A man was left feeling embarrassed after he ignored a ‘no sex’ rule after he underwent a hair transplant, only to quickly regret his actions when his face swelled up
If a doctor gives you medical advice, you should probably take it. One hair transplant recipient learned this the hard way – after ignoring his specialist and paying the price for it.
Ruben Owen woke up to his head looking like “a balloon” after his hair transplant in Turkey. It was all because he’d ignored the ‘no sex’ rule, which caused his face to swell up so much he looked like he’d been “stung by 100 bees”. The social media influencer, from Abersoch, Wales, has since issued advice to anyone else planning to get the procedure done.
The 24-year-old was offered a hair transplant to rejuvenate his lost locks. He was warned after the procedure that he shouldn’t engage in any high-intensity activities so he wouldn’t sweat. This included no sunbathing, exercising, or sex for two weeks.
However, he ignored the recommendation and regretted it. After initially worrying that he may have an STI, he realised the facial puffing was due to the hair transplant he’d just undertaken.
Online advice warns that increased heart rate and blood pressure can reopen healing incisions, and sweating can irritate the transplant area and increase the risk of infection.
It took Ruben’s face a week for the swelling to go down. He said: “I wake up and my head’s blown up like a balloon – Face puffed, scalp tight, and it looked like I’d been stung by 100 bees.
“No joke, I thought I’d caught something. I was actually googling STI symptoms and panicking. Turns out it was just my own fault for going too hard too soon – definitely learned my lesson the weird way.
“The left-hand side was bigger than anything to the point it didn’t even look like I had been punched – it genuinely looked like my face was going to explode.”
Ruben flew to Turkey in November 2022 at the age of 22 to undertake the popular hair treatment.
He had concerns about his hairline and was offered the procedure for free in return for a modelling session for the clinic. In total he spent £800 for the flights to and from Turkey and returned to Wales the day after the procedure was done.
Hair transplant surgeons generally recommend abstaining from sexual activity for at least seven days post-procedure. But Ruben decided “not to listen” to his surgeons.
He said: “I was doing some modelling work for their social media, so I got the deal for a really good price. It all went ok they went through the after care things of what you are not meant to do.
“I didn’t quite listen about the sex part, and because of that, my face just went quite enormous,” he joked, sharing that he had sex the night of the procedure.
Ruben said: “I was told there was nothing to worry about too much and that it should go down, which it did eventually, because I was going to go to A&E. I looked like something out of a film – it was something else.”
The social media influencer said to have learnt the lesson “the hard way,” but it is now his motivation for laughing with his friends.
He said: “It is one of those stories that still gets brought up, and to me it is too good not to share. This is one of them things that I look back on now and it was really stupid I hadn’t listened but it was really funny.”