The Confident Choice Podcast Season 2, Episode 6 | Dr. Roberto Garcia with Catherine Turner

Mini Facelift, Major Confidence: Restoring Spark at Any Age

Episode Overview

Dr. Roberto Garcia welcomes longtime patient and friend Catherine for a candid conversation about aging, confidence, faith, and the power of a positive outlook. Catherine recalls her first mini facelift consultation and reflects on family, resilience, service, and the lessons passed down through generations. Their conversation explores how feeling refreshed on the outside can complement a purposeful, fulfilling life.

Transcript

Dr. Roberto Garcia: You're listening to the Confident Choice podcast with me, Dr. Roberto Garcia, a double board-certified facial plastic and reconstructive surgeon. Honest conversations and expert advice about the decisions that make you feel your best. All right, welcome everybody to season 2, episode 6 of The Confident Choice., I'm your host, Dr. Roberto Garcia and today I have a very, very special guest. Are you looking at my socks? You know what they are, right? It's the Ascension.

Catherine: I know. I'm very impressed.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Thank you. Sock religious throwing a little knockout for Sock Religious. You know, Vivian gets them at that blue mantle place.

Catherine: I know. Yeah. Right on St Augustine. It's great.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. So, you're not going to see my socks today, but you are going to get to meet one of the most classy, beautiful women I have come across. And um as she sticks her tongue out at me, everyone, you believe that? I I get that. But I have known you since

Catherine: um I think it's 18 years I've known you. Well, I'll tell you what. Your daughter was 3 weeks old.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: She was 3 weeks old!

Catherine: when I met your family, when I met you, it was at least a year before that.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. So, we met then? no, no, no, no, no, no. We met in 2008. because you heard about our practice through Lifestyle Lift.

Catherine: That's exactly right.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: And we started that in 2008.

Catherine: And we were in Minneapolis when I heard it on the TV.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yep. So, walk us through how all that happened.

Catherine: that's an easy one, actually. My son was born when I was 41 and my husband was 50. So, it was perfect. It was beautiful. We were a little smarter, a little easier, you know, raising a child. Except when he got to school and I met all the moms and dads, they were at least 10 years our junior, 20 years my husband's junior. Great stuff. There was nothing bad about that. And I think we both look pretty young for our age. But there was a time when I was about 54, I guess 53 or 54, and the light hit me and it made me think of that Maggie May song. You know, when the light hits your face, it really shows your age. It sort of did. And I wasn't sad or anything. It just was a little I guess the word would be um shocking, you know, a little bit like whoa, you know, I'm looking like my mom. Not a bad thing. My mother I thought was beautiful. But I said, what can I do about it? And I mentioned it to my husband. He was like, you're not going to do anything about it, you know. And I said, okay, whatever. I saw a commercial and it was a lifestyle lift, not a facelift, just a a little bit. And I thought, maybe I could do that. He was watching it with me and he said, "Well, what is that all about?" So I go, "Yeah, I got him. I guess I got him to listen." So I called for Florida. I wanted to know when we were down here where I could go

Dr. Roberto Garcia: because you guys had a that place in Amelia Island, right?

Catherine: And yes, we still have a home there now. We ended up moving there, but I got you and I said, "Let me go and meet him and see what he says." And you came up behind me when I had the consultation. And I kept pulling my face up, pulling it back, and it looked awful. It just looked all so, you know what I mean? That kind of hard to explain. But you came behind me and you did this gentle pull and I went, "Oh my gosh, that's it. That's what I want.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah.

Catherine: So, you took it from there. And he said, you said to me, you just want to look fresh.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah.

Catherine: You don't want to look really younger necessarily, just not tired. And that's what you did. I got to tell you, I don't regret it a day. And I still think I look 10 years my junior

Dr. Roberto Garcia: for sure.

Catherine: But I want to keep going. And I'll tell you why. I lost weight.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: But you do all the right things. Sorry to interrupt you.

Catherine: No, no,

Dr. Roberto Garcia: you do all the right things to maintain yourself, right? You take care of yourself. You live life very moderate.

Catherine: Yeah.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: you just are the model patient for maintaining a certain very elegant look. And you've always done that. In 20 years practically we've known each other.

Catherine: Yeah. I think the nuns started that with posture and all of those things and our family. It was important. There's nothing wrong with being feminine.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: No,

Catherine: I was told.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: No. And it's not it's not that you you know, and this is kind of a a a struggle that I've had in my career is, okay, I'm not a particularly vain person, but I like to look good.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: I don't think it's a sin to have vanity. And even though you might find some of devout people in our faith that say, "Oh, well, I'm not vain." Well, hold on a second. You put on lipstick, don't you? You put on clothing. That's some level of vanity.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: And so it it's the conversation of if I feel better about myself, how much good can I then do for others, right? And you do so much for the community that it spills over.

Catherine: I think if you um if you feel good, you are good. My husband's, you know, the military man and him, he's 80 years old going on. Still fits in his Air Force uniform.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Man, he looks so good.

Catherine: I mean, he's incredible. his whole thing is look sharp, act sharp, be sharp. And it is the truth. If you're the most dressed in the room, you're going to have an air that's okay, a presence or something. If you are the most dressed in a room for an interview, you'll be noticed first

Dr. Roberto Garcia: for sure.

Catherine: You know, you don't get a second chance for that first impression. So, the face thing with me was more about just people no longer saying to me, are you tired? Is everything okay? Do you feel all right? And I felt great, you know, but I just had that little hang dog look, I think. And you took that away without making me look. People would go, "You look so good. Have you been away or what? What did you do? You cut your hair. What'd you do?"

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah.

Catherine: I told them because I think it's so cool what you did. I didn't hide it. I never said to anyone, "Oh, I'd never get a facelift or I didn't do that." I said it was a mini facelift at I said I was perfect in a few days.

Catherine: You know, it wasn't a big deal. and I'm friends with that doctor now. Why am I friends with that doctor? Because he treats the whole package, talks to you, who are you, what makes you the way you are. So by the time you were ready to do my face, how many days later, you knew where I was coming from and why? And my husband thought it was the greatest thing ever. He did.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: You know, my dad and and we're going to get into later on at the end of every podcast, I I do kind of an homage to my dad. different lessons. Yeah, it's awesome.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: But one of he was a physician, he was an internist, you know that. But one of the things he always told me was develop a practice where your patients become your friends. Because if they become your friends, you have a different affinity, a different love for them that you now become a….you're caring for them. They they become part of your family. And and and and you know what? You were probably the first patient that I that I really gained that affinity for because I was young,

Dr. Roberto Garcia: you know, third year of practice, I think, maybe. Yeah, third year. And I was still a kid. I didn't have any gray hair then. Okay. I had a full head of hair then. Lots of things have changed. But I really found that you taught me so much. You and your husband and your family and Spencer taught me so much about how it's supposed to be, right? How is that relationship supposed to be? And um you can't in this industry, you can't do good quality work unless you care so much for that person that you are committed to giving them the best version of yourself that day and and really every time you meet them, right?

Dr. Roberto Garcia: And so, you know, you have you have tackled that aging process at that perfect time. Right? So the question is, am I too old? Am I too young? Am I too skinny? Am I too fat? And the answer really comes down to I'm too tired of seeing a reflection that's that's bringing out negativity in me, right? in my in my self-talk, you know, and that's kind of something that you you alluded to, right?

Catherine: Yeah. I'm I am overly positive a person. I don't believe excuse the two negatives that you can't do anything. Do it. If you have I was just telling your daughter that I'm working on a project in North Carolina helping Father Baron build a Baroque style church. a Baroque style church from the 1600s in Highlands, North Carolina. And he said, "I just want to do this. It's" and he said, "I want a catechism in stone." I said, "You got me. I'll do whatever it takes to do it. We've raised over $16 million already. the church is more than halfway completed.

Catherine: People can't believe it. he can't believe it." And I said, "Father, the negativity that will stop things from being done. And if I may bring it back to my face with that, I said, I want to lose weight cuz I'm exhausted when I'm doing the work. I don't fit in any of my clothes. I want to shop in my closet again.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Mm-hmm.

Catherine: I've lost 20 pounds. I'm exercising. I'm back to doing it. And I said, "Now I want to do a little more to just make this cuz you I lost weight and I can't, you know, hold it." Ron said, "Do it if you want, but you don't need to do it." And I said, "Great. We'll talk another time." But I feel like a new person. And I know it's the positivity that brought me there.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah, for sure.

Catherine: There's no doubt in my mind. And you had that air when I met you. I can do this. You were. And I found out you had your faces foundation that you took care of children that had suffered awfully in in in terrible ways, be it a dog bite or an accident or whatever. And that was it. I said, "This is not a guy who's a doctor to just make money. This is a guy who wants to repair lives."

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah

Catherine: and that meant more to me than anything. So I said, "You can do whatever you want because this is easy."

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah.

Catherine: You know, no one's hurt here.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. And you know, look, it's it's I remember seeing remember Jim Lovell.

Catherine: Oh, yes, of course.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Okay. Apollo 13.

Catherine: Absolutely. My husband knows him.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: He does knows him personally.

Catherine: Yep. Absolutely.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Oh my gosh. Was he Air Force?

Catherine: Yes.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Anyway, he says he said one time to somebody says, you know, we only went to the moon because we decided to go, right? It wasn't like we got lucky or anything. We just said we're going to go. And you can thank John F. Kennedy, you know, who started the whole program. or really, it was more Eisenhower who kind of planted the seed, but John F. Kennedy really took it fresh. Yeah.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: And so they just decided to do it, you know, and this I had this really, really nice guy came to see me not long ago who had had a cancer on his cheek. And it was during Covid and they end up creating this huge hole in his cheek to remove it. They brought tissue down from his forehead and they reconstructed the defect and he needed to go in for additional surgeries. But then COVID happened. He got lost in the system and seven years later he came to see me and his eye was all the way down here and he's been walking around like that for seven years and he says, "I've gone to see a couple other people and everybody keeps telling me I need to go see you. I need to go see you. And he told me the other day, he says, you know, the reason I had my surgery, don't you? Is cuz you said, I can fix it.

Catherine: I can do it.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: I have an answer. You know, and I studied it for a while. I looked at it for a long time and ideas going through my head and then finally it get it comes to you and you say, I can do it. But if you doubt yourself, if you doubt your own skills, you will never be able to ascend to the next run, you know, and every run becomes a more challenging lift, right?

Dr. Roberto Garcia: And I I tell these young kids, nothing in the world is impossible. It might be improbable considering where you are today, but it's not impossible.

Catherine: It's it just shouldn't happen that way. It's only impossible if you keep putting things in front of yourself.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. you keep barrier stopping yourself

Catherine: And it's, you know, the whole thing to me too with the positive attitude like you're saying, can I do it? You know, you can do it. I don't believe you could do it if you didn't have your faith in your background.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Oh, absolutely.

Catherine: I you know, I think to me that is that is number one. Then I can love my family. Then I can help Father Baron. then I can help Father Eric do what he needs to do. I can't if I have nothing. You know, I I often think about people that are and of because of our age now, our dear friends and things. There's some of them that are sick and dying. They were negative when they were 12. You know, you see them negative now, but they were negative when they were kids.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah

Catherine: it just kept sticking with them. And my sister, you know, was two a year and a half older than I am now. When she died of ALS, she couldn't move. They put a big button under her hand, the nurses, and said, "If you need anything, she just couldn't do that. Couldn't. It was just sitting there."

Catherine: She had a heart. She was so positive. It blew me away. All she could move were her eyes. I said, "Do you want to pray the rosary?" And I would she would pray it. She had it written on the wall and we'd pray it together and all of a sudden, I'd look over and she had tears coming out of her eyes smiling with her eyes closed and I'm like, "Are you kidding?" You know? So when she left this world, I was good. I mean, I was sad that she was gone, but she was positive from the time she was a kid and she kept going with it. I think it makes you who you are. So you got it. And I'm I'm glad you were able to We were able to meet each other and now I'm in love with your family and all of them.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. So, you're like almost everybody who gets to go be first and then meets my family. They end up liking my family more than me.

Catherine: Well, it's easy.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: That's what happened with the Harmons. Okay. He told me, he goes, "I liked you when I first met you, but then I met your wife and I fell in love with your family."

Catherine: Yeah.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: And then the kids came along and screwed it up.

Catherine: I met your dad. Oh my gosh. I met him at Rocco's first communion, at the party at the house.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yes.

Catherine: And oh my gosh, he was a flirty. No, but what a sweetheart. What a what a wonderful human being. He was very happy and positive.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Well, you know, it's funny. So, and and I I usually have like this segment at the end, but I'm going to kind of segue into it because it's good about faith and believing in yourself and and your talents, the talents that God may have given you and exercising them. And he had this poster in his office at his main office, which is on Pearl Street in downtown. He had this poster. It was, you know, maybe an 8 and 1 half by 11 thing. and it said, "Don't worry." Okay? And then underneath it says, "The only thing you have to worry about is whether you are well or ill. If you're well, you don't have to worry about anything. But if you're ill, you only have to worry about whether you're going to get sick or get better. And if you get better, you don't have to worry about it. But if you get sick, you only have to worry about whether you're going to live or die. And if you live, you're fine. if you die, you only have to worry about whether you're going to heaven or hell. And he goes, "If you go to heaven, you're great. And if you go to hell, you're going to be you're going to be shaking hands with old friends, so you're not even going to have time to worry." And you know,

Catherine: I hope you have that poster.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: You know, I don't I don't think I do.

Catherine: Oh my gosh.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: I know. And I need to recreate it and put it up. But but the reason he had it, my father had he wasn't a religious person, but he was a very faithful person. And his faith drove his ability to not worry about the temporal things, right? The things of this earth. He always said, "If I can draw breath, I can fight another day.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: It doesn't matter what it is. If I can draw breath, the problem's not that big." And and I tell my kids, when you're young and you're faced with troubling things in your life, there is a test somewhere in that that's preparing you for something greater. And it is your job to fight through that test, find the solution, conquer it because you owe it to your older self. Your older 50, 60 year old version of you is dependent upon what how you are responding to that test in your teens and your 20s and your 30s. Right.

Catherine: Absolutely.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: And it's almost like when you're young, you're paying a ransom for that older version.

Catherine: Oh yeah.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Right. Absolutely. And we have in I think in today's day, kids have kind of lost sight of that. They think that if they're not throwing a no-hitter in life and it's not a perfect game, all the wheels come off. And and it's when you fail, it's when things go wrong. It's when you wake up in the morning, you say, "I don't know how I'm going to pay this electric bill." That's when you are building your leather.

Catherine: That's when you don't buy a latte.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Well,

Catherine: I'm joking.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: That's why you don't spend $6 on a latte.

Catherine: The truth is I was mentioning to the girls before I lost my dad when I was two weeks from turning 14. He died of lung cancer. I don't have to worry about it. Daddy smoked like four packs of cigarettes a day. He was a hard hardworking man. It's a long story how we got there, but a beautiful soul my dad was. But he was 53 and a half when he died. All of us had to pitch in with six kids. You know, mom was a stay-at-home mom.

Catherine: So, what do you do? What could I do? You know, what can you do at 14? I got a part-time job in a place called Great Eastern Mills and sold paint and hardware things and had a job. Made however much an hour I made. And I sold paintings on the street. That's why I vowed today I would never take another dime for a painting that I do. It will always be for charity or whatever because now I can afford it. But it taught me all of us how to be self-sufficient and how to give back. I mean, at 21, I look at you, you see, now you're older than that. When I was 21, I was unmarried, head of household. Just think about that. You know, put my brother through college. And I'm not saying pat me on the back. I'm just saying you did it. You did what you had to do.

Catherine: And it my mother said to me, "Please just don't lose sight of your future. I want you to be happy and keep going. I said, "Mom, this makes me happy. If I can make sure everybody's okay and that's my thing. I'm a maternal nurturer.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: That's your love language.

Catherine: That's my love. I have to care for people or things or whatever the problem is."

Catherine: so that happened and it made me who I am. it made my son who he is.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah

Catherine: we could have given Spencer anything when he was born. And you think having him late in life like that, he's beautiful little boy. You know, he's this gorgeous child and he's sweet and smart and you know, he walk in the store and he never asks for anything. And I thought, wow, it must be in the bloodstream. He's not asking for things and he worked hard to get everything he has to this day.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah

Catherine: he won't let me do anything for him in his business or dad. I love that.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Very proud. And that's something that came from you guys.

Catherine: You get that from what your dad gave it to you. Okay. And I'm sure Philip and Carmen, you know, you just you got that. And that's that's a gift that's beyond belief.

Catherine: On that, paralleling that, I I brought something, bought something, and brought it for the kids. Call your kids. I always will. And I want each one of them to read it. It's a book called We Were the Angels, the nurses from Bataan. from World War II

Catherine: and they were in a Japanese prison camp, all of them. It is so good. My husband's reading it right now. It's one of the most interesting books that teaches women not just how to be strong, but how to be a woman, how to be gentle when you need to be and not feel like you have to compete with anybody. Their biggest competition was finding food so they didn’t starve to death. And it's not a depressing book. It's a kicktail book. You read it and all you want to do is say if they can do that, boy, can I make it through this day.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Absolutely.

Catherine: And I think that that is what our young people are missing. And it's I I don't wish for them to have that life. Spencer's only known war since he was born. Practically one week after his kindergarten started, 911 happened.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: That's right.

Catherine: and I worked at the trade center for quite a long time. And to see that happen and you know his his answer was his daddy's a pilot. How could anybody be silly enough to fly into a big building like that? And I remember you're right. That's why we knew it wasn't an accident, right? But we have this wonderful generation of very smart, more faithfilled than kids have been in a long time.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yes, they are.

Catherine: the the vast majority, but they're lacking the knowledge of our history. And it isn't because of them not wanting it. They never got it. It didn't happen in school. The truth of things. I mean, one of the kids I went to school with, Alan Song, who's a doctor now in South Jersey. His mom and dad met at Auschwitz.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Wow.

Catherine: He was friends of they showed me the tattoos. They were 13 years old when they met each other. And they they vowed they would marry when they got out. And they said, "We're getting at like your dad said, you go to the next day. I'm not going to give up now. I'm going to the next day."

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. I'm not going to quit today.

Catherine: Right. Who just said that? I'm not going to quit today. Quit tomorrow.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah.

Catherine: The guy who shop in line, he just said the same thing.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah. We talked about that in one of our podcasts. That was one of the things my dad would say. He goes, "Just say to yourself, I'm not quitting today."

Catherine: Yeah. I'll quit tomorrow.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: When tomorrow comes, I'll hang it all up.

Catherine: Right. But not today.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: It doesn't happen, does it?

Catherine: It's very very important. And

Dr. Roberto Garcia: I will tell you that um the the the biggest travesty I find with parents nowadays is that they don't pass on the wisdom of the old folks in their life. Right? I don't feel that the old folks really take the time as much with their kids and their grandkids to pass on life's lessons.

Catherine: When we grew up, grandma, I had nana. I didn't have papa. He had passed away. He was a doctor. I had nana on dad's side and grandma and grandpa on my mom's side. We all lived within very short distance of each other because it was your family. I'd say I have 52 first cousins on my dad's side. First cousins, 38 on my mother's.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: You guys like that? and you complain about your nine cousins or whatever you are.

Catherine: Oh yeah. See, you know, Facebook now, it's the first time that I since Facebook now I don't even care about whether Facebook is popular or not. We our cousins we talk to each other now. We keep up with each other. So that's a sweet thing. But my point was families a were bigger. They dined together every Sunday.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah.

Catherine: At the Table. daddy would say, "How was your week? How would you I mean I remember when I was a little girl I asked him how come we had him and pointed to my baby brother cuz he was a pain just how come we had him and he answered me, can I say what he said?

Dr. Roberto Garcia: Yeah.

Catherine: I said how come we had him I was four and a half I bet and he said well Katie the reason we had him is because there's only two things to do on a rainy day and I hate the movies

Dr. Roberto Garcia: I love it

Catherine: my Irish daddy but it's so funny because I I didn't even know what he meant, but dad said it so good. You know, it was it was gospel, whatever he said. So, so

Dr. Roberto Garcia: so lesson to everybody. Eat with your family. Put the phones away. Learn about others in your family. Talk. Okay. Pray before meals. All right. My producer is telling me that we are about out of time. I wish I could talk to you for another Well, you're going over to You're coming over to my house today.

Catherine: Yes, I am

Dr. Roberto Garcia: We have plenty to talk about. So, everybody, this has been a great podcast. I really enjoyed you being here. It means a lot that you came. It really does.

Catherine: Thank you!

Dr. Roberto Garcia: she'll be around signing autographs afterwards for about what 10 minutes or so.

Catherine: 3 maybe

Dr. Roberto Garcia: I got the big tennis ball from the US Open, but I want you to sign.

Catherine: There you go.

Dr. Roberto Garcia: next week we are talking about eyelid surgery and we're going to get into some of the details of why that becomes a important kind of entry point for aging face. why it's one of the most common surgeries we do and the good, bad, and the ugly of it and things you should be asking your physician when you go for a consultation. And we will see you next week. And as always, remember that good decisions come from good information. Have a great week, everybody.