Did your face fill back out in maintenance?

I found this as a side effect too...the fat in my face went away and so I looked less soft and rounded in my face, and yeah, that looked gaunt rather than fashionable. I think I've rebounded a bit and have moisturized religiously. But still, I think 40 year old skin just doesn't rebound like it did when I was younger.

Still wouldn't want to regain the weight, though.

I’ve experienced this too, around my eyes and neck. I moisturize like crazy, but.... oh well, I’m 39, so I know I’m no spring chicken. I don’t really mind it, I guess, it’s just.... different.

Yes. Skin shrinks more slowly than fat depletes. Also, there's some glycogen depletion, often, from the calorie deficit, while weight loss is still in process. Maybe there are other factors.

I looked pretty haggard in the face at goal, but it improved over several months at the same weight at maintenance calories.

I still have some deep wrinkles and droop that I didn't have when obese, but I lost weight at age 59-60 (now 64). It's better than it was at first, definitely.

I suspect regular exercise, good nutrition, adequate hydration, and not losing at too fast a rate are good allies. Skin is an organ, and the same things that make other organs healthy are likely to keep skin as healthy, supple and elastic as is possible.

I've been in maintenance for about a year and a half. My face hasn't exactly 'filled back out' - I still have quite hollow-looking cheeks - but the skin has tightened up a lot so that most of the lines are gone and I'm back to my accustomed youthful appearance.

I will probably collect a whole load of disagrees for this but high dose liposomal vitamin C has been reported to improve skin elasticity. I have been taking it for a year and my skin is in great shape. I'm early 50s. My weight loss has been large but slow and steady. The bingo wings are an issue but facially I'm in good nick. That's probably mostly down to good genes and skincare but since taking the vitamin C my facial skin feels bouncier.

I'd add that there's a whole 99-page (!) thread over in Success Stories with before/after face photos - huge range of ages & weight loss amounts. It's a reasonable caveat that people might not post on that thread if they thought they looked really bad after weight loss . . . but also that a super-common comment by others on those photos, in that thread, is some variation on "you look so much younger". FWIW.

It's here:

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10207059/before-and-after-face-edition

. . . so others can take a look, if feeling that I'm biased.

Nope. My face is looking gaunt at the moment unfortunately. I’m 46. I’m gonna gain a bit thro bulking. Maybe my face will fill out a bit. Fingers crossed !

Thank you, @rheddmobile: Yes, subtle but noticeable, similar to things I noticed in myself (but didn't photograph). It's so helpful that you have photos taken under nearly exactly same conditions.

I don't understand why this is hard for some people to believe: Stress shows in our faces, and weight loss takes us a few percentage points away from optimum good health, which also affects appearance. Weight loss is a stressor. Beyond that, there are additional adaptations to completed weight loss that happen over time, after goal, like glycogen replenishment, continuing tightening of skin, and so forth. Some of them are slow.

I can easily believe that the effect is greater for some, less for others, potentially for reasons not clearly related to magnitude of weight loss, speed of loss, age, etc. But for people on the route to goal, it seems reasonable to expect that there may be some gradual improvement, and not to let worry about this be an additional stressor.

The idea that we're all going to look olders/worse is just not born out by the before/after photos in Success Stories, or by yours.