uncomfortable” but said she wasn’t experiencing major pain.

She also said she slept sitting up during recovery.

Matthews booked the procedure through Beauty Hopper , a Korean concierge service that she said helped arrange her surgeon, pre-operation testing, and translation appointments.