Frightened of starting Botox or you don’t want anyone to know you’ve had it? Dr Yuri Michitiuc explains how you can look wrinkle free without everyone knowing what you’ve had done.

It is understandable to be concerned about people noticing that you’ve had Botox to fix wrinkles or smooth out lines on your face. While Botox is effective, it does temporarily weaken the muscles that cause wrinkles to develop, and if it’s overdone, it can be easy for people to spot the treated areas.

But, there are ways around this. ‘Baby Botox’ is a treatment option that uses smaller amounts of Botox in each injection. This provides you with effective results without using as much Botox as you might expect.

How Much Works?

A typical Botox injection will provide you with 50 units of Botox. The number of units refers to the strength of the Botox treatment. When you take in more units, the Botox will block off more nerves that are responsible for muscle contractions.

With a Baby Botox dosage, you will only use about half the amount – 20 to 25 units of the compound. This is usually good enough to treat most wrinkles and yet deliver a good result.

Who is this suitable for?

Baby Botox works best on people who have lighter wrinkles or whose forehead muscles aren’t overly strong. Using the usual doses on those muscles could result in an overly dramatic result – or a frozen look.

Room to move

It takes a couple of weeks for the effects of Botox to become apparent. After Baby Botox, there will be some residual movement around your forehead as some parts of muscles continue to move while other areas are weakened. Correct placement of the Botox helps create a natural looking appearance but the muscles are sufficiently weakened so that they won’t produce the wrinkling you might have otherwise had.

Keep Numbness Under Control

Botox can cause muscle weakness around the injection site, bruising and stiffness. The smaller doses involved in Baby Botox helps minimise these effects.

As a starter?

Baby Botox may also work if you’re thinking about trying Botox out before getting a larger dosage in the future. You can use the smaller dosage now to get an idea of how well the Botox solution works. When it wears off, you can opt to go for a full dosage if you don’t think you got the results you were after. You could also choose to stick with Baby Botox. Either way, you will get a clear idea of what might happen when you use a smaller dosage. You could also get used to the effects of the treatment so you can potentially move forward to a larger dosage if you prefer.

So, Is It Worthwhile?

Baby Botox is perfect for your needs if you have any of the following:

• Lighter wrinkles that don’t require a full dosage
• Weaker tissues that could be overtreated by a full dosage
• Concerns over how individual muscles could be identified as ones treated by Botox
• Worries about the side effects of Botox

Talk with your specialist about how a Baby Botox dose may work for your requirements. The trend away from a ‘plastic’ or ‘frozen’ look is gaining ground and most practitioners are embracing the ‘baby step’ approach.