NOLA in September?
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Chelle... I would talk this out with him at pre-op... And for the injections, he did it to me, not a dermatologist... But that could be because it was in a non-surgical area. When I have an appt with him in July, I will ask about injections then for my lower back area, since that was the area I had cellulitis. I am thinking the scar tissue has interfered with drainage... But perhaps by then after a few PT sessions, I won't need it. Mine are not bumpy or keloids.
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That would be great Betsy!! Jeanine said if I was local they could do them there, but since I'm not, I would need to go to a dermatologist office on my own. It was your issue that made me think of having massage done after the next surgery in hopes of keeping things soft back there. I am new to all this, so I don't even know who or what type of massage therapist to look for.
This will be my last surgery and I wasn't expecting this one, but then again I didn't expect to have this problem. It doesn't seem to be a common one either, but I have always been the odd ball out when it comes to stuff like this.
I am holding onto the fact that the front scar is good and (praying/hoping) that isn't how my hips/butt will heal this time around. Again, this doesn't seem to be a normal occurance. I have to hold onto to that!!
Thank you ladies so much!! Sorry for the pity party today....
Barb, thanks for the kind words
Marsha, you are on my mind today. Hope you pre-op went well and you are more at ease. Sending you hugs!!! You will do great tomorrow!!Chelle
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Hi Springtime,
I'm scheduled for phase 2, Dr. S, NOLA June 26.
Thanks,
PerryDawn
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Chelle... I asked my PT when is the best time to start the massage and she said when the drains are out... you want to look for a Lymphedema massage therapist. I think I started by googling LANA certified. They are few and far between, but they are out there. Today she massaged my lymph system to encouage drainage, but she also massaged my scar on the back to break up the adhesions.
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I had steroid injections in my breast scars along the sides. It hurt like hell but then after....ahhhh. It flattened them and the pain was gone. Before that, they were raised, Welty, itchy, sore, and I gasped in pain every time I took a bra or swimsuit off. I did try massage and oils and such first. I just self referred to a dermatologist here. It did bleed inside the scars, thereby creating a tattoo effect so they were really purple then. He said that might fade or it might not. But it felt so so so good to have the pain gone I didn't care too much. Dr. Sullivan did cut them out though at this last surgery. I am being super careful with bras and trying to make sure I never wear one that puts pressure on the sides of the breasts. However, the right one is bright red and angry looking, a little raised and itchy. So I am worried. Starting over with this surgery in so many ways....but if I have to go back for more infections I will as it really really helped. The relief was almost instant, within a day or two.
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Marsha--all the best to you tomorrow! It will be great
Gettin my booty drained again tomorrow...all least this time no out of pocket. Last aspiration cost me over $500 ---ugh!
My belly scar has some rope feeling under it...esp in the middle. I am not in pain from it though...at least that doesn't hurt
Maggie=2
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Chellehump...thinking of you. It will get better.
I emailed Laura because I have one little spot where my flap was sewn to my breast on the very inner corner where the flap meets the skin that has seperated. It's like a little opening and I'm terrified of infection. Laura look At the picture I sent and replied for me to paint it with betadine twice a day, and to let her know by the end of the week how its going or contact her right away if it gets worse. Please pray for me it resolves and heals. I will be 4 weeks out of stage 1 on Friday and Almost all the glue has come off. Has anyone had this happen ? Thanks!!
Good luck Marsha...😊0 -
Yay Mags! No out of pocket is great! 😁😁
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Melanie... Not sure what happened? But you are saying you have a small opening along an incision on your breast?? If so, that happened to me. Mine got out of control though.... and was leaking a red sticky fluid. Is that happening? Mine was leaking from the moment the incision opened. The opening just got bigger and bigger and continued to leak.., eventually the opening was huge and the whole flap slipped out of place and was all skewed. Yours sound nothing like mine.... but I now feel had I gone to a wound doctor the day it happened, I wouldn't have ended up with my complications and the need for a replacement flap.
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Betsy it bleed a little at first. Now it does seem bigger but not leaking that I can tell. I've had too many complications with expanders before this and I will call tomorrow to find out if they can send me somewhere. Thanks for the heads up !!
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Do you think I should be putting anything else on it?
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I think Betadine and some light compression... just so you know, mine was leaking profusely. If I removed the ABD pad it just ran down my belly... so it sounds like you just need to dry it up a little for it to heal.
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I had a small one on my recent flap. It was not even the size of a pencil eraser. It healed up on it's own. Keep a real good eye on it...like Betsy said it can continue further if not taken care of. My belly scar opened up and I had to go to Hyperbaric treatments for 2 1/2 months. Keep sending in pics if you are not sure or just make an appt at a local wound care center....hoping it goes away for you
Maggie-2
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Ok..thanks so much Betsy & Mags:) I am a nervous wreck about it and not going to do my 2 mile walk because I don't want to sweat in me cleavage. It's right where the spot is:(
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I had something similar to this happen after my stage 1b and 2. When he did my rotational flap the outer incision line had a little opening. (Maybe an inch long) Sent pictures regularly, and I just had to do the beta dine twice a day. It took about 3 months to close up. My stage 2 was Feb. 22 and my last incision hole just closed up over the weekend. It's a nuisance, but it was no big deal.
I did have a huge problem with my incision from stage 1: eschar, gaping hole about 6 inches long, wound doctor, wound vac followed by emergency surgery with Dr. D resulting in the rotational flap.
The difference between the small holes that didn't close along the incision and the gaping wound was night and day. The big problem was very obviously a big problem, very angry and gross looking. It was a third of my breast. The incision holes that were no problem just looked like small shallow opening that never gave me any trouble.
Don't panic yet--this could go either way. Keep an eye on it and stay in touch with Laura. Definitely trust your gut and don't be afraid to push Laura if you think it's something to panic over.
I hate to say this, but my nasty eshcar was a problem from the day after my surgery (August 1) until it was finally resolved on Oct. 31. Three very long months of Laura telling me it would heal, it would just take time. After getting conflicting information from two different wounds doctors, I panicked and went to my local ps that screwed up my DIEP for a third opinion. He told me the necrotic area was so large it would never heal. He said he would take me into surgery the next day to remove all the necrotic tissue. I called Laura in tears and said I couldn't take it anymore, and she put me on a plane the next day. Dr. D did have to remove a huge portion of my flap and replace it with the rotational. I think if I had pushed Laura a little harder I would have had the same result, but maybe a month or two sooner. Three months is a long damn time to have a gaping hole in you boob...especially when it started to smell like rotten chicken.
Sorry to be so long winded, but I guess I'm really saying trust your gut. I KNEW the eshcar wasn't getting better and I KNEW something had to be done. I just didn't want to be pushy...not my style. With the incision problems, it just didn't seem like a big deal. The holes never got bigger, just took forever to get smaller. My gut told me when to panic, but I was afraid to be a pain in the butt. You've come too far for that!
Good luck and keep us posted.0 -
Russell, haven't had that happen, but I did have a stitch I cut off (dumb, dumb dumb I know) that bled - so I put a butterfly bandage on it sort of like you would to hold skin together to avoid a stitch - it closed up in 24 hours. HOWEVER not suggesting you do that, but that that they do heal! Flaps are such delicate creatures in our hearts! And, mine was a redo of one that failed, so I was extra nuts when I did that!!!
BUT I will pray for you! I can do that!!!
Hugs
Catie0 -
Melanie.. Dianne and I had similar problems that sound very different from yours. Mine was also many inches long, kind of started right below the nipple, went down to fold, and turned toward armpit... perhaps 6-7 inches, and very deep. At one point, Laura had me doing a wet/dry packing and I could fit two whole gauze pads inside my wound. So I got the flight back to NOLA also. Luckily for me, it was 2 weeks after the wound opened. Although I feel it could have been sooner. This was one of those situations where if my doctor were local I would have gone in the minute it opened up. But since he wasn't I feel now I should have gone to a wound center and I might have avoided it from progressing. But who knows. I had problems the minute I came out of surgery - blisters, black skin, very raw.
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Perry Dawn, I added your stage 2 surgery to the list, above.
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I'm keeping a close eye on it...but trying to keep my mind off of it!
Catie.. Butterfly stitch sounds good to me. I will ask about that. Yes these flaps are near and dear to us:) thanks ALL of you0 -
Melanie, I had an open area as well, probably the size of a pencil eraser, but elongated instead of round. It was at the bottom of my mastectomy scar in the fold, so I didn't even see it for a couple of weeks. Just keep it dry, keep the betadine on and if it gets worse instead of better, I would get someone local to look at it. Nothing to panic over right now, but definitely keep a close eye on it...and trust your gut if you think you need to have it looked at.
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Betsy, wow that soon? I never would have thought to start massage right after the drains are out. Thank you SO much for asking your PT!!
I will google that and see what I come up with.
Kbodie, I heard the injections do hurt, but it's a small price to pay right? My scars are already purple and raised, but I am not going to do anything with them since I've been told it will all be cut out. Praying hard that the new scars won't heal this way!!! But, if they do, I will do what I can early on and see what happens.
Thank you Melanie for the kind words. I hope the hole is just something minor that will just heal up for you!! (((HUGS)))
To be honest, I could live with the ugly raised scars that I have now. I would do what I could to improve the look of them and move on.
It's the hard ropes that I have underneath the skin (I don't even know what to call them) that's the problem. They are about an inch wide and start at the hips and go all the way down. It's sore to lay on my side in bed
Last night I sat in those hard "school" chairs for my son's last chorus concert. I should have just stood up, but was there early and wanted to be in the front row to get pics. Paying the price though.Marsha, thinking about you today!!!
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Thanks Tracy...going with my gut for sure..it seems to be ok as of now:) xo!!!
Chellehump...I know this will be resolved for you with pt and injections after the removal underneath. You should be able to sleep on your side comfortably and also when sitting sweet friend:)
Betsy.....I looked at your pics on the forum and see that this is different. It is so amazing how fantastic you look after what you went through! These docs are truly the best. I am so happy that you have amazing results. We do deserve near perfection for enduring these journeys!0 -
no apsiration for you...come back one yr...sorry that was for all the seinfeld fans.
got to hospital for my 9am by 845..got signed in. waited...waited...manager comes out...order was put in wrong but we are trying to correct and see if we can "fit " you in today. Got back for the US finally and then radiologist would look and determine if it needs draining. Wait some more....yes he will drain it....go back to wait for him to drain and another us tech mentions that he wants to put in a drain (accordian style something)...I know Dr M last time was adamant about NOT putting a drain in so I called her. She graciously took the phone call--love her ---and say NO...have him call me if there is a problem but it just needs to be aspirated. So....tell the tech who tells the nurse who tells the doc. we wait some more and the manager comes back to tell me that the doc refuses to do the procedure. She uses the excuse that it is an out of state script. I cry and start to just rip the bp cuff etc off and start to just walk out. She tries to console me....not happening...walks us out and hands me a piece of choc cake as I was told not to eat since last night. I told her that it is unfathomable for me to believe that a doc who is supposed to help those who come to him for help can refuse treatment (on a paying customer I might ad--thru insurance). I will never choose that hospital for any procedures in the future...it is the same hosp that kicked me out for chemo 6 after performing 5 of them and refused treatment....Unbelievable. Dr M's office is working to get me in somewhere other than there. Perhaps I could just take off to the windy city and have Dr M do it---errrrrrrrr!!!!!! grrrrrrrrrrr!!!!! ugh!!!!!!!!
Maggie-2
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Awwww Maggie 2 so terribly sorry for your ordeal! So not fair or in my mind ethical! Just not right either!
Hope you get better care somewhere else!
My internist referred me to a breast surgeon who in turn referred me to a PS locally as I developed seromas and thought I needed them aspirated. Just sort of like a shuffle of responsibility - only takes a minute to aspirate! Good grief! I paid co pay of $50 PLUS insurance paid hundreds each time I went - I figured that I paid his rent for office space for the two months I had them aspirated - my PS was 6 hours away - finally went to my PS and he said when he would take care of the seromas as stage 2 I wouldn't need a drain- he didn't want the local PS (which was why I stopped going) to put in a drain!
Stage 2 took care of seromas just fine. I went 5 months without aspiration after going weekly for 2 months! My body absorbed quite a bit of the fluid as time went on.
But you have to believe what goes around comes around with your experience today - just isn't fair what you had to go through! Especially after all you have BEEN through!
Hugs
Catie0 -
Oh, Maggie -- that is BS! Who do these people think they are? It sounds like they absolutely didn't know what they were doing. I'm so sorry -- what is your plan B?
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The nasty part of me (and the Irish in me) might have used that cake to make a statement! Good grief!!!!!!! Like cake would do it?
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My care cooridinator is trying to get me in somewhere else...Dr M will call me tonight and tell me if she wants me to go to er again ( that will be $500 please) Becky said er cannot refuse tx...hope that is true
Maggie0 -
Hi All,
I PM'd NoWhereGirl two separate times about getting access to the picture forum but got no answer. Did I do something wrong?
I am in my 5th week following Stage 1 hip flap with Dr. S. My right breast (which I had a prophylatic mastectomy) feels pretty soft while the radiated breast is somewhat hard in places. And both breasts look a little sad, not as perky as I would have expected and they spread under my arms. I'm not discouraged and hope that corrections made in stage 2 will rectify these problems. My questions are what does the PS do in order to make a nipple and second, I have a little bit of an indent occurring along my hip incision where the tissue was taken, where does the fat come from that the PS will inject to fill in the indent?
So many questions.....
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I heard ER cannot refuse either from my PS. Again, so sorry!
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Mags, So sorry you are running in to medical issues. Enough already! There has to be someone in that city that can see you. Good grief. If I still lived there I would pester some of my Dr. friends. Stay strong.....don't let them get you down. Hugs, Jamie
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