Ripples, feeling cold and phantom pain..... normal?

plantchild

Hello ladies, I am sure some of this has been covered in previous posts but I am not having much luck finding it in various threads.

I had my exchange surgery 22 days ago. All went well not one ounce of pain (probably because I am numb all over my chest still). No pain meds taken. There are things that I am noticing and wonder if normal. I got high profile silcone implants above pectoral. 450 cc each

1. Implants are cold....when I exercise outside or even when I wake up in the morning the are cold to the touch.... it is very weird ....is this normal?

2. I have a LOT of ripples on both sides of my chest especially when I bend over the entire half circle of the top of the implant.... even with a bra. Maybe this is normal....maybe this is how it will be. I see my PS tomorrow and want to know how to deal with this. My husband said who is looking at them anyway beside me and I don't care what they look like I am just happy you are alive.....but without a bra on or like I said when I bend over they don't look good......IDK what to think......but maybe....this is normal?????? and if not how can it be corrected? And I hate to complain I know I am lucky.....

3. Been having phantom pain in the area....like I said I am numb but feel like I have shooting pain in the area now and then, I also feel like the implants are tight (not as bad as the TE where I felt like I had an under wire bra on) but kinda engourged (like when I used to breast feed).....again so weird and maybe this is normal.....

Thank you in advance for any insight you may have!

Moderators

Hi plantchild, and thanks for posting!

We don't have any insight on #'s 1 or 2, but we do have some good content from the main Breastcancer.org site on Phantom Breast Pain. We hope this helps and you get some answers soon!

--The Mods

plantchild

Thank you!

macb04

Hi plantchild, I created a thread about over Pectoral Implant Reconstruction (Prepectoral Implant Reconstruction). Women who have done the same reconstruction method as you have rrecently talked about the same issue of noticing a cold sensation with their breasts. It got better for many of them after Fat Grafting over their entire breast area.

Numbness often persists for most of us after the huge trauma we have had done to us. Stop by the site and say hello. Ask questions. Also, would you like to give me your PS's name for the list of docs doing Prepectoral Implant Reconstruction?

Topic: TE/Implant OVER pectoral Can exercise, comfortable &NO RIPPLES!

Forum: Breast Reconstruction — Is it right for you? Discuss timing and various procedures and techniques.

NotVeryBrave

Yep - cold is unfortunately normal. With very little covering the implants, they tend to feel kind of cold.

Rippling is also common for the same reason. Gravity pulls the silicone down inside the implant and leaves a wrinkled appearance at the top.

Sensation is weird. I have full feeling around the edges but none in the center of each breast or the nipples. I can feel pressure and sometimes get shooting or burning types of pain. My understanding is that it's from the nerves that were cut.

Apparently fat grafting helps both with the temperature difference and the smoothness of the contour. Who knows about sensation!

plantchild

Thank you to ladies for taking the time to respoind! I talked with my PS last week and he too thought that the rippling was excessive. He doesn't want to

try anything (he mentioned a different implant) for 6 months so not to risk opening up and infection. I asked him about the fat grafting and I don't think he has a ton of experience in this area and he thinks I don't have enough fat (which I totally disagree on I do) to use. Macb04 I will check your threads now. I think finding more info on the fat grafting to give to my ps for him to try is a good way to go I don't think changing the implant will make a difference. I will give my PS info on there too. Thanks again!