Tamra Judge Spent Her Birthday Recovering From Cosmetic Surgery: See the Shocking Photos
"Progress isn't always pretty," The Real Housewives of Orange County cast member declared during her recovery.
Over the years, Tamra Judge has been candid about her various cosmetic procedures, from getting regular Botox to trying out a lower facelift to having "IPLs once a year."
According to WebMD, IPL, or intense pulsed light therapy, is a treatment that “uses light energy” to target areas of the skin and can “treat a range of skin conditions."
More recently, The Real Housewives of Orange County cast member revealed three procedures she had done during her birthday weekend (her birthday is September 2), documenting the "journey" via her Instagram page.
Tamra Judge's Birthday CO2 Laser Treatment and Brow Lift
On September 1, Tamra shared an Instagram video of herself visiting Donald S. Mowlds, MD, in Newport Beach. The California mom revealed the plastic surgeon gave her a "brow lift, CO2 laser, and a blue chemical peel."
Let's break this down.
According to the Mayo Clinic, a brow lift is a procedure that "improves the appearance of the forehead, the brow, and the area around the eyes" by raising the brows. Additionally, a CO2 laser, aka a carbon dioxide laser, "uses targeted beams of light to remove the superficial layer of your skin," per Healthline. The treatment is said to treat areas on the skin with discoloration and also attend to cosmetic concerns, "such as fine or deep lines, wrinkles, and acne scars."
Moreover, the "blue chemical peel" Tamra received (that made her face look a little blue in the video) is described as the "ZO Controlled Depth Peel" on Dr. Mowlds' website, and is noted to "target the deeper layers of the skin" to "achieve maximal non-surgical skin tightening as well as correct deeper wrinkles, scars and pigmentation."
The peel, which features a "blue-based dye," (hence the name), asks for patients to have a "strict" recovery period to fully heal, seeing skin improvement over six weeks "as deeper stimulation and correction takes place."
Tamra was sure to take those instructions seriously, documenting in the video how she was taking it easy at home to fully recover. "Let the healing begin!" she said in the Instagram video.
Tamra Judge's Post-Surgery Recovery
On September 2 — her birthday — Tamra gave fans an update on her recovery "in the thick of it."
"[T]aking it one step at a time… literally. Happy birthday to me," Tamra wrote in the caption of the video post, in which she explained why her birthday was "the worst day" of her recovery.
"The swelling is pretty bad," Tamra shared. "I do feel a little bit better today. I took a shower, I'm able to turn the TV on now; before, [the] noise hurt my head so bad because of the brow lift so I just wanted to stay in complete silence."
Tamra Judge's Mom Reacts to Her Cosmetic Procedure
In addition to sharing the details of her procedure, Tamra also posted a video on September 2 revealing how her mom, Sandy, reacted to her recovery. In short, it was pretty hilarious.
"Your face literally makes me want to throw up," a text from Sandy read, which Tamra posted over her selfie video. "It looks so [painful] and you don't look like yourself."
"One of my friends called and asked if you had been in a motorcycle accident," Sandy continued in her text messages.
"I literally can't stop laughing at my mom's text message to me," Tamra giggled. "I can't, she's too much!"
