In The Life Of: Dr Galyna Selezneva

In The Life of Dr Galyna Selezneva This month, Aesthetics met up with a practitioner renowned for her body sculpting treatments and experienced an insight into her daily life

How I spend my morning… I like to keep my morning routine simple and easy, so that I can stay relaxed. I wake up after pressing the snooze button about fourteen times; I never ever wake up to my alarm! Eventually, when I do manage to get up, the first thing I do is go and find my dog – a pomsky. My husband and I like to shower the dog with lots of love and kisses in the morning. Then I stretch, I dry brush, I shower and I drink water. Hydration is key to a healthy life and body, so I make sure that I drink at least half a litre, but it has to be lukewarm because that way it hits the gut better. I skip all the complicated morning routines when it comes to skincare – I like to keep it basic and just focus on exfoliation and hydration.

A typical working day for me involves… I usually start at 8:30am and finish at 8:30pm. In regards to how many patients I would see within that time, I couldn’t tell you. I have what I like to call ‘clinical flexibility’ – I don’t know if that exists as a term, but it means I could see between four and 20 patients a day. That’s because I mostly work with devices. If patients want a treatment such as CoolSculpting, they will need three to six treatments in different areas, which I would often do over several sessions. But, if they are only in London for a day, they might want to get them all done within those 24 hours. I won’t do treatments back to back with one patient, but I will do two separate treatments with a break in the middle – normally after the first procedure I send them off to Harrods for a few hours. So, if that was the case, I’d see hardly any patients that day. On the other hand, some of my treatments only last for 15 minutes and then I’m able to see many more people. I also used to work two or three weekends a month, but I didn’t mind that because I enjoyed it. I try to work a bit less now though, only one Saturday a month. At the end of each working day, I have my half-hour drive home and that’s How I got into aesthetics… My career properly began one day when I was getting a treatment at Dr Rakus’ clinic. I was so in awe of her and what she did that I asked her if she would mentor me and let me shadow her. Luckily she agreed, and I’ve been working in her clinic ever since!

My most popular treatment… I’ve been nicknamed ‘the body’ because my main focus is on body contouring, although I do face treatments too. I was the first UK practitioner to have studied at the CoolSculpting university in California, and that’s still the technology I use the most – although we have lots of different machines at the clinic.

when I talk to my mother. I tell her everything that’s happened in my day and we’ll plan the day ahead. My mother is a big part of my life, I’m such a mummy’s girl. How I unwind after work… I don’t say this in a cheesy way, but when you love what you do, you don’t work a day in your life. Every single one of my patients has my number, and they all message or email me. So, I don’t know if I ever completely unwind as there’s always a part of me switched on, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. I wouldn’t want my doctor, if I needed them at 10pm for some reason, to not be able to reply to me. In my spare time, I watch a lot of TV; a lot of Netflix. I used to be a psychiatrist, I love anything to do with psychopaths, serial killers and paranoia, so I watch documentaries and series in that genre. That’s my guilty pleasure. I also collect comic books and graphic novels – I’m a massive sci-fi fan and I could watch a lot of Star Wars.

The most defining day in my career was…

When I first started in aesthetics,

I went on a trip to LA to train with plastic surgeon Dr Grant Stevens, who was considered the number one in the world for body sculpting. While I was there, Dr Raj Kanodia had also agreed to train me and let me watch his procedures and consultations.

So I would spend the mornings with

Dr Stevens and then the afternoons shadowing Dr Raj Kanodia, with a lunch break in between, somewhere nice in Beverley Hills. One evening,

Dr Kanodia took me out to show me around LA, and we went to the restaurant Nobu in Malibu, and sat on the sea line. As I was sat there, eating sushi, I could feel the wind in my face and the sea salt on my lips and I thought, ‘damn, my life is great’.

I couldn’t believe that I was in LA being trained by the best people in the business. I was so humbled. That was a very beautiful and defining moment for me. Of course, I also have to say that every day I work with Dr Rita Rakus at her clinic in Knightsbridge defines my career. She inspires me every single day and I really have to thank her for everything she’s done for me.