Friday, January 02, 2009

Ta Ta to The Ladies, With No Regrets

Yup, still obsessed with my chest. ;-)

I know it's been a while since I've updated, but as of December 18th 2008 I am free of The Ladies as 48-DDs! Ta ta, Ladies! I'm 15 days post-op breast reduction surgery today, and recovery is going well. The surgical scars are healing well, as long as I don't over-do it. There have been a couple of unavoidable instances where I had to lift and reach more than recommended thanks to one of the girls smashing some Christmas ornaments, and Manny not being here to take care of it. In those instances, I've bled through the stitches a bit or at least seeped through them, and then fresh bruises show up. The initial surgical bruising has all but faded, to a pale almost-unnoticeable yellowish tinge.

Pre-op, the surgeon (Dr Greg Babigian, for anyone who's in CT and interested, through CT Surgical Group) told me that in rare cases women lose nipple sensation or even lose their nipples. He rarely has seen that happen under his own knife, but said that there was still a risk. What he does there is remove the over-sized areola, leaving only the nipple, and he never severs the nerves that connect the nipples to the breast. After nursing two of my three beauties, I had decreased sensitivity there. Thanks to the surgery I actually have the opposite now. I have more sensation than I did before having children, or at least I'm able to notice it better now. It's very strange, to be honest, but it's a very good sign.

At this point the surgical scars are healing and in spots diminishing, but only being 2 weeks post-op are still quite sensitive.

As for painkillers … thank God for them. The pain isn't as bad as I feared it would be, but there's still definitely pain and pain management is still very important. I started out with Percocet for the first week. Those worked quite well, and I just had to make sure not to take additional Tylenol/acetaminophen products. Beginning my second week, I was able to go "a step down" to Vicodin. Right now, if I go too far past my time when I'm due for pain relief, my pain reaches about a six on the 1-10 scale (with 10 being the highest). Thankfully, the nurse in the surgeon's office told me this morning that a six is normal without pain relief. During the night for the past several nights, I've actually overslept through expected pain relief dosage times, but I think it's because I still sleep on my back and have been pretty successful in not moving around too much in my sleep. If I do wake during the night, a few Advil liquid-gels seems to do the trick until morning. If it's been a busy day, aka a day where I was up and about, it's a different story and I will wake up from pain and soreness. During the day, however, I need to keep on a schedule of going no longer than 5-5 ½ hours between doses. The entire time, I've been able to get away with taking only one Vicodin (and before that, Percocet) every five hours. I'm slowly trying to stretch that out, and rely more on OTC pain relief, but it doesn't always work out that way. If I start to feel some pain and painful soreness before the five hours are up I'll take a couple of Advil to be sure I don't take the Vicodin too soon. The nurse said that's pretty good, because even at this stage post-op many people are still taking two Percocet or Vicodin every four hours. I was lucky that in the hospital, I decided to stick with just one to see how well that worked. The less pain medication needed, the better, but I'm not foolish about it either. I know that you tend to heal better and cope better when there's little/minimized pain.

I know you're wondering about size now. I won't know for sure for another 3-6 months, but the surgeon believes I'll hit my target of larger B cup or small C cup. I'll finally be able to buy cute bras again! I'll even be able to shop in Victoria's Secret again! Hell, I'll be able to pick up some cute little Hanes cotton and lace bras.

What I'm most excited about? I'll be able to go back to the gym and use more equipment than I could before. I'll have more range of motion. I'll be able to jog on the treadmill instead of just walking. That already, my shirts are fitting differently and look better. I look like I've lost several pounds. You can see my waist again. I have shape again. Well, I had shape before but it was blobbish and pear-like. I'm wearing some tops already that I haven't been able to wear for years. I'm starting to actually like what I look again, and it feels odd.

I'll try to post some clothed pre-op and post-op comparison pictures soon. Right now, I still have the bandages on due to occasional bleeding and seeping and the fact that the scars are a bit too sensitive to be rubbing up al fresco against regular fabric right now.

5 comments:

3LittleFlowers said...

Im soooooooooooooooooo happy for you!!!!!!! And a bit jelaous, of course... Cant wait to reduce them again!!!! =)

Jenn said...

That's fabulous Jess! (Just so you know I'm not a random stalker, I was on the Feb/05 board and have followed since) I can't imagine how much better you must be feeling, although only being a 32A which barely exists, I think you should have donated the extra ladies over here ;)

♛Qu€€n♛J€§§¡¢a♛™ said...

Thanks so much! I know you're not a stalker Jenn, ha ha. I really do feel so much better. I'm still amazed at how differently I look, how much better I look on top of feeling better physically.

Anonymous said...

Congrats! I'm sure you look awesome chica!

Jackie

Anonymous said...

Jessica Wessica-

Congratulations on your surgery. I am glad it's gone well.
I hope I am not coming across as a stalker but I read your post (on BNaBBT) about your weight loss and I have to ask- how are you doing it? I can't get my butt in gear to start exercising again. How do you stay motivated?

Julie