Recovery guides describe a standard path. This page starts with that path and then marks where a real schedule or an existing health condition pushes against it.
What the first days look like on paper
The American Society of Plastic Surgeons notes that following completion of a facelift, a bandage might be placed around your face to minimize swelling and bruising, and that small tubes may be present to draw off any excess blood or fluid.
That is the published starting point. The same society walks through each step of the facelift procedure, which makes the recovery description easier to place.
Where a standard schedule stops holding
A recovery guide assumes you can rest on the timetable it describes. That assumption fails if you care for someone, travel for work, or manage a health condition your surgeon has not yet heard about.
None of those situations appears in the bandage and tube description. They are the ones to name early, because a plan built around uninterrupted rest does not stretch easily.
A second source for comparison
MedlinePlus publishes an encyclopedia entry on facelift surgery. Read it next to the society's pages and notice what each source chooses to emphasize.
What the published description leaves to your surgeon
Neither the bandage description nor the tube description tells you how long either stays in place. They also do not say what your own recovery will look like. Those details are left to your surgeon and depend on your operation.
This is the compromise a simple guide hides. The general rule gives you a shape, and your surgeon fills in the dates.
What to raise before you book
Start with candidacy, since it shapes everything after it. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons keeps a separate page on facelift candidates that is worth reading first.
Then list the commitments you cannot move in the weeks after surgery. Bring that list to the consultation and ask how the recovery plan would adjust around it.
Stanford Health Care also describes facelift as a facial surgery in its own terms. Comparing it with the sources above shows where descriptions differ, and those differences make good questions for the consultation.