My Belly Button’s Not the Same after Children

Pregnant women or women who have gone through pregnancy may realize their belly button doesn’t quite look the way it once did. Maybe you had your belly button pierced at some point.  It looked great at one time— now, not so much!  Dr. Caroline A. Glicksman, a board-certified plastic surgeon from New Jersey, talks about a quick, outpatient procedure that can tighten and reshape your navel region.

By: Caroline A. Glicksman, MD
and Adam McMillon
ThePlasticSurgeryChannel.com

Make Your Midsection Youthful Again

As a woman’s stomach begins to enlarge during pregnancy, so too, does the belly button. After pregnancy, the navel can sag and lose some of its elasticity and  youthfulness.  Add in a hole where a belly button ring used to be and you can have a significant issue, that can cause both physical and superficial problems. 

“Many patients may not be ready or may not need a full on adominoplasty, but there are some great revisionary techniques we can use to correct the belly button area and eliminate the hole where a piercing used to be,” says Dr. Glicksman. “The hole can become more noticeable after the changes the body undergoes during a pregnancy, just like the skin in the area loses elasticity. Without having to do an adominoplasty, we can remove the hole, contour the belly button and make it appear much more youthful.”

Do NOT wait too long to remove your belly button ring!

During pregnancy, drastic changes to the midsection can cause serious problems if there is a belly button ring present. Especially if the patient will have to undergo a cesarean operation; a possible infection from a belly button ring can be disastrous. “Recently I had a pregnant patient who waited too long to remove her belly button ring during pregnancy and the area became infected,” says Glicksman. “Just days before a planned C-section, the infection caused a surgical emergency that could have had serious effects on the patient and her pregnancy.” Women should consider removing belly button rings early in their pregnancy.  “Do not worry about the look of your belly button,” says Glicksman. “We can easily correct it with outpatient surgery later.”

Not ready for a Mommy Makeover? Belly button revision may be a safe, outpatient procedure that can restore a youthful look to your belly!

Even if a woman is considering having tummy tuck and liposuction procedures in the future, there isn’t any reason to wait to repair the navel area. “If it’s a straightforward, unsightly hole from a former piercing, we can take care of it quickly,” says Glicksman. “The procedure and recovery are both fast, getting the patient back to normal life with a prettier belly button.”