If you are a fit and healthy person who enjoys regular exercise, you will probably want to know how plastic surgery can affect your ability to exercise—especially post-op. 

Like all forms of surgery, there is normally a period of rest after surgery to ensure effective recovery—plastic surgery is no different.

This brief article takes advice from Radiance Plastic Surgery to help inform you about exercising after plastic surgery. 

It is also recommended that you consult the advice of your doctor or surgeon before making any plans to go back to exercising.

General rules to follow

Exercise is very important for the mind, body, and soul and can certainly help with a holistic recovery. However, similar to most medical advice, there are general rules to respect as well as more specific advice depending on your particular surgery. 

The most common rule to follow regarding exercise after plastic surgery is to avoid exercise for at least 48 hours after surgery

After this period, depending on the type of surgery undergone, your doctor may advise only sticking with light exercise for two weeks. This could include a light jog, bike ride or walk.

It is important to understand that even mildly intense workouts can have potentially serious health consequences after plastic surgery, so do take this advice seriously. Even if you think you are not exercising the part of your body that has had the surgery, taking care of your whole body after plastic surgery is the priority. Everything is connected! 

Exercise after liposuction

Liposuction is a fat removal procedure that is very common in plastic surgery. 

The recommended guidance for exercise after surgery is a return to light exercise no less than three weeks after the procedure. Liposuction often causes swelling of the affected region, which means you should avoid exercising those specific areas where swelling exists.

Five weeks after liposuction, all swelling should have been reduced enough to allow you to engage in more rigorous forms of exercise.

Exercise after breast augmentation

The process of breast augmentation surgery requires implants to be placed beneath the major pectoralis muscle. 

To prevent any serious complications after surgery, it is recommended that no exercise that engages the torso should be done for at least four weeks after surgery. This includes push-ups, sit-ups and weightlifting. 

Light cardiovascular exercise that target the lower body such as walking or jogging is likely to be recommended not too long after surgery. After a recovery period of 4 weeks, more rigorous exercise can take place.

Exercise after a facelift

Although you might think having a facelift shouldn’t impact your ability to exercise, it is vitally important that you do not engage in any cardio workouts for four weeks after the surgery. 

Even moderate exercise after plastic surgery such as short walks are considered risky. This is because any significant increase in blood pressure after a facelift can have potentially serious effects on the healing process.

Between weeks 4-6 of the recovery process, moderate cardio workouts can be reintroduced, with more rigorous exercise being allowed after six weeks.

Final thoughts

Hopefully, this brief article has given you an insight into what timelines can be expected in terms of when to start exercising after plastic surgeries. 

In most cases, a period of two to four weeks of recovery should be observed before engaging in any form of rigorous exercise. Crucially, the recommended advice is different depending on the type of plastic surgery, state of health of the patient, and the progressional speed in which you are healing from surgery.

As with all medical advice, we would recommend getting a tailored exercise recovery plan from your doctor to ensure that you do not jeopardize the recovery from plastic surgery.