I felt like a car crash victim who hadn't seen her face for weeks. I was very curious to see what I would look like after the plastic surgeon took off the bandages at my post-surgery followup appointment. In my head, I knew that what it looked like would NOT be the final result. I've been reading about other people's experiences, and many say that it took months for the implants to take shape.
Still, I was underwhelmed.
As I told my dad, instead of "boobs" it looks like "bloobs" (half way between a blob and boobs). The bandages were tightly wrapped around my chest to limit swelling (versus putting in drains, thank goodness), but there was still a fair amount of swelling in my chest. I couldn't even wear my wedding ring for the first day or two because my entire body was a little bloated. There wasn't much definition, which doesn't seem to make much sense because there was plenty of mal-formed definiting with my tissue expanders, and the implants are the same size with even better shape.
Anyway, I decided to wait to blog because I didn't want to post anything so soon after my initial disappointing view. After a day, things have gotten much better. The swelling has gone down and the implants are taking shape. I know that it's going to get even better as time goes by.
Aside from that, I'm doing great. I stopped taking pain meds yesterday morning, and my whole body actually feels better than it did a week ago. I no longer have muscle pain in my upper back, and it feels like a weight has been lifted off of my chest. It's quite amazing how bad the expanders were, but I was so used to having them I didn't realize it.
All in all, I'm happy.
Showing posts with label expanders. Show all posts
Showing posts with label expanders. Show all posts
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Monday, March 30, 2009
Surgery today
Today I have surgery at about 11:45 AM to exchange my tissue expanders for permanent implants. I'm VERY READY.
Rusty will probably post an update from the hospital to let everyone know how it went. I can't wait!
Rusty will probably post an update from the hospital to let everyone know how it went. I can't wait!
Thursday, March 19, 2009
New Boobs!
Hi everyone. I thought now was a good time to give an update, because I have a date for my next surgery. I'm supposed to be working from home today (and I AM, I swear...) but we have contractors installing new windows and doors and I've been having to corral the kitties away from where they're working. Ever heard the phrase, "it's like herding kittens"? Yeah, that's what I'm doing today ;-)
So, anyway, I've been enduring my tissue expander fills for the last couple of months. Each one has been worse than the previous one. A lot of people have asked me how I'm doing, and how it feels. Ugh, it's far worse than any muscle pain I've ever felt. Surprisingly, the chest area doesn't hurt the worst - it's my back that's really been hurting (probably because my shoulders are hunched to ease the stretching in my pectoral muscles).
Just as a refresher... I have inflatable implants underneath my chest muscles, with a metal port under my skin at the top of my breast mound. Every 3 weeks or so, I go to the plastic surgeon to get them filled. He uses a weird magnet thing to locate the port and pokes a needle through it. Then he puts anywhere between 35 and 80 cc's of fluid in the implant, until I start to feel pressure. My boobs literally grow before our eyes :-)
It doesn't hurt right away. After a few hours I start to feel a burning in my back/shoulder area. Then it feels all knotted and twisted. I have to sleep in a reclined position for the first night or so because sleeping flat on my back really hurts. Ever since the last 2 fills, I've been uncomfortable pretty much 24/7. At night, my arm goes dead (not quite numb, but it feels heavy and hurting). So, I wake up every so often to change positions (but there are not really many positions I can tolerate!). During the day, it's very difficult to use my arms to prop myself up. It's not difficult lifting things, but for some reason the motion of pushing up with my arms is pretty difficult.
My right side seems to hurt the most. This is really strange, because that's the side that wasn't radiated. It might be because the muscle is softer and more flexible, so it seems that the implant has shifted a bit toward the armpit area. Seriously, I feel so broken :-(
So, anyway, you can see why I have been VERY anxious to get these things out of me. During my last fill, my plastic surgeon said that we could schedule the surgery soon. A week later (which was just this past Tuesday), I spoke to his secretary and she informed me that he had a cancellation, and he would be ready to do the surgery on March 30th!!
I have my pre-op testing tomorrow. My doctor informed us that this surgery should go a lot more easily than the last one. It should only take about 2 hours (versus the 6+ hours of the last one!) and best of all, I won't even have to stay overnight! Woohoo! Therefore, I think my chances of contracting C. Diff again are probably much less. I've also read that a lot of women actually feel better soon after surgery because the "turtle-shell" expanders are gone and replaced with soft implants.
This one is coming up a lot more quickly than I expected, but I'm really happy about it. I was thinking about this the other day and I realized that between my diagnosis, treatment, and first round of reconstruction, it's been just under a year! Wow.
Note that I say "first round of reconstruction". I'll post more on what I mean by that later. After my meeting with the plastic surgeon tomorrow, I'll have a better idea of what the different stages will look like. But the most important part is happening in less than 2 weeks!
So, anyway, I've been enduring my tissue expander fills for the last couple of months. Each one has been worse than the previous one. A lot of people have asked me how I'm doing, and how it feels. Ugh, it's far worse than any muscle pain I've ever felt. Surprisingly, the chest area doesn't hurt the worst - it's my back that's really been hurting (probably because my shoulders are hunched to ease the stretching in my pectoral muscles).
Just as a refresher... I have inflatable implants underneath my chest muscles, with a metal port under my skin at the top of my breast mound. Every 3 weeks or so, I go to the plastic surgeon to get them filled. He uses a weird magnet thing to locate the port and pokes a needle through it. Then he puts anywhere between 35 and 80 cc's of fluid in the implant, until I start to feel pressure. My boobs literally grow before our eyes :-)
It doesn't hurt right away. After a few hours I start to feel a burning in my back/shoulder area. Then it feels all knotted and twisted. I have to sleep in a reclined position for the first night or so because sleeping flat on my back really hurts. Ever since the last 2 fills, I've been uncomfortable pretty much 24/7. At night, my arm goes dead (not quite numb, but it feels heavy and hurting). So, I wake up every so often to change positions (but there are not really many positions I can tolerate!). During the day, it's very difficult to use my arms to prop myself up. It's not difficult lifting things, but for some reason the motion of pushing up with my arms is pretty difficult.
My right side seems to hurt the most. This is really strange, because that's the side that wasn't radiated. It might be because the muscle is softer and more flexible, so it seems that the implant has shifted a bit toward the armpit area. Seriously, I feel so broken :-(
So, anyway, you can see why I have been VERY anxious to get these things out of me. During my last fill, my plastic surgeon said that we could schedule the surgery soon. A week later (which was just this past Tuesday), I spoke to his secretary and she informed me that he had a cancellation, and he would be ready to do the surgery on March 30th!!
I have my pre-op testing tomorrow. My doctor informed us that this surgery should go a lot more easily than the last one. It should only take about 2 hours (versus the 6+ hours of the last one!) and best of all, I won't even have to stay overnight! Woohoo! Therefore, I think my chances of contracting C. Diff again are probably much less. I've also read that a lot of women actually feel better soon after surgery because the "turtle-shell" expanders are gone and replaced with soft implants.
This one is coming up a lot more quickly than I expected, but I'm really happy about it. I was thinking about this the other day and I realized that between my diagnosis, treatment, and first round of reconstruction, it's been just under a year! Wow.
Note that I say "first round of reconstruction". I'll post more on what I mean by that later. After my meeting with the plastic surgeon tomorrow, I'll have a better idea of what the different stages will look like. But the most important part is happening in less than 2 weeks!
Monday, September 29, 2008
Surprise!
I forgot to mention that today was my first appointment in over 6 months with my Radiation Oncologist, aka "The Zapper". They called me with the appointment about a month ago, so I kind of forgot about it, too. I was told that there would be four appointments before the first actual treatment, so I knew this would be more of a "meet and greet" session.
When we got there, I was reminded how much of a tedious process this is going to be. At this hospital, patients normally have to register every time they arrive. However, for radiation patients, you just register once at the beginning of each month. Luckily, the treatments are at a different campus of the hospital, which is approximately an 8 minute drive from my house (as opposed to the 10-12 minute drive to the other campus!). More importantly, it's directly on my way home from work. This is very convenient, since I'll need to be there 5 days a week for 6 and a half weeks.
So, anyway, we meet with The Zapper and she is very happy to see that I look a LOT better than she expected. She'd heard about an infection and more antibiotics (without realizing it was C-Diff, I believe)and was afraid that there would be infection at the expander site (but there is not). She also said she was impressed at how high I could lift my arms. We were SO happy to hear her say that. I want to make sure that I'm recovering well, and sometimes it's hard to get that kind of feedback.
One thing we weren't quite prepared for - she wants me to start right away. I didn't realize this, but they like to start radiation about 4 weeks after surgery. Well, this coming Wednesday is 3 weeks. Also, radiation involves "prep work" (which I'll describe later), and my body shape cannot drastically change in this time. This means that once the prep is done, we can no longer inflate the tissue expanders. Guess when she wanted to start prep work? Today! Those 4 preliminary appointments I talked about? Baloney. Or bologna.
I am very surprised that this is happening so soon, and I really wish we could have gotten that last fill in next week. When we talked to the plastic surgeon at our last appointment, we really thought we would be able to get at least one more fill in by the time radiation started. But what could I do? Obviously, the treatment is the most important thing we have to worry about.
Unfortunately, I'll be stuck with these small, unbalanced boobs for a few months. The worst part? I can't go shopping!!! Really, I can't justify buying clothes that I know aren't going to fit properly in another few months. On the other hand, I'll be happy to be done with treatment. Also, my incisions will have more time to heal before we start going to crazy with the inflation. And let's face it - anything worth doing is worth overdoing, so I've got a ways to go :-)
So, onto the prep work. Radiation is a very targeted, high-energy beam that is directed at certain areas where cancer is likely to fester or recur. This includes the lymph node area, mammary glands, the chest wall, etc. Just like chemo, it kills both healthy cells and cancer cells, so it's important to make sure it's pinpointed to the right area.
Today they did a CAT scan of my chest to view my anatomy to determine where the beams may be directed and where they could possibly hit organs or other good tissue that we want to avoid. It was pretty interesting - The Zapper spoke about how some patients have "perfect" anatomy, and some have not-so-desirable anatomy. So, if the heart is too close to the breast tissue, for example, it makes positioning the beam very difficult.
I had to lie with my arms above my head for about 30-40 minutes, so it's really good that my range of motion is restored. It strained a bit, but I wasn't terribly uncomfortable. The techs were very careful about positioning my body just so. They made small markings all over my body for the scan, and then after the calculations were done I got tattooed. Oh yes, you read that right. I was hoping for a big read heart that said "MOM", but instead they are tiny dots that are no bigger than the period at the end of a sentence. :-( First, it was the polka dots not covering my incisions, and now this. I never get my way.
Anyway, the tattoos are where the beam is going to enter my body, so they are a little more appropriate. I think there are four of them.
My next appointment is the "dry run" appointment, where they'll go over the kinds of things I'll need to manage side effects, and position my body for the treatment without actually administering treatment. That happens not on this Friday, but next Friday. Then, the following Tuesday is my first treatment.
And now for the beer countdown... 1 more day to go! I've fielded lots of questions about what my first beer is going to be. I joked with my dad that if this was him, it would be easy - a Miller Lite! But for a true beer connoisseur (sorry, Dad), how will I know today what beer I want tomorrow? I pretty much know that it will be one of two beers, but I just don't know which one at this point. You'll just have to read tomorrow to find out.
When we got there, I was reminded how much of a tedious process this is going to be. At this hospital, patients normally have to register every time they arrive. However, for radiation patients, you just register once at the beginning of each month. Luckily, the treatments are at a different campus of the hospital, which is approximately an 8 minute drive from my house (as opposed to the 10-12 minute drive to the other campus!). More importantly, it's directly on my way home from work. This is very convenient, since I'll need to be there 5 days a week for 6 and a half weeks.
So, anyway, we meet with The Zapper and she is very happy to see that I look a LOT better than she expected. She'd heard about an infection and more antibiotics (without realizing it was C-Diff, I believe)and was afraid that there would be infection at the expander site (but there is not). She also said she was impressed at how high I could lift my arms. We were SO happy to hear her say that. I want to make sure that I'm recovering well, and sometimes it's hard to get that kind of feedback.
One thing we weren't quite prepared for - she wants me to start right away. I didn't realize this, but they like to start radiation about 4 weeks after surgery. Well, this coming Wednesday is 3 weeks. Also, radiation involves "prep work" (which I'll describe later), and my body shape cannot drastically change in this time. This means that once the prep is done, we can no longer inflate the tissue expanders. Guess when she wanted to start prep work? Today! Those 4 preliminary appointments I talked about? Baloney. Or bologna.
I am very surprised that this is happening so soon, and I really wish we could have gotten that last fill in next week. When we talked to the plastic surgeon at our last appointment, we really thought we would be able to get at least one more fill in by the time radiation started. But what could I do? Obviously, the treatment is the most important thing we have to worry about.
Unfortunately, I'll be stuck with these small, unbalanced boobs for a few months. The worst part? I can't go shopping!!! Really, I can't justify buying clothes that I know aren't going to fit properly in another few months. On the other hand, I'll be happy to be done with treatment. Also, my incisions will have more time to heal before we start going to crazy with the inflation. And let's face it - anything worth doing is worth overdoing, so I've got a ways to go :-)
So, onto the prep work. Radiation is a very targeted, high-energy beam that is directed at certain areas where cancer is likely to fester or recur. This includes the lymph node area, mammary glands, the chest wall, etc. Just like chemo, it kills both healthy cells and cancer cells, so it's important to make sure it's pinpointed to the right area.
Today they did a CAT scan of my chest to view my anatomy to determine where the beams may be directed and where they could possibly hit organs or other good tissue that we want to avoid. It was pretty interesting - The Zapper spoke about how some patients have "perfect" anatomy, and some have not-so-desirable anatomy. So, if the heart is too close to the breast tissue, for example, it makes positioning the beam very difficult.
I had to lie with my arms above my head for about 30-40 minutes, so it's really good that my range of motion is restored. It strained a bit, but I wasn't terribly uncomfortable. The techs were very careful about positioning my body just so. They made small markings all over my body for the scan, and then after the calculations were done I got tattooed. Oh yes, you read that right. I was hoping for a big read heart that said "MOM", but instead they are tiny dots that are no bigger than the period at the end of a sentence. :-( First, it was the polka dots not covering my incisions, and now this. I never get my way.
Anyway, the tattoos are where the beam is going to enter my body, so they are a little more appropriate. I think there are four of them.
My next appointment is the "dry run" appointment, where they'll go over the kinds of things I'll need to manage side effects, and position my body for the treatment without actually administering treatment. That happens not on this Friday, but next Friday. Then, the following Tuesday is my first treatment.
And now for the beer countdown... 1 more day to go! I've fielded lots of questions about what my first beer is going to be. I joked with my dad that if this was him, it would be easy - a Miller Lite! But for a true beer connoisseur (sorry, Dad), how will I know today what beer I want tomorrow? I pretty much know that it will be one of two beers, but I just don't know which one at this point. You'll just have to read tomorrow to find out.
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