Hope you are healing well. The drain removal was quick and painless. Everything is numb there now. I like to take an inquisitive approach to things so I asked the doctor to show them to me after she had removed them. Trust me the drain removal is no big deal. I can’t even remember if I had staples. I must have had something but that event was non eventful too. The only major pain I had was from the pectoral muscles having the expanders place beneath them and get too large of a fill. They’ve made big improvement in that regard in the past few years. At this point you won’t have to deal with that.

Dlittkemann- Hi there, I was in a different situation, as I had a UMX with direct to implant. Even with that I slept with what I now call my pillow fort. So many pillows to get comfortable!! Sleeping on and incline with a wedge pillow and many more to prop up my arm helped. I was a bit nervous to get my drain out, but it was painless, I think she just had a couple of sutures to snip before pulling it out. but I couldn't see that part. I would say stay up on a consistent routine with pain meds, my worse pain was day 1 and day 3. I had a pain block that wore off on day 3 and had some painful muscle spasms. The Valium they gave me for the muscle spasms really helped and allowed me to sleep better as well. I was trying to not take many pain meds, and that was a big mistake. It is easier to manage your pain before it gets out of control rather than playing catch up. and keep in mind the narcotics along with recent anesthesia will slow your bowels down so keep up with any instructions your doctor gave you in that regard. Did they give you exercises to do? as odd as it seems those ended up helping me.

Hi dlittkemann,

I had a bilateral mastectomy with reconstruction in Sept 2017. I came home with 4 drains. I really didn't have any pain when the drains came out. Farmerlucy is right. You are so numb there you barely feel a thing. I didn't have staples, I had stitches. But I really didn't feel them being removed. Maybe just a pinch or a tug when she was trying to pull them out. Nothing that was too uncomfortable.

Not a problem! And don't be surprised if your drains come out at different times. I had the top 2 drains come out first, then a week later the bottom 2 came out. So don't be alarmed if all 4 don't come out at once. It all depends on the amount of fluid output per drain.