Whew! If I thought time was flying before the surgery, I don’t even know where to start to try to understand how it’s already been a week since the big day! It’s unbelievable.

I suppose the best way to answer “how are you doing?” is with “hanging in there!” In many ways this recovery has been better than I expected, but in the interest of not sugar-coating, some parts of it pretty much suck.

My range of motion is so much better than I expected – I read stories of women who couldn’t brush their own hair. I can do that and almost raise my arms above my head. Yes, it hurts, but it’s totally doable. The drains were my biggest concern as everyone I talked to said they were the worst part. I honestly don’t even realize they’re there… They stay in my swanky apron and they’re just “there.” Not much itching and a weird feeling when I strip them but not painful. The drainage is slowing down and clearing up – hopefully they’ll be out soon. But I’m really not bothered by them. The bruising and swelling is pretty much as I expected – not pretty but improving every day. Cosmetically the girls look way better than I expected – I never imagined I would wake up with them filled like this! And I’m so impressed with how small the incisions are. The Boob Dudes are incredible!

But yes, the expanders are indeed like rocks. They’re heavy and feel very foreign. The hardest part of this last week is without a doubt the muscle spasms. Really if I’m not moving around the pain has pretty much resolved. But when these spasms hit, it’s like having 2 Charlie horses on your chest and you can’t stretch them out, and you feel like you can’t breathe. The muscle relaxers help for awhile, but they a) wear off and b) knock me out. I’m tired of being in a haze from them and the pain medicine. If it wasn’t for the spasms I think I’d really be in great shape. So yeah. That’s definitely the most difficult part. It’s a catch 22 between wanting them to stop and being asleep for most of the day, or not taking meds that take the edge off and being awake. On a related note, the “pins and needles” of nerves being messed with is also bizarre and unpleasant. So much stretching is happening, and the tingling is mostly under my arms. It comes and goes but is just strange getting used to the numbness. I have to remember to be patient, that it’s only been a week since a fairly extensive surgery, and hope that things will improve soon. I have faith that they will, as I’ve already come so far, but patience has never been my strong suit when mentally I’m ready to get back into things but physically I’m not quite there yet. So yes, hanging in there indeed! I know in a few weeks I will look back and this will all be a blur!

I’m so grateful for visitors that provide such great distraction… And holy moly my friends can cook! I’m so impressed… And spoiled! I’m also so grateful for friends that have kept me company when I certainly was not much company! I’ve made a lot of progress weaning pain meds so hopefully those occurrences are fewer! I don’t understand how people can function on these meds every day. I guess I’m a lightweight! But yeah so over the side effects.

I see my plastic surgeon on Thursday to see where we go from here – I can’t even begin to reiterate how great it is to be over the worst of this and be solidly on the other side!

All went well yesterday morning and we were out of the hospital by noon! Quick stop to drop off prescriptions and made it home sweet home!

I’ve been hanging out on the couch/recliner and have been resting pretty well. I had heard from more than one person that post op days 2 and 3 are the most painful and there’s some definite validity to that, along with the ongoing “elephant sitting on your chest” and “expanders are rocks” analogies. The swelling and pulling pressure is pretty intense at times, and the spasming is a really unfortunate feeling – Flexeril makes it tolerable, but it’s still such a bizarre sensation. My range of motion is getting better every day – I was even able to shower with minimal help today, which felt great. Thankfully the drains aren’t bothering me at all (knock on wood!) and they’ve slowed down quite a bit except just one… Just such a strange feeling to strip your own JPs!

My plastic surgeon is so amazing he is always just a text away and requests updates and pictures, and with all the swelling on my right side it helped to have his reassurance this morning that everything looks good – the mastectomy bra was really cutting into my skin so he took that off yesterday. It’s the side that has the dressing for the clinical trial on, so it’s covered except for once a day when we change the dressing. The girls look pretty rough still, but once the bruising goes away and the “tattoos” come off the results are going to be incredible. Definitely a work of art!

And saving the best for last, the most awesome news of today was my breast surgeon calling (yes, himself – have I mentioned how amazing he is?) with the pathology report – they removed 560 grams of tissue from the right side and 470 from the left side (and grams and cc’s are equivalent so with 500 cc’s filled in each expander, size wise I woke up not much different than where we started with which is incredible). There was dense tissue (as expected) but all tissue and sentinel lymph nodes were benign with no signs of malignancy!! Such a great thing to hear I can’t even put it into words!!! That phone call makes all of this worth it!! Such a relief to be on the other side of all of this. He was surprised I answered my phone myself so I take that as a good sign I’m recovering well, all things considered!

Everyone keeps asking if I’m up to visitors, and the answer is a definite yes! I’m a little groggy from the meds, but really not too out of it. The distraction is much appreciated, so come on over!

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend! Thanks again for all the good thoughts and wishes – I can definitely feel the love!!

A little late but… Hello from the other side!!

What a total and complete relief it is to be on the other side of the toughest part!! And I’m thrilled to report that everything went beautifully on Tuesday!

I have such a great support system we were pushing the limits on visitors – They became known as my “posse!” LOL. My amazing parents and friends hung out all day and it was a long one!

We got here a little before 10 and things really kept moving. My amazing pre-op nurse got my IV on the first stick, which was such a relief with my crappy veins. My plastic surgeon made quite the colorful map on my chest marking everything… A rainbow one might say! Talked to my breast surgeon and met with my awesome anesthesiologist, then soon after I got my “IV margarita!” around 12:30. Here I’m ready to go!

I remember feeling GREAT talking to my CRNA as I sat up to help her get EKG electrodes on my back and then… holy nap batman! Surgery lasted almost six hours and the report from the surgeons was great- I actually do remember talking to them both in PACU. My pesky shunt did get in the way, but my wonderful neurosurgeon was able to fix it quickly – if they hadn’t told me I would have never known! So glad he was on standby. My breast surgeon did do a sentinel node biopsy on each side, and we should get a final pathology report that (hopefully) everything is clear soon. The right side took more than twice as long as the left with all the obstacles! But that was expected

My plastic surgeon cracks me up – he is SO passionate about what he does! My friends were having so much fun retelling his report… He was miraculously able to fill my expanders with 500 cc’s each!! That’s just amazing. So theoretically I could only need 2 fills before I get my permanent implants. I’m SO incredibly pleased with the results so far – the girls are quite bruised and swollen, but look amazing for just over a day out.

I was in recovery for about 2 hours where they gave me lots of awesome drugs… I remember being in and out of it. Then mostly “in”… I do remember the transport and I finally got up to my room at about 8 on Tuesday night with my parents and 3 of my best friends waiting for me!

Moving from the stretcher to the bed was so unfortunate, and I made a new best friend with my morphine PCA that night! I absolutely could not move my arms… Dad had to “airplane” feed me mashed potatoes! And my mouth was so dry. Throat not sore at all… Thanks fab anesthesia team!

It was a long night with not being able to move and a decent amount of pain. But the morphine helped a lot… I was off of it by the next morning, switched to oral meds, and as soon as I had my catheter pulled I was able to get up and move around. Yesterday was rough with nausea, but after I got some phenergan I was a new person! And putting on real clothes and brushing my teeth helped immensely too. I had some wonderful visitors to keep me distracted – really this time in the hospital has flown by! Thank goodness for that – I’m ready for some real rest at home now!

Looking pretty good post-op day 1, if I do say so myself!

Plastic surgeon was already in this morning and he is thrilled with the result. Thankfully I get to ditch the mastectomy bra – it did its job compressing the swelling but it was getting really tight. My 4 JP drains have slowed down too – I see my plastic surgeon next Thursday and will hopefully get a few, if not all, of them pulled then! They really aren’t bothering me though so I feel very lucky in that regard.

Muscle relaxers are my current best friend – they help the pain more than the Vicodin! Since really what hurts is my spasming pec muscles. I’m glad my expanders are as full as they are, but whew the “elephant sitting on your chest” analogy is rather accurate. Though overall I definitely think I’m doing better than I expected. I think being able to go into surgery healthy is so important. Hopefully the soreness will improve every day – right now my range of motion is pretty limited but obviously that’s expected. Basically it’s my whole upper body that’s sore from the positioning in the OR and of course the actual surgery.

Anyhow, all went as well as I could have possibly hoped for! Just waiting on breakfast now, and then once my breast surgeon stops by we should be able to deuce out of here! Yay – the hardest part is over, only going to get better from here!! Thanks again for all the love and support – I can definitely feel it!

Just couldn’t resist that title… It’s not everyday you get to say your boobs are radioactive!!

So to rewind a little bit since I didn’t get a chance to update before the amazing Voyage… This last week is such a blur!! My conference/trip was so fantastic – I’m so glad I scheduled everything like we did, as I couldn’t have asked for a better distraction!! Really barely thought of the surgery and it was SO fun! I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I am so incredibly lucky to have a job that I absolutely adore. I’m going to miss all the amazing people while I’m gone! But really I think this time away is going to fly by too and I’ll be back in no time!!

So after a fabulous, memorable last night out on Friday, I flew back Saturday evening and my roommate picked me up at the airport with this this waiting for me:

So incredibly excited!! She’s one of my absolute best friends from college and I adore this couple so very much. Another great distraction for sure – let the planning commence!

Anyhow, today was a long day… Yet it flew by so quickly at this point I feel like I was just going through the motions! Started off registering so all I have to do tomorrow is show up with my “admit one” ticket to surgery (no really… That’s what it says!) Did get thrown for a small loop though… My surgery was bumped back just a little bit. Have to be there at 10 now. Ironically I know the lady before me… We keep running into each other! She’s so sweet. So yeah… Surgery is at noon! Fingers crossed… No more bumping!!

Then to the pre-surgery testing nurses… Labs done and went over last minute instructions. Then we hopped over to my plastic surgeon’s office so I could sign consents and have pictures taken for a study he’s doing that I’m in. It’s looking at how to keep the best perfusion in nipple-sparing mastectomies. Love the coordinator – she’ll be in the surgery tomorrow too. That just took a little while to get everything done, but was very informative.

Then off to yet another building to nuclear medicine for the lymphocintigraphy. In all honesty I was more anxious about this than I was anything else! Needles and nipples are two words that should never go together!! But really it wasn’t terrible… A little weird, especially as I could feel the radioactive isotope moving around, but really not painful. Just stung a bit when they injected each side.

Grabbed some lunch during the 2 hours I had to wait for the dye to travel around, then headed back for the scan part. After some interesting yoga-like poses to get the pictures they needed, I got my latest body art:

Yeah… Whether it’s lymph nodes or simply uptake not quite sure, but it’s right where my shunt is as well as where I had a port, so it could be any number of things. That’s for my surgeon to decipher tomorrow!! Poor right boob can’t catch a break!

So a bit of an exhausting day, but glad to have it over!! I’m still on a high from last night, so it was remarkably easy to get through today. I got this beautiful bracelet last night, and will forever treasure all the memories that I associate with it every time I catch a glimpse:

Talked to my wonderful Aunt and now my longtime best friend and her Dad are coming over for dinner… A great way to spend this night!

Hoping for smooth sailing tomorrow… I’m so grateful for all the positive thoughts and prayers headed toward me and my family… I couldn’t do this without all of you!!

See you on the other side!!!

It’s not often that I’m speechless.  It’s even less often that I can’t find words to write.  But, perhaps for the first time in my life, I am absolutely, positively overwhelmed at the amount of support that was shown tonight.  Everything fell into place so perfectly, and it was just the most incredible, beautiful, and FUN “ta-ta to the tatas” I could ever imagined.  In fact, MORE than I could have ever imagined.  I am blessed beyond belief.  To have so many of my incredible family and friends together, whether physically or in spirit, is something so amazing I literally can’t find words to describe it.  So instead of turning into a blubbering mess on here, I will let a few of the pictures (that I have at the moment… I know there are many more… and I want them!) speak for themselves.  THANK YOU doesn’t seem adequate, but I hope each and every one of you know how much you mean to me.

The beautiful set up! Gerber daisies, leis, beads, wristbands, you name it! A perfect explosion of pink!

My chair!! Tulle, feather boa, AND amazing boob scarf from Nicole – what more could you want?!

The most incredible hosts/party planners/party preppers in the world!!!! And above all, truly incredible friends.

Boobcakes and boob cake! So fantastic… and delicious too!!

This needs a close-up… like whoa!

The party in action… so much fun… so much love… so much support!

The beautiful Amy even came out! So great to have her there!!

So all in all, a truly touching night that I will never forget.  My heart is more than full tonight!

Marathon day of pre-op tomorrow… more to come then!