Cosmetic enhancements and Real Housewives seem go hand in hand, but going under the knife, or even getting the mainstay vial or two of Botox, was never on former Real Housewives of New Jersey star Caroline Manzo’s radar (with the exception of a post-pregnancy tummy tuck). Fast forward to the end of her role on the hit show, wrapping her own series, Manzo’d With Children, and a recent weight gain, the 57-year-old’s stance on plastic surgery began to shift. As Page Six notes, Manzo’s latest appearance on her sons’ Dear Albie podcast was the perfect time for the personality to reveal that she got a facelift.
“I’m going to be 58 and so those things start to play on your mind a little bit,” Manzo explained to her sons, Chris and Albie Manzo. “Now I started to gain weight in the past year. Probably the heaviest I’ve ever been in my life. So, one day, shortly after New Year’s, I woke up and I decided that, you know what, I was spiraling and going to a bad headspace and I can’t do that for a multitude of reasons. It’s not good for me, it’s not good for the family, it’s not good for a million different reasons. And the first thing I decided to take control of was my weight.”
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As a result of majorly changing her diet—she nixed all carbs, meats and soda—Manzo was able to drop a whopping 20 pounds, but her new figure left her unhappy with something else now. “I noticed I had on my neck what they call turkey neck, where my skin was just loose under my neck,” she shared. “It just freaked me out…I lost all that weight and then I started seeing my face in FaceTimes and I went and said to myself, ‘I’m going to the doctor to see what can be done about this.’”
Manzo paid a visit to the same plastic surgeon who did her tummy tuck 18 years ago, Paramus, NJ plastic surgeon Robert Zubowski, MD. “He said to me, ‘Your neck is not going to snap back because of your age and it lost elasticity.’ So right then and there I said, ‘Okay, let’s do a facelift.’”
While the decision was likely one she never thought she’d make, Manzo is thrilled with the outcome, and says her result span much further than the physical sense. “Since having it done, and this coincides with the weight loss, my whole entire outlook on life has changed and I could cry thinking about it. It really, really for me just brought my headspace to a whole different place. And you know it’s funny because…Lauren and Albie just recently got tattoos and I was like, ‘Cool, do it. You should do it, do what makes you happy.’”
