Some senior citizens tend to go on at length about the pains and pitfalls of getting and being ever older. Others, however, see more to the aging process like architect Frank Lloyd Wright who observed, “The longer I live, the more beautiful life becomes.”

But the years – along with gravity and your particular lifestyle – often send senior citizens to cosmetic plastic surgeons to see if they can look as good as they feel.

While the entire body shows changes as we age, the nose –the most prominent facial feature — seems more effected by gravity and tends to droop, joining the host of other bodily features that now point down.

Many senior citizens come to our office complaining of a nose that seems to be growing, getting longer and more bulbous. Science backs up some of that assertion: age and gravity do stretch the nasal tissues.

Plus, there’s one more common bugbear: many older people – particularly those with stronger smile muscles – have found the nasal tip dips close to the top lip when smiling.

Plus, any nasal surgeon can relate how a senior citizen’s skin becomes thicker in the lower half of the nose while the upper half of the nose develops thinner skin.

Another bothersome aspect occurs when irregularities that have always been present in the nose now show through the skin. As if that were not enough, the tip of the nose often becomes larger. Mother Nature must have a strange sense of humor.

Of course, not all people will experience the same thing in their Golden senior citizen years while others do in spades but but just won’t be concerned about looking for, or having a nose job.

But all is not without solutions!

Take that strong smile muscle. Cosmetic plastic surgeons often sever it in surgery. If breathing problems exist due to nasal obstruction from weakened internal cartilages, nasal airflow may be changed so functional nose surgery can be done.

If a nasal hump exists, it can be gently filed down.

Long story short: Nasal surgeons bring a little more facial balance to an older person by shortening the age-related elongated nose.