Exchange City
Comments
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Judy: Soooo glad to hear you got rid of your "puppy" and are on the mend!!!
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Estepp: You look beautiful in your new avatar!!!! I didn't recognize you--you look so young!
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Hi Everyone-Time for me to join this goup! I have my exchange scheduled for noon today. I could barely sleep all nite-excite and afraid of another surgery and the awful drains again-but so glad to get out the Te's. The right side has been awful with pain. Pressing on nerve?
I don't even know what to expect yet. Feel like I'm holding my breath! Any advice?
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Pinkie, Just BREATHE. You may or may not have drains. Most of us didn't have drains with exchange. It depends on how much pocket work is done and your PS "standard procedures". This surgery for most is not bad at all. A few days of discomfort and then you'll have to remind yourself to behave. Good luck today. With the softer implant, hopefully all that pain from pressure will be gone for you too. Prayers for a beautiful result!!!
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Pinkie Good LUCK today!!! You will be amazed at how much better you will feel!
Estepp You look great! I am also a brunette that has been blond for the last 8 yrs. My wig is blond still but added caramel lowlights for fall. I am going to leave it brown when I stop wearing the wig...folks at the office are in for a SHOCK. I hope I look younger too!!
Diane
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Pinkie...,Im 9:30 this morning..... sitting here with my DH smelling his morning coffee..,.,wishing I could have a cup. Getting ready for my anti-bacterial shower...I slept on my side last night ....just because I could...I probably won't be able to for a while now...... PS says no drains should be necessary, but he did indicate he may have a job to do getting them over to the center of my chest...(they are too far apart)...... we'll see. i am NOT looking forward to wearing a bra again.....sniff sniff
Diane
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Pinkie and Diane -- I'll be thinking of you today! Please post again when you can...
Laura -- you are so gorgeous -- love the new avatar. My hair has been blonde or reddish blonde forever, but I'm also experimenting with something just a little darker. Have to be careful going darker at my age, but it's fun.
MBJ -- I hear what you are saying and know it is time for me to get a different PS. Mine has been such a jerk lately and that's definitely not working for me.
Today I am going to try to do a bit of holiday shopping and see how that goes. I've barely been out of the house since starting on the antibiotics because I've been so tired and uncomfortable, not to mention leaky. Today isn't a lot different, but I'm going to see what happens.
Have a wonderful day!
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Good luck to all having exchanges today!!! I was able to sleep on my side the same night as exchange so hopefully you will too. (I'm on the west coast, so I'm always late to the party!)
Judy- happy to hear that you're feeling better.
Cheers! Dee
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Good luck with all of the surgeries today!!! Wishing you a painfree experience and soft, squishee new foobies.
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Bonnie, I've been following your PS issues and thought I'd give you my experience. I changed PS. My first one was inept and the tissue expander was not positioned correctly . . . and VERY VERY painful.
When I decided to switch, I called several PS. Two of them said they will not get involved at this point and aren't interested in fixing another PS errors. Decided I wouldn't want to deal with doctors like that regardless.
However, the top surgeon I was hoping for told me to come in so she could take a look and we'd go from there. She was basically rendered speechless when she saw my tissue expander placement and said she will take me on as a patient.
I told her I was really anxious about having to fire my PS. I didn't know how to do. I didn't want to do it and I was really uncomfortable even thinking about it. She said not a problem and she would fax a letter to her telling her that I am no longer her patient, the reason why, and informed my old PS that she is now my doctor and any communication must now go through her. I wanted to kiss her I was so relieved!!!
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Swanny: I am all caps and crowns, too. But I only recal having one root canal and that was 3 1/2 years before my diagnosis.
Bonnie: I forgot to add: My Onc was my advocate and found me my surgeons. I found out about the hospital and he found me my surgeon! Maybe your BS can help!
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Bonnie....I will ask KEW [Karen] for the name of her PS - she lives in Portland.
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Estepp- It was a page or two back but thank you for your post about switching PS's. I did put a call into a new PS's office and they said I needed to request all my records from my old PS and I've just felt so uncomfortable about that. Like I feel guilty or something for switching. You are right, though, it's our bodies and we have a right to go to anyone we want! Thanks for the (gentle) kick in the butt!
P.S. You look gorgeous!!!!!!!Facecrafter- Congratulations! Will there be a purse puppy bonfire in your backyard?
pinkie- Good luck with your exchange today! Hope you are home soon! (((hugs)))
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Mantra -- I LOVE your story about changing PSs and I'm so happy it worked out well for you.
Deborah -- Karen and I have the same PS and the same concerns. She did give me another PS's name recently.
I have had many surgical complications since getting BC -- infection after mast/TE placement, 2 implants removed due to capsular contracture, hematoma surgically repaired -- no antibiotics afterward and 3 weeks later a seroma with infection. (a) perhaps all of this is just my body and has nothing to do with the doctor and (b) plastic surgery is not in my future plans right now, so it seems weird to see another PS. I'm really hoping to finish up this infection with my current PS and then ask BS and for a recommendation to a different PS when/if that time comes. Does this seem reasonable or am I being the pollyanna I am often accused of being?
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thanks for the good words..there will be no bonfire as much as I would like that) as this puppy costs upward of 175. a day!! it has to be returned!! But good riddance!! JUDY
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Estepp, you are just beautiful in your new avitar.
Bonnie, I've switched PS's too. The first time I looked for a new one on my own. He encouraged me to work things out with my first PS and I told him I had tried and was over it. I told him, if he didn't feel comfortable taking me on, I would continue my search. He said he knew my first PS and admitted he had a "difficult personality sometimes". He agreed to take me and sent for my records. I will now be seeing my 3rd PS for some fat grafting and to get my foobs lifted in Jan. My current PS referred me to him. Only because my current PS doesn't do fat grafting and I was insisting. Current PS said that he would refer me to PS 3 but I was still his patient and he would continue my long term care. One would like to think that your current PS could at least handle an infection. But of that I'm not so sure.
Judy, so glad to hear the purse puppy is gone, gone, gone!
Pinkie and Diane, I hope you're home and feeling great.
Whippetmom, I'm off to check out your revised tats!
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Diane509 Sorry I missed you...hope your exchange went well today and you are resting comfortably high as a kite on meds!
DawnHope -- Hope your nips went well too!! I can't wait to have a matching pair again!
Diane
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Thanks, Didel! Yes, I got fipples today! It was surreal being in an actual operating room and awake for the whole procedure. My PS asked if he could take pictures of the process and I said yes. There were three other PS's in the operating room ... the whole scenario was just surreal. I didn't think I had any feeling in the foobs but when he stuck the needle in for the local ... wow! Deep pain! I didn't realize until he was talking with the other PS that the alloderm sling comes up so high ... it comes up halfway the foob. I just thought an alloderm sling was at the very bottom. Very interesting. The weirdest part was the sewing up ... I could feel the pulling ... I felt like I was a quilt being quilted. Strange. I looked down at the fipples when they were done & they looked really pretty. I'm most uncomfortable in my shoulders right now ... I think I was pretty tense laying on the table ... weird because they strap your arms down, your legs down ... just weird.
I really, really struggled with this decision but now that it is over I am soooo glad I've at least tried to finish the process. I'm praying for no complications and a good result. Overall, I think today's experience was one of the stranger ones I've ever had.
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Yay Judy!
Sorry everybody else....I have missed the last 30 or so pages and am going out of town again tomorrow so don't have any idea when I will catch up. This thread moves SO FAST. Some of the other threads I follow go a lot slower and I have been able to kinda keep up by popping in here and there.
All my best to all of you. You are still in my prayers even though I really have no idea what you are dealing with right now. I just pray for all the best for all of you.
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DawneHope: Congratulations!!! I can't wait to see the results!
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Thanks, MBJ!
I'll post pictures soon!0 -
Thank you ladies! I never though about that avatar as being a good photo really.... it was just an answer to some ladies here. Most of my avatars.. you cannot see my eyes..hehe.. so I found one... at least one from my laptop I carry with me. My son was taking shot after shot of me with my camera... just being a dork.... so I made random silly faces... ( we are a silly family)
Bonnie, you are 100% right on about dark hair color as we age. There comes an age... where if you color your hair dark... it will age you... you are hot just the way you are now...
I love any red in hair... it is more natural...OK MJB........... I am going to ask........... since you " Did not even know it was me in the avatar......... CAUSE I LOOKED YOUNG...."................................... DID I LOOK OLD BEFORE????????????????????????????????????????????????? ROFLOL.
Ladies.. have a great weekend... I will be entertaining the M-I-L this weekend. She is in from AZ... staying with us............ so I will not be back online until Sunday night...
xxxooo Laura
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Diane.... good to hear..... Rock the Brown sister ! I bet you will look AMAZING! If you put a little ..." tude" in your step..... you will look amazing no matter what!
.... that actually goes for all of us, right?What is the saying..." Well behaved women rarely make history..." I love it, and since I am WAY too well behaved in my life... I am not a history maker.....LOL LOL.... but I LOVE to live vicariously though others..:)
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LOL Laura you always crack me up ("did I look old before?") -- I think we could not see you in the last avatar! And I agree: this one is beautiful!
Congrats ladies who had surgery this week (sorry I was afk all day and there were two pages since last night!) -- congrats on the nipples Dawn!
Judy -- yay!!!!!!! for being done with the purse-puppy!
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Good Morning Girls: The day after my exchange.
My exchange was yesterday. I arrived at 9:30 to the Surgical Centre and slipped into something "more comfortable" (and air conditioned behind me!) My surgery was done as an outpatient at the facility in the basement of my PS office. When you hear the words basement and surgery together... it conjures up visions of Frankenstein or Jeckyll and Hyde.
The facility in reality was fabulous. While I lay waiting on the gurney the nurse put an inflatable blanket on me. It looked like giant bubble wrap and they connected a huge hair dryer to it. I am always cold so this was nice. I have terrible veins for IV's and warned the nurse. She tapped my arms looking for a good vein to use and decided to put a hot wet towel surrounded by a plastic covered gauze to heat up my arm. But the wrap leaked onto my gown, which of course I didn't feel since I am numb in the chest. Some other nurse came by and asked me about the wet stain after my arm wrap had been removed... I told her I was excited about my surgery and I was lactating! My sense of humor gets a little twisted after I have the IV with a sedative in it.
In the stall next to me another plastic surgeon from this office was preparing a woman for her surgery and he was doing all his drawing on her chest that very morning. My PS did his artwork the day before. Always blue ink, never black - superstitious! Both are good surgeons, but they practice differently. One believes in immediate reconstruction when possible after a mastectomy (mine) and the other (not mine) believes in delayed reconstruction. As I have learned on these boards we all have surgeons who differ greatly in their theory and technique, even when we go through what sound like similar procedures, we all have different, medications, bandages, bras or no bras, post op exercise regimes and even within the surgery itself how and where they cut differ greatly. I'll bet the doctors cringe when they read about how we try to explain to one another the method of their expertise.
The anesthetist came by and told me everything to expect and said she would see me in there... and then I was wheeled around the corner into the operating room. I was so surprised it had a huge wall sized window with a rock retaining wall and plants and trees in view. I was still in chat mode when I got in there, unlike the first surgery when I was already so heavily sedated I don't remember the ride from the prep room down all the hallways in the hospital to the operating room.
At last the mask was placed over my nose and mouth. I didn't feel a thing or smell anything different. I was talking and asking questions and of course, complaining that the room was so cold. they said they like it like that because after they scrub in and the lights are on it gets pretty toasty for them. Within seconds I wasn't complaining any more.....
... Poof, there you are, awake in the recovery room. Don't you all agree that is the weirdest feeling? Waking up from anesthesia is nothing like waking from being asleep. The buzz in your head is so strong. It feels like you are slipping away and you seem to try to fight it to stay awake. After 2 ice chips they called my husband who was home 6 blocks away and when he got in the room I tried so hard to smile. I knew if I didn't smile, my face would have hung so long .. like a bull dog (in my mind) so I talked to him and tried so hard to stay away, but I would have loved to just fall asleep again.
We stayed there in recovery for about 2 1/2 hours which when by quickly for me, but it probably dragged for my husband, listening to me blather on incoherently. They wouldn't let me leave until I ate something and got up to pee, so I enjoyed a piece of toast and butter and a glass of cranberry juice ( and then walked to the bathroom (with help). The nurse stayed in the WC with me while I sat there with my shy bladder. It took a few minutes, but I finally went. I was glad I didn't have to be sent home with a cathater.
I woke up with a Clear Point Medical Classic Comfort Bra M218-02 size 38 clearpointmd.com, under the bra I see steri-strips covered with gauze, held down with another piece of medical tape. I was sent home with extra gauze if I bled through, but so far nothing is showing through. My prescribed medication is oxycodone/ap ap 5/325 (aka Percocet) 1-2 every 3-4 hours as needed for pain and Cephalexin 500mg (aka Keflex) 1 every 6 hours until finished (anti-biotic). I am finishing up a jar of sub-lingual pellets I began taking on Wed called Arnica Montana 12C which is homeopathic sweet tasting pellets that dissolve under the tongue to aide muscle aches, stiffness, swelling, discoloration and bruising. They taste like candy. I took 2 Oxycodone before I left the surgical centre at 2:30 pm and when I got home I took 1 at 6:30 pm and 1 more before bed. I thought I would try a lower dose and see how it went. I have a little discomfort, but not too bad. Oxycodone is strong than the Hydrocodone I took for surgery number 1. It does make you woozie and goofy much more than Hydrodocodone. This morning I woke up and just took 1 as well.
Enjoying coffee and hubby is making me breakfast. What a sweety. The pain I feel is in the center of my chest. My TE's were too far apart and I guess he needed to kind of chisel in there to get the implants places. BTW they are Natrelle 421 silicone. (My TE's had been filled to 400cc) but these appear smaller. I was told they would look smaller since they are softer.
Appointment with PS today at 11:45 to check on everything. I can already feel a difference in how much more comfortable they are than the tissue expanders. They were right about that part. What a relief already. The hard part is over.
Hope everyone is recovering as well..,.
Diane 509
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Hi ladies, I haven't been to this thread in months. I decided I wouldn't read/post here until it came time for my surgery, or else I'd probably just worry and conjure up problems! Anyway, my surgery will be mid-Jan. if all goes as planned. I do have one question already: did any of you have other work done at the same time as your exchange? I am seriously thinking of getting my ears pinned (I've always had ears that stick way out and now that I'm bald from chemo it is awful and will be so long before I can cover them up with hair again). And maybe some chin lipo for my double chin. May as well get it done while I'm under is what I'm thinking.
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I jokingly asked my PS for some liposuction and botox while I was being wheeled in yesterday. I don't think they would risk some other procedure during and exchange due to the battle your body already has to do with entertaining the foreign substance in your body....but hey, I'm just a GOOGLE DOCTOR. .......
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Good morning,
Diane -- You have such a remarkably detailed memory, particularly in a time of such stress! I'm impressed and also very happy to know you are feeling relieved and more comfortable already.
LadyBama -- Some women have posted here about having more than one procedure at the same time and they've been very happy with that choice. Maybe you should talk to your PS and see if you can work something out.
I'm finally starting to feel better and am going to try hitting the mall today, since I didn't go yesterday. I need to see something besides my house and my cats -- LOL. Oops, forgot DH, but he's only home long enough to eat dinner, sleep and go back to work.
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Yes, your PS will do other procedures during your exchange, unless there is some weird situation with you that makes your PS back off. I had my lower eyelids done... my old lady bags.. GONE! POOF!
I woke up with big , perky boobs and no bags under my eyes..... it was a good day!
Peace and Bubble Gum girls!
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I have a question for those who have nips already. I will be having more fat grafting in February.
Can I get the nips at the same time?
After I get the nips if I need/want more fat grafting can that still be done?
Deborah your nips look fabulous!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I really think that will be such a boost to get my nips done. I think I will feel more complete. I am still very emotional but trying to deal with the depression on a day to day basis.
Well I am always glad I have all of you,
Rebecca
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