May 2016 Surgeries

the smooth bra under the sports bra has worked wonders!!!!'

Sending best wishes to all of my May sisters as we try to solve these new mysteries brought on by our changes. Love reading the updates and the helpful hints!

I'm wrapping up 13 days of hospital living in June, from two separate stays. Hoping to go home this evening.....I'm ready! My body is feeling pretty beat up after multiple surgeries and so many days of being poked and prodded. The thing I've missed the most is sleep - so I plan to savor my first night back in my own bed with my comforts of home and no one waking me to change a dressing or empty a drain! Can't wait to get home to my kiddos, and even the dog, too.

Speaking of drains, I did finally get my original left drain out - 37 days after my BMX surgery....hurray!

Toystory - 37 days with one drain! Yeeeesh. You've had a real time of it, and I'm glad to hear you're going home.

Re: bras during recon - my PS goes for compression garment for the first week or two, and then tight sports bras after, 24/7. So that's what I wear. I found 3 different styles of front-close sports bras before surgery and tried them on in-store, buying what fit then, because I don't plan on going up in size any. So I'm just wearing, washing, wearing 24/7 as the weeks go by. Kind of limits the clothing - the straps show and they're cut rather high in front, so they peek out of necklines if I don't wear a top high enough. As long as the band fits, the "cups" of the bra will stretch as the TE fills expand.

Watch out though - one my TE is lower than the other and lower than my natural breast was (this has become more and more obvious as fills increase the TE size) so it pulls (more and more each week) unevenly on the sports bra. Which is to say I had to toss out one of my sports bras because the non-adjustable straps are too short now! I hope the squishies end up even and where they're supposed to be...lopsided is not a great look.

So that's my 2 cents. Make the band fit and watch the strap length if you need tight compression/support during recon.

Thanks ToyStory. I'm currently battling an infection on top of feeling really discouraged about the damage to my hand/arm nerve, and you know, being disabled for life because of their carelessness, so I'm pretty glum right now. But I am happy to hear that maybe there's a light at the end of your tunnel. I still can't get over that you had a drain for 37 days as everything else was going along. That seems like a huge infection risk, and I don't know how you managed it.

For those of us with lopsided Te's. My PS says not to worry. During exchange, he will adjust the implant positions to obtain symmetry. The PA described that my PS will sit me up during surgery to see how the new girls hang and rest. Then they make any necessary adjustments to get things even. As the implants settle, additional adjustments may be necessary. So I am forewarned and prepared to undergo iterations of surgical adjustment if necessary.

Ask your PS to explain how they will fix a currently mismatched position. Please share what they have to say if you are willing. I'm so curious about how this process works and how other surgeons perform their procedures.

LRGO - Yes, they sit you up in the process of exchange and see how things hang/look/if the size looks right. I already discussed that with my PS because I find that being treated like a rag doll in surgery really adds to the degradation of all this.

Given the disabling damage they have caused me, I am not willing to undergo more surgery than this exchange unless there's an exceedingly above-all good reason, because they've proved themselves careless and incompetent at patient protection. So they better get this right the first time. If these TE were permanent and didn't look so funky, I'd quit right now just to save myself the risk of them disabling me further with their carelessness and ineptitude.

SpecialK - I just want to add there is an alternative to being able to write out the sitting-up part in the consent form: you can voice how much you don't want that part, and would like to veto it, and the surgeon can refuse to do the surgery in any other way. Like mine has said.

They don't *have* to agree - they can refuse to do the surgery at all.

Hello All

Finished my first week of rads. Skin is good, but I am using aloe gel and aquaphor as directed. Hopefully it all will past quickly. Still having finger issues, have appt with lymphedema specialist, but MO thinks it's neuropathy.

Valstim52, glad you're skin is doing OK during rads. I never had any problems - slight redness, no worse than a mild sunburn. Fingers crossed it will stay that way for you as well!

A question:

One month after the BMX I still have fluid in the right side, the drains went out right after the op. They've emptied it once but now they say let the body absorb it. I don't see any difference. Will it ever go away by itself? What is your experience with something like that?

Thank you

I'm sensing a theme in our recent posts - it's been long enough since our surgeries that we're all ready for a little more "normal" to return to our lives. We're ready to have our exercise routines back, our clothing fit us comfortably, our hands and feet to stop feeling pain, our drains to come out and our swelling to go down, our sleep routines to get back on track, our outcomes to become more predictable. "Normal" sounds so good. Cheers to us as we keep pushing our way toward some version of "normal"!

I had my first follow-up appointment with the PS since my most recent hospitalization. Everything was looking better. One of my right side drains was removed, so I'm down to one last drain on my right side. It actually felt quite uncomfortable coming out - I wasn't expecting that - as the others have been a non-issue. The final drain is scheduled to come out next week (at the 8-week mark)...I'll be so ready! Then fills should start the following week....finally! Of course, this whole game plan was a 'deja vu' of my PS appt the day before my infection roared again earlier this month, so I treat it with guarded optimism. But I'm motivated by the dream of getting back to "normal". I did jokingly warn my PS, who is headed on vacation for 2 weeks, that holidays seem to be my triggers - I was first readmitted over Memorial Day weekend, then I had another surgery on Father's Day.... I'm already starting to fear the 4th....

it's the weirdest thing to be recovering from surgery and have people ask how your going and your looking well. I don't feel sick but am so dreading the next few weeks when the cure is going to make me sick. I have my first oncology visit on 5 July and can't wait to start to catch any escapee cells.

I am struggling with being lop sided and wish I had had both boobs off but that wasn't to be. Later down the track will check out options.

I hear you. I miss "normal" severely. Been fighting for one month now to get into OT and FINALLY today the drs office put in the paperwork to get it approved - nearly 8 weeks after surgery/injury.

If I have to hear the pollyanna-ish "well you'll find a new normal" one more time - I know it'll be a new normal, I'm missing body parts now! But then everything else, complications, and this infection I've had for five weeks now that isn't responding to antibiotics...ugh. I am so tired of pain and pills and trips to the hospital.

Normal was so much better than this.

Good luck to you Toystory & Raven & Helen. We just keep going, don't we?

Moreshoes - you know what, that's kind of funny, that they actually stuck a note in your file about that. I needed something to smile about today. Thank you.