Building a Better Boob

Today I had my pre-op consult with my plastic surgeon (Tabouli McSteamy, you may remember from a blog entry almost 2 years ago).  Yikes, it's been a long time.  Anyway, we are about to complete what I hope to be the last stage of reconstruction - nipple reconstruction.  At this point, it kind of seems a little too much to write about in a public forum to my family and friends, but why stop now?

Before the bilateral mastectomy, my oncological surgeon recommended that he remove both nipples as well as the breast tissue.  The nipples are a part of the breast where cancer can grow, so they are oftentimes removed during a mastectomy.  It was pretty much a sure thing with the side that had cancer, but I thought for the sake of symmetry (and to prevent recurrence, of course) I would be okay with removing the right one, too.

Several months after my tissue expander exchange I was mostly happy with the shape and feel of the new boobs, but there was definitely something missing.  Well, two somethings.  I thought I would be okay with getting nipples tattooed on, but the incision was slightly dog-eared and getting that fixed would require another surgery anyway.  I decided pretty early on that I wanted to have nipple reconstruction, too. 

The radiation on my left side has definitely left my left breast feeling different.  The tissue is not as soft, and it's slightly redder.  If it hadn't been radiated, my surgeon could have created a nipple using my existing skin.  Instead, he'll take some skin from my inner thigh to prevent problems with wound healing.  I've had a hard time finding details on how this is done, but here is a medical journal article with some pretty good pictures taken during the surgery.  You'll want to scroll down to the "Technique" section and click on the "Figure" links to see how it works.  Interesting stuff, but I'm glad I'll be asleep during the procedure.

The surgery is scheduled for Monday, January 11th, and it's expected to last about an hour.  I'll go home with bandages that I can't remove until my post-op appointment on the following Monday.  That means no showering for a week.  Yeah!  I'll have some discomfort at the donor site, but I hope to return to work on the Wednesday after my post-op appointment.  It's supposedly a much less intense surgery than the tissue expander exchange (and certainly a lot easier than the mastectomy), but I think the skin graft thing makes the healing process a lot more fragile.


I'm pretty excited about the whole thing, but work has been kind of crazy so I'm not looking forward to losing all that time and then coming back afterward.

I believe you may be treated to a blog from at least one guest blogger on that day, but I may check in before then when I know the time of my surgery (to be determined on Friday).  Thanks for reading!