A young mum claims a botched filler treatment landed her in hospital and left her with a 'horrendous duck lip' - only for the practitioner to threaten to 'smash her face in' if she told anyone about it. Grace Palmer, 23, said her top lip ballooned to triple its usual size after the needle was inserted into her lips just twice.
In too much pain to continue, Grace left the home of the aesthetics practitioner, who promised she could have the 1ml of filler still in the syringe at a later date. The following day the care assistant's lip was so big that work colleagues feared she'd lose it - urging her to go to hospital to get it checked out.
There, Grace was given tablets to tackle the swelling but while waiting to be seen she contacted the injector for her insurance details and claims she was met with a barrage of abuse in return. Now three months on from her ordeal on December 9th, Grace has vowed never to get her lips done by anyone who operates from their home and isn't a registered nurse.
Grace, from Earby, Lancashire, said: "My top lip was massive, it was triple the size it normally is. My skin was so tight on my lip I thought it was going to burst, it was awful. I looked horrendous, I looked like a completely different person, it was just huge. I looked like I'd been punched. It was embarrassing too, I felt like hiding away from people. I was essentially left with a 'duck' lip."
The mum-of-one said she decided to get the £50 treat after having her lips done there previously with no issues. But Grace said the appointment got off to a bizarre start when she claims she was asked to apply her own numbing cream and wait in her car for 10 minutes before being let into the practitioner's home.
But after the injector inserted the needle just two times into either side of her cupid's bow, Grace said she couldn't cope with the wasp-like stinging sensation and begged her to stop. Grace said: "I've had lip filler done by her before. The first time I had 0.5ml some time early last year and then had them done a second time in December. I loved it the first time, that's why I went back for more. Once the swelling goes down you want more
"The first time I only had half a ml and it was absolutely fine but this time I wanted a full ml - but she didn't put anywhere near that in. It all just seemed a bit weird and dodgy from the start to be honest, she made me put my own numbing cream on in the car and then I had to wait for 10 minutes. She only inserted the needle into my skin twice. When she was pushing the filler in it absolutely killed, it was like I'd just been stung by a wasp.
"I said to her 'I don't know what it is that's different but I can't stand that pain'. It was awful, my eyes were streaming. I couldn't cope anymore so I told her to stop - so basically she still had a full ml of the filler in there [the needle].
"She said she could get me some numbing stuff that would make my mouth completely numb but that it would be another £10. She said she would save it [the syringe of filler] and that once she'd ordered the [new] numbing cream we could use it then.
"I did think about the fact that the needle was just left but to be honest I just wanted to get out because it was too painful. I've never experienced that kind of pain in my lips before."
After trying to get her lips filled, Grace went home and straight to bed and it was only the following morning that she saw her new 'duck-like' pout. Concerned work colleagues urged her to go to nearby Airedale Hospital in Keighley, West Yorkshire, where she had her lip checked out by A&E doctors.
Grace said: "I woke up just thinking 'I want to look at my face straight away' and when I saw that I thought oh my god. I work in a nursing home where there are nurses, luckily we had to wear masks. It was the only time I was happy about wearing it.
"It wasn't just swelling on my lip, the bottom of my nose was starting to swell as well. When I went to work my manager and the nurses said 'you need to go to A&E just in case you lose the oxygen in your lip, you could lose your top lip'.
"People at my work were worried in case the swelling would go higher up into my eyes. I left work, I lost out on a day's work, and I took myself off to A&E. While I was there I was receiving phone calls from the practitioner [saying she would] come and smash my face at the hospital.
"She was so angry, she was saying things like 'what do you expect me to do? It's just swelling, what do you want?'. She also said I was stupid for going to hospital and wanted to know which hospital I was at, she was being really aggressive about it. She also wasn't willing to give me any refund - bearing in mind I've not used that filler there was a full ml still in that syringe. All I kept asking her was 'can you give me your insurance details please?'.
"She was just saying 'if you want insurance details then come to my door and get them' like in a threatening way. Obviously she didn't want to do that, she refused to give me my money back and said if I put it anywhere that she was going to get me done for slander.
"I was concerned with her saying what hospital are you at, I was worried she was going to come. I was more worried about my lip and what was going to happen to my face. The doctors pressed on it and it went from white to pink straight away so the circulation was still there, so they were happy about that.
"They weren't really sure what had gone on because it was so swollen but they gave me some tablets to take and they said it would take the swelling down. I took them and within one or two days the swelling went down."
Two days after Grace had the lip filler she was able to return to work, and has vowed to never get treatment with the injector again. Grace said: "I went back to work the day after that (being at hospital). I've not had any contact from her since and she's not given me any refund, I've just got on with my life. I've not even thought about getting them done again but if I did I'd go to someone who's professional, who's got a shop, and is a proper qualified nurse. I would never go to someone's house ever again that's put me off that."
