Growing up as identical twins in the New Jersey suburbs, Erica Hyman and Nancy Marciniak did everything together. From playing the same sports to wearing the same prom dress (Hyman found it first; Marciniak got it in another color) to even dating brothers in high school, the sisters experienced life in lockstep. Decades later, and they’re still very much in sync. Now 61, the twins live just two houses apart in a private Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., development. (Their homes are nearly identical, down to the picturesque backyard pools and views of a sprawling golf course.) So when Hyman, whose daughter Lizzie is a writer-reporter at PEOPLE, decided she wanted to address the signs of aging that had started to bother her with plastic surgery, she knew who to call first: her twin. “I just wasn’t happy with what I saw in the mirror,” says Hyman. “I wasn’t trying to look different — just fresher. Like me, but a bit younger.” Call it twintuition, but Marciniak didn’t need convincing. “For me, it was the iPhone,” she laughs. “You look down at your phone and suddenly you’re like, ‘Where did all those wrinkles come from?’ They multiply.” The sisters turned to Dr. Jacob D. Steiger, a Boca Raton-based facial plastic surgeon known for his natural-looking results — and deep plane facelift expertise. “The deep plane facelift is a more advanced technique rising in popularity,” Dr. Steiger tells PEOPLE. “Rather than just stretching the skin or muscle, we’re releasing and restoring the retaining ligaments of the face — which are what really sag with age. The result is a lift that looks natural, lasts longer, and doesn’t have that pulled or ‘done’ appearance.” The procedure isn’t cheap. Each sister paid $57,000 for a package that included a deep plane facelift (the cost at Dr. Steiger’s practice is $50,000 depending on add-ons), brow lift, lower blepharoplasty (to address the appearance of aging undereye skin), CO2 laser resurfacing (a cosmetic procedure that uses a carbon dioxide laser to remove damaged skin layers, stimulating collagen), and a small fat transfer from the thigh to fill hollow under-eyes. “When you have identical twins, the structure of their ligaments and their bones is similar,” says Dr. Steiger. “But because of environmental factors, they are not exact copies. They are more a rhyme of each other.” All About Transparency For Hyman and Marciniak, the facelift decision wasn’t about hiding anything. In fact, they told everyone. “One of our friends joked that we should hang a banner outside our houses because the whole community knew we were doing it,” Marciniak says. “But Erica and I, we’re not ashamed of it at all.” They even found humor in the whole process — from being offered chin implants (“I still don’t know what a weak chin is,” Hyman quips) to the coffee-deprivation challenge of surgery day. “Nancy went first because she found the doctor,” Hyman says. “But the hardest part for me was waiting all day for my turn without food or coffee. I wasn’t nervous — I just wanted it over so I could have my coffee!” The sisters had a nurse for the first few days, but recovery wasn’t exactly smooth sailing. Two weeks post-op, Marciniak’s husband — who had been caring for them — came down with COVID. “We grabbed our pillows, pills and ointments and trudged down the street at 6 a.m. to Erica’s house like fugitives,” Marciniak recalls. “We thought we dodged it. Four days later, we both had sore throats. Sure enough, we got it.” The illness delayed their healing and "was a bear,” according to the pair. “We were doing great, and then everything slowed down. It really set us back,” Hyman shares. The hardest part, they say, was how long it took to feel “normal” again. “I didn’t realize how major a surgery it really is,” Hyman says. “You’re healing for three full months. I wish someone had told me that upfront.” Adds Marciniak: “I was surprised by the numbness that can linger. And no activity for six weeks. We’re both active [golf, pickleball and power walking are just a few of their favorite activities], and that was tough. But the silver lining was all the shows we caught up on.” More than anything, they say, the experience brought the high-achieving, and at times very competitive duo closer than they’d been in decades. “We lived together for the first time in almost 40 years,” says Marciniak. “Every second for four weeks. It was like being little again — we didn’t need anyone else.” They laughed, watched TV, compared swelling, and powered through the discomfort together. “It was therapy,” says Hyman, who notes it also helped heal tension in their relationship stemming from her sister’s move next door. “Not just for our faces, but for us.” Why Facelifts Are Trending If you feel like plastic surgery procedures are filling your feeds more than ever, that's because they are. New techniques and social media awareness have given facelifts a lift in buzz lately. The average age for first-time facelifts used to be around 65, but Dr. Steiger says now most of his patients are in their 40s and 50s. "We use this term pre-juvenation, meaning rejuvenation before aging really takes on.” He adds that more people are looking at it as a form of self-care: “Plastic surgery today is a luxury good—like buying a car or a handbag. People see it as an investment in themselves, and it’s becoming more common, especially as the stigma fades.” Dr. Steiger says over the 20 years he's been in practice, the conversation around plastic surgery has become way less taboo. "In 2007, when I started practicing in Boca Raton, patients would ask me, 'Well, what am I going to tell my friends? What's my excuse?' I don't hear that at all anymore. It's almost like in Brazil, where people are very open about their procedures, and wear them like a badge of honor. I don't know if we're totally there for badge of honor just yet, but I definitely see that people are proud of it." Now, most of Dr. Steiger's business comes from "word-of-mouth" referrals. "I tell patients to not be disappointed if people don't say, 'You got a facelift,' because I would consider that shame on me if they could recognize the work. For me, I feel very honored when people tell me, 'Everybody says I look good, but they don't know why.' That means I did a good job." Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. A Stronger Bond While the twins supported each other fully, their families had more complicated feelings. “My husband didn’t want me to do it,” Hyman says. “He took a photo before surgery and said, ‘This is the woman I married.’ When I came back, he could only look at me sideways. He was that upset.” Even now, they don’t discuss it. “He told me, ‘Don’t ask me how you look.’ But I think he’s fine with it now.” Her daughters, Lizzie, 26, and Julia, 28, were more accepting. “I just hope they never feel they need to do this to be beautiful. They’re already perfect.” Marciniak, meanwhile, had full support from her daughter and husband — who told her she looked beautiful even when she felt like “a monster.” “My son doesn’t want to talk about it. And our 93-year-old father, who doesn’t believe in plastic surgery, we basically didn’t tell him.” Now three months out, both women are healing well and say they’re thrilled with their results. “We didn’t want to look different. We didn’t want to be pulled or ironed. We just wanted to look like ourselves,” says Hyman. But the sisters say they’re not rushing back for a touchup anytime soon. “One and done,” Marciniak says laughing.”The drudgery of recovery is still fresh.”