I don’t want to look old. And I’m guessing neither do you.
Botox injections offer a simple way to keep all of us looking younger. It’s almost like cheating the aging process!
Botox gets injected into your face and temporarily paralyzes your muscles1 – which helps those stubborn wrinkles to vanish right before your soon to be wrinkle-free eyes.
Sounds simple, right?
All it takes is about an hour out of your day, a few hundred dollars, a little bit of courage and – voila! You’ll be looking ten years younger in ten minutes!
That is, unless you fall asleep immediately after getting your Botox injections.
If you do this, you’ll end up looking like something out of a horror film. Which is ironic, considering you likely got Botox to smooth out your sleep lines.
And that’s just one of the ways that Botox and sleep don’t mix well…
Botox Can Shift In Your Sleep
Aside from massaging or touching the area where your Botox was injected, falling asleep immediately after a Botox procedure is the single worst thing that you can do.
And being unable to lay down after Botox is pretty frustrating. Especially considering that feeling groggy or sleepy is a common side effect of Botox.
You know that horrible feeling when you’re trying to fight the urge to lay down and let your heavy eyelids close? That’s what you may be dealing with after your Botox session.
It might feel like torture, but be strong. You must fight the urge to lay down! Fight it with all your might – your youthful face depends on it!
Botox needs time to naturally settle into your facial muscles after it’s injected. Laying down and falling asleep before it does that can result in it shifting or moving around.
Most doctors advise that you refrain from laying down or falling asleep for at least 4 hours following your Botox procedure.
On the other hand, some doctors claim that this is sheer myth. They say that there’s no harm in laying down after receiving Botox…2
…but are you willing to take that chance?
After all, if you can spend all that time and effort getting a toxin injected right into your face, then staying awake for a few hours after is child’s play.
Do your new face a favor and avoid laying down for several hours after Botox to ensure that your Botox stays put.
Sleep Apnea And Botox
Whenever I hear about sleep apnea all I can think of is those Darth Vader like sleep masks that people who suffer from this disorder are forced to sleep with.
“Luke. I am your fah-thah.”
All jokes aside, obstructive sleep apnea is a pretty serious sleep disorder. Basically, it causes people to temporarily stop breathing in their sleep.
This happens because something is blocking their airway, usually soft tissue that has collapsed in the back of the throat.
Sounds terrifying. Not breathing for periods of time while I’m asleep? Yikes.
While this is very scary – what does sleep apnea have to do with Botox?
Potentially, a lot. If you suffer from sleep apnea, you may want to reconsider just where you get Botox injected.
If you get Botox injected anywhere in your upper face, it should have no impact on your sleep apnea.
But if you get Botox injections in your neck – you might be putting your sleep apnea in danger.
Unfortunately, not much research has been done on this. And many doctors say that the likelihood of neck Botox impacting your sleep apnea is rare – but it’s not impossible.3
Are you willing to risk it when it comes to breathing properly (or breathing at all) while sleeping? I would think not.
As I covered earlier, Botox works by paralyzing your muscles.
Which means that it could paralyze the muscles you use to swallow and push your breath through your throat. This is why people with sleep apnea may find it difficult to sleep after Botox injections in their neck.
The moral of this sleep apnea story?
If you suffer from sleep apnea – don’t get Botox in your neck! You already struggle enough with breathing in your sleep, do you really want to make it worse for the sake of losing a few wrinkles?
Having a wrinkle-free neck is simply not worth the complications that Botox can cause for your sleep disorder.
Don’t Sleep On Your Face After Botox
Unless you sleep perfectly still on your back throughout the night, you are going to put pressure on your face while you sleep.
Side-sleepers and stomach sleepers beware – you’re going to want to rethink your sleeping position after Botox.
Sleeping on your face in any way puts your Botox at risk. This is because until Botox settles into place, it can move around after it’s been injected. Creepy, but true.
Botox gets injected into very precise facial locations – and trust me, you want it to stay there. It doesn’t matter whether you had Botox injected into your cheeks, forehead, lips, chin or anywhere else, you are going to want to avoid sleeping on it.
Eventually Botox will naturally settle into place where it was injected and the risk of it moving around will decrease significantly. But this takes time.
And putting hours of pressure on your freshly Botoxed face while you sleep can make a real mess of it.
Have you ever seen a Botox job gone wrong? If you are a tabloid junkie like me, you will have no doubt seen some disastrous examples of Botox gone wrong gracing the pages of US Weekly. Botox that has moved or shifted after being injected is not a good look.
Whether you fall face-first into bed, sleep on your side, or doze on your stomach after Botox – there’s a good chance it’ll cause you to look like a distorted, bumpier version of yourself.
Do yourself a favor and keep your head slightly elevated and avoid sleeping face down for several nights following your Botox injections.
Botox Can Cause Sleeplessness!
Even if you take the correct precautions when sleeping with Botox, there is one more thing that you need to be mindful of. And it’s a sleep killer.
Botox can actually rob you of sleep by causing anxiety
But pinpointing hard scientific evidence to explain why Botox may cause anxiety is difficult.
But it’s easy to find reports of people claiming that their anxiety levels skyrocketed after receiving Botox. Which then affected their ability to sleep4 Anxiety and insomnia tend to go hand in hand.
I know that when I’m dealing with anxiety of any kind, getting to sleep is practically impossible. My mind races, my stomach feels all knotted up – sleeping is the last thing on my mind.
And trust me, there are plenty of things that cause me this kind of sleep-stealing anxiety – though at this point in my life, Botox is not one of them.
But apparently, (one day) it could be.
Even though many doctors claim that anxiety from Botox is impossible, it’s pretty hard to ignore the hundreds of patients who swear that Botox gave them anxiety.
Doctors explain it like this – Botox is injected underneath the skin and should really never enter the bloodstream or brain. Meaning that scientifically speaking, Botox should have no impact on anxiety levels or difficulty sleeping.
But can we really ignore the countless personal accounts from patients who developed anxiety following their Botox?
No.
Plus, anxiety is listed as a possible side effect of Botox – along with hundreds of other possible side effects.
The bottom line: when you get Botox, you’re injecting a toxin into your body. And with that comes a certain amount of risk.
You risk Botox causing you anxiety or rob you of precious snooze-time. Or it may not. People react very differently to medications and medical procedures. Hence the never-ending list of possible side effects that come with most medications and procedures.
Just be prepared for the possibility that you may lose some sleep after getting Botox thanks to increased levels of anxiety.
And even if you don’t experience Botox anxiety – it’s clear that sleeping after Botox is no simple matter. The things we do to hang onto our youth. But hey, at least your cheeks are crease free and your eyes no longer droop.
Has your Botox affected your sleep? How do you sleep after getting Botox injections? Let me know in the comments below!
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