Full, ultra-plumped lips are one beauty trend that just won’t quit.

Influencers like Kylie Jenner and the rest of her famous family have helped to make the use of facial fillers increasingly common. The more we’re bombarded with photos of perfectly plumped pouts on social media, the more we wonder: Is there such a thing as too much? If so, what does that mean? 

Enter “filler fatigue,” a buzzy beauty term to describe what happens when someone has had too much filler. Essentially, over time, filler stretches and weighs down the skin, which means you need more filler with each trip to the doctor, which will just stretch the skin and tissue even more. 

Over extended periods of time, fillers can actually stretch out the tissues under the skin, essentially accelerating the aging process “because those tissues aren’t going to bounce back the same way as you get older,” Park Avenue facial plastic surgeon Andrew Jacono explained to HuffPost. 

New York-based cosmetic facial plastic surgeon Michelle Yagoda told HuffPost that once the filler is gone (whether absorbed back into the body or dissolved by a doctor), it leaves behind an enlarged space that requires more filler over time to stay inflated. 

“Each time you put more filler in, the pocket expands more and it becomes a bigger pocket, so it needs more and more filler to keep it expanded,” Yagoda explained.  

When it comes to lips, if you don’t add more filler to inflate the space, you can be left with droopy, wrinkly or even misshapen lips that may require surgery to correct, Yagoda noted. 

“After the skin has been stretched out, it’s like a tummy tuck when a woman’s had a baby and her skin hangs,” Jacono said. “When you [get rid] of that big lip, it’s like [after] giving birth. You dissolve away the filler and there’s all this extra skin and I have to cut it away. It’s a pretty big procedure and takes about two weeks to recover.” 

Fillers can also migrate once they’ve been injected, and you could end up with a top lip that looks like what Yagoda described as “two saggy boobs,” in which the sides of the lips hang down. 

Yagoda said that she doesn’t use injections in the pink part of the lips, as she considers it a dangerous area. She will, however, inject where the pink part of the lip meets the skin. 

“I think it’s a big mistake to inject into the pink part of the lip because the lip is a muscle, and the filler gets moved around and can clump and lump and deform the lip and will pretty much require a surgery to get rid of it if you do it more than once or twice,” she said. 

Both Yagoda and Jacono noted that “filler fatigue” also commonly happens when people use too much filler in their cheek areas. 

“Filler in the cheek is great for someone who has a flat midface or somebody who doesn’t have very significant cheekbones,” Yagoda said, adding that putting filler in someone whose cheekbones are already defined pretty much just stretches out the underlying tissues.

Eventually, she said, the pocket becomes so expanded that “the volume of filler necessary to hold up and inflate that pocket becomes so much that it tips the balance of the face so that you have a very large cheek area and by comparison, the chin area and jawline look small.” 

If that happens, she said, some people will then have filler injected into the bottom half of their face in an attempt to balance everything out. However, that can leave the face looking “almost like a puffed-up bobblehead,” Yagoda said, adding that the normal contours of the face become lost. 

Just as fillers can move when they’re injected into the lips, they can also gravitate when injected into the cheeks and weigh the face down. 

“What people try to do, because they don’t get the same effect from one or two vials of filler, is that they try to fill the face so that the sagging is lifted, but then the face looks wider,” Jacono said, adding that people may start to look “distorted.”

“When the fillers go in, they don’t really support the face, they weigh the face down,” he said. “[People] start to look a little bit simian or monkey-like, because there’s too much filler that gravitates toward the mouth … it kind of droops down from the upper part of the cheek.”  

While fillers may be a great option for some people, they may not be the best for others. More importantly, fillers will not stop the body from aging. 

“Putting too much filler in the face to try and make up for the aging process, which tends to happen, starts to make people not look like themselves anymore,” Jacono said. “I see patients who have been doing fillers for five to 10 years and they’re coming to me for a solution, because they’ve already done all the injectables and lots of lasers, and now they’ve spent tens of thousands of dollars and the effects of the treatments aren’t working for them anymore.” 

As Yagoda said, “Filler is not the answer to everything.”

“As you continue to age and depending on your genetics, you may be predisposed to loose skin and areas where there’s a lot of hanging. And it is not true, even though it’s a perpetuated myth that filler in the cheek can lift skin at the lower part of the face. It’s just not possible.”

If someone is trying to reverse the effects of too much filler, there are treatments available, both surgical and nonsurgical. For example, there is an injectable enzyme called hyaluronidase, which can dissolve hyaluronic fillers like Restylane or Juvederm. There are also minimally invasive treatments like ThermiTight and Ultherapy that work to tighten the skin.

But sometimes, as Yagoda noted, surgery is the right way to go. 

Both doctors agreed that the length of time someone can use filler and see the results they want is different for each patient. 

The younger you are, the firmer and more elastic the skin generally is, Yagoda noted, which means you may be able to use filler a little longer. But for someone in their 40s or 50s, the “sweet spot,” she said, is probably around three to five years. 

According to Jacono, some people may even be able to get eight to 10 years out of fillers on a case-by-case basis, but he noted that no matter what, you’ll be stretching the tissues.

“There’s no way to get around it,” he said. “And you have to be careful. Because if you push it too far, you’re stretching them way too much, you’re almost guaranteeing yourself a more invasive treatment at a younger age.”

If you’re looking to get fillers, especially in the lips or cheeks, Yagoda suggested reading up on the various types of fillers out there to educate yourself and recommended getting different opinions from doctors.

“It’s important,” she said. “I wouldn’t want to make decisions without being as educated as I could be.”

We are living in a time where inclusivity is king. Attitudes toward aging are changing, and self-expression comes in many forms ― including electively going gray.

And yet, our society continues to value youth and beauty. Ageism still exists, and no celebrity opting to dye their hair gray is going to change that. 

So if we’re going to celebrate gray hair, we ought to celebrate the women who earned it. And if you ask them, there’s a lot to celebrate. 

A call out from HuffPost for women to talk about their gray hair generated hundreds of responses with a common theme ― a love and acceptance for going gray. 

In spite of that, many women, like the ones we spoke to for this story, have a complicated relationship with graying and the aging process in general. Some have fully embraced their hue, while others still lean on hair dye to cover it up. Read these 10 real stories below from women who started going gray as early as 16.

Age ain’t nothing but a number, especially when it comes to having truly satisfying sex. 

According to Match.com’s annual Singles in America report, it’s not Tinder- and Grindr-using millennials who are having the best sex of their lives. It’s their parents: On average, single women reported having their best sex at age 66. For single men, the sweet spot was 64.

The findings, based on a survey of 5,000 singles of all ages, ethnicities, and income levels across the U.S, come as no surprise to sex therapists. Sex tends to improve once you’ve learned that your sex appeal isn’t based entirely on your physical appearance. Unfortunately, that’s a lesson that takes most people years to learn, said Vanessa Marin, a sex therapist and the creator of Finishing School, an online orgasm course for women.

“With my clients in their 20s and 30s, self-consciousness is a huge factor in why they aren’t able to enjoy sex: Younger people are too in their heads about what their bodies look like, how they’re performing and what their partner is thinking. Eventually, that wears off,” Marin told HuffPost. “Even between the 20s and the 30s, there’s already a significant decrease in self-consciousness.”

The survey finding is a welcome counterpoint to commonly held beliefs about sex in our 50s and beyond. Why do we worry it’s all downhill once we hit a certain age?

In part, it’s because our bodies do change as we age, and as a result, so does sex, said Celeste Hirschman, a sex therapist who co-authored the book Making Love Real: The Intelligent Couple’s Guide to Lasting Intimacy and Passion with her business partner Danielle Harel.

Come mid-life, our bodies may not be as taut as they once were. Sex itself may be full of new challenges: Women may grapple with pain or dryness brought on by menopause, and many older men have problems with premature ejaculation and erectile dysfunction. 

Still, there are workarounds that, in many cases, make sex just as enjoyable, if not more than, it was before, Hirschman said. 

“Yes, some kinds of sex become more difficult, but the plus is that these changes generally make communication and creativity much more essential,” Hirschman said. “When we’re young, sex is often a swift race to penetrative sex without much foreplay or fantasy added in. When penetrative sex is less of a goal, people can become more creative and sex can actually get a lot better.”

Realizing that an orgasm and penetration isn’t the be-all-end-all-of sex can be a game changer, regardless of age. In fact, Hirschman said a client once boasted that the best sex she’d ever had was with a partner with erectile dysfunction.

“They were together for a year and she said she had the best orgasms of her life, and he had great ones, too, just not from penetration.”

Another reason post-50 sex may be so fulfilling? The older you get, the less compelled you feel to put up with rigid sexual expectations and roles, said Kimberly Resnick Anderson, a sex therapist in Los Angeles.

That’s especially true of older women, many of whom spent their 20s and 30s searching for a partner to start a family with some day.

“That search often shapes what women in their 20s and 30s are willing to do and tolerate with their partners,” Resnick Anderson said. “As women age, they become more selfish, in a good way: No more worries about getting pregnant, no more worries about their kids barging in on them. Plus, many have an increased comfort with their bodies and a healthy sense of entitlement to sexual satisfaction.”

As Resnick Anderson explained, post-50 women (and men) are finally “taking ownership of their sexuality” and reaping the benefits. More modern and progressive views about sex allow women to celebrate their sexuality in a way that they couldn’t 30 or 40 years ago, the therapist added, pointing to one of her clients as an example. 

“After 40 years of faking orgasms, a 63-year-old client of mine actually got to know her body and what genuinely felt good to her,” Resnick Anderson said. “Sex at 65 or 70 can feel carefree and easy because it’s more about pleasure and connection and less about performance and ‘selling yourself.’”

Younger people would be wise to adopt the same sexual confidence, Hirshman added. 

“As a sex therapist, I hope people start to get to know themselves sexually at a younger age and feel comfortable asking for what they want from their partners,” Hirshman said. “Lowering shame and judgement around sex will mean more people having great sex at every age!”

It buckles when I go up and down stairs, yelps loudly when I try to cross my legs, and jolts me awake from a deep sleep if I accidentally shift positions and bump it. The discomfort was enough for me to choose to spend my birthday in the company of the nice knee doctor.

Before my left knee started acting up, I spent a few weeks with my right thumb doing this weird snapping thing. Not really painful, more like a seriously major annoyance for someone who types for a living ― and yes, I still type for a living. And the snapping thumb came on the heels of my big toe joint aching in a way that WebMD was pretty sure could only be gout. It wasn’t. A few months before the non-gout episode, there was a flare-up of my plantar fasciitis ― a foot problem in which every step makes you wish you had a bullet stuffed in your mouth to bite. That one forced me to hang up my hiking boots until the prescription orthotics arrived. I may have proposed marriage to the physical therapist who saw me three times a week and rubbed my feet in all the right places. The man is gifted; I mean it.

So what does this all mean, all these aches and pains and weirdness affecting my body parts? It means that I am getting older. It also means that I might actually meet my medical plan’s deductible this year.

But mostly what it means is that if I want to avoid becoming someone who spends half her week seeing doctors and the other half waiting in line at the pharmacy, I need to get out in front of this. 

I understand that body parts wear out, and my superhero may be Bionic Woman, but that’s about as close as I’ll come to ever being one. I also know that pain is your body’s way of telling you something is wrong. But I’ve come around to believe that the key to successful aging rests in your ability to ignore the creaks in the floorboards.

If you run to the doctor for every twitch or tingle, you will spend (the rest of) your life there. Me? I’d rather keep company with folks less focused on growing old together and more into staying young together. 

So this is my plan: I’m going to will myself to rise above what hurts. I’m putting my mind over my matter. I won’t ignore serious pain ― nor am I suggesting that you do, either ― but I will raise the bar on what constitutes “serious.” 

My first line of defense will be my ice pack and my heating pad. I will continue to walk my dogs, hike my trails, and park the car in the spot farthest from the door to get my daily steps in. I will sing a song in my head to distract myself from any body parts that don’t feel like going along for the ride. I will take stairs, not elevators; I will stand, not sit; I will follow the “use it or lose it” rule whenever and for whatever possible.

It’s not greater longevity that I’m seeking. Frankly, I would rather die than live to be 100, which I suppose is actually what would happen. What I want, though, is to live as fully as I can for as long as I can. But when doing so requires a visit to the nice knee doctor who proclaims it is “time for surgery,” I may just reserve the right to take my ice pack and walk away singing “Have A Little Faith In Me”  on behalf of my knee. 

I go to bed at 10 and get up at 5; not the reverse. Seems like every time I visit the doctor he finds a potentially life-threatening disease—then tells me not to worry. I worry a lot more. When I do high-impact cardio my back achieves complete failure before I do. I’m at my happiest in bed, alone. I jest, of course: My dog takes up half the space. My biggest fear when flying is not crashing; it’s being seated next to the window without easy access to the bathroom.

When I look at my mother I often see someone else—me. I can’t remember what appointments I have this week, but they probably have something to do with that life-threatening disease. Please don’t ask me what I did yesterday: I panic under pressure. I’m furious when friends cancel last-minute, until I remember it means I don’t have to deal with the hassle of trains and figuring out what to wear and—Damn, Heather just soared past me on Words with Friends! My night has purpose.

I have friends who are getting sick, but this time it’s from illnesses I’d heard about growing up. Unless it’s free I have no patience for crowds or bad seats—sorry, Barbra. Binge-watching is the new binge-drinking, and unless you mean “Popcorn and Pixar” I don’t PNP. I’m still attracted to older men, except that most of them are now younger than I am. I’ve seen more dicks on my phone than I have in real life.

I shave my back as often as I shave my beard, but at least I don’t have much gray hair. What there is I refer to as the “silver lining.” I’ve learned that “You have a lovely shaped head” is meant as a compliment. And that only thick-haired people say it. And that I’m sure they have grotesque-shaped heads. I like muffins and tops but not my muffin top. My favorite foods are fattening; so are my least favorite. I don’t care if you’re the cutest go-go boy on the planet; if you don’t know who the Go-Go’s are I just can’t even.

Even though I don’t have children, I can be a Daddy, a DILF, or, if I gain ten pounds, a Dad Bod example. And that if I stopped working out to actually raise kids, something different altogether: Discarded. I’ve learned that we never learn, and that accepting this is unacceptable.

When I run into longtime neighbors on the street, we discuss arthritis, pinched nerves, hip problems, food allergies, skin rashes, cataracts, and which remedies work best. And we are referring to our pets. No matter how simple the instructions, I will always return from the store with the wrong item. Would it have killed you to use FreshDirect? I don’t care if you’re the cutest go-go boy on the planet; if you make me wrap it up first, it’s probably not going to wake up before I go-go.

I’ve learned that the people who make restaurant menus are in cahoots with the eyeglass people…and are Nazis. When I go on a date, I’m now judged, not on my looks and personality, but on my ability to fit in with their furniture, which has an enormously large collection of brand-name baggage. And that traveling isn’t the only time men search for an upgrade.

I no longer max-out my credit cards but one trip to TJ Maxx means I might have to cut my closet space in half. I can no longer bear to lie in the sun and I survive winter about as well as the night watch. I’ve learned that our country has hit bottom so many times it’s like two-for-one night at the Eagle. And that I’ll never learn to take it. I’ve learned that my political views have changed a lot of people’s minds. And that I still have a sense of humor.

I’ve learned that friends come and go, lovers come and go, family comes and (hopefully) goes home, but the planet just goes. And that sadness is in the bloodstream.

Oh, one more thing: I’ve learned that, despite the above, I’m a fuck of a lot happier at 53 than I was at 23. Membership has its privileges.

Follow David Toussaint on Twitter and Facebook.

David Toussaint writes about subjects affecting older gay men. If you’ve got a “Daddy Issue,” let him know. –-DRT