On December 1st, 2016, I went under anesthesia for the 5th time in 2016. It was, by far, the easiest of all of my procedures — well, maybe not the Fecal Transplant. Outside of the prep for the colonoscopy, that procedure was the shit. And it took no additional maintenance following.
In December, I went in for my stage 2 reconstruction of my, then, tissue expanded, breasts. I was able to have the hard tissue expanders taken out and in their place, Dr. Johnson {my kick ass Plastic Surgeon} put tear drop gummy bear implants with 620 cc of fluid. And he told me at the time, “I will see you in 4-6 months to discuss where we’re at and see if there are any tweaks we should consider.”
So, two weeks ago, on Cinco de Mayo, I saw Dr. J. Five months post surgery. I know… quite the fiesta!
Here’s the good stuff:
- My implants have held their shape well.
- I’ve had no infections {thank you, Jesus!!!}
- My bacon bit nip has healed up pretty well. While not twins any longer with Lefty, Righty has her own personality and is hangin’ out just fine as Lefty’s sister nipple.
- The implants have softened up and I have even regained a tiny bit of feeling in parts.
- The scarring is really pretty darn unnoticeable and the implants themselves look pretty much like real breasts.
Here are the tweaking points:
- The right one has shrunk up a bit {as predicted} because of the radiation to that side and the way that radiated skin behaves differently.
- The right one has also pulled to the right side a bit.
- The right side is very thin in one part along the outside curve and dents in a bit.
- Again, righty… capsular contracture… a bubble that forms right outside the scar line (that’s how I understand it…) and causes some pain
Soooo… what’s next? Technically, I could keep the gals just as they are. And if I felt the risk was greater than the reward OR that Doc didn’t think there was any way to make them appear more symmetrical or less thin on the side, I wouldn’t be scheduling a follow-up procedure at all. BUT. Because we now know how Righty is prone to scar and we know which areas are thinner, a follow-up procedure is very reasonable.
As a breast cancer patient, with the current healthcare status, all procedures to the breast area are covered by government mandates. I have NO plans to go under any further times after this next one unless it’s to remove something dangerous, broken, or something similar. If they don’t look totally right after the next procedure, I plan to just use it as my fun fact when I play two truths and a lie.
So what’s the plan? I could have gotten scheduled for this summer but will wait until fall because I will have to have 4-6 weeks of down time again {technically. Although the recon is so much less obtrusive to life than the mastectomy. So. much. less.} and don’t want to have the healing to do with the boys home during the summer months.
They will remove the current implants and put in two different sizes of implants so that once they heal and scar, they will actually appear more the same. And yes… if you’re wondering, I’m even going a little bigger on Lefty. Because YOLO. I will also have additional alloderm {grafted skin} in the areas that have thinned out. Because I have no tissue inside, and I’ve had rads, the skin just naturally gets very very thinned out. And it actually hurts/strains a bit. Also, I am choosing to switch shapes {I think} from tear drop {think: natural looking} to round, high fill {think less real looking}. When I had my surgery, they did not yet have a textured implant in round and now they do. I think that I am going to go for the round over the tear drop because I don’t really care if my breasts look a little more fake — they are what they are;). And as I said in a prior post, it really behooves me to have the textured implant because it helps with something called capsular contracture. I actually have some of this on the right side of the right side… didja keep up there? And it also presents as a lump of sorts and is achey in that spot. If for no other reason, I would have surgery to make that area as comfortable as possible.
I will go under in the late summer and that should be all she wrote for the next few years of surgeries. Should. Which is only sad because I love Dr. Johnson and his staff sooooo much. {And no, Village Pointe Aesthetics does not pay me to talk about them. But when people do a great job, I give them kudos.}
The reality is, post-children and pre-cancer, I didn’t have much in the bra. Now, I am amazed at how good the boobs look having gone through getting cut off, sewn up, expanded, radiated, cut open again, and now having implants. It is truly unreal at how much they look like normal breasts. Especially Lefty. Which is good for Lefty because she never did anything to me in the first place. I’m okay with her looking a little better than the one who turned against me. And, in further support of Lefty, friends who have seen them have said that she is truly the perfect breast. So at least she has that going for her.
So that’s the update. Nothing to big or bad going on. Nothing that requires emergent attention. And enough to fill a swimsuit.
But if you see me this summer and you wonder if one of these things is not like the other, your eyes are not deceiving you. But soon, we will nip that in the bud.
