GRRRRRRRRR I HATE LE..........
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GMA, what does your doc say about the leaking? sounds like a call is in order to me
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Nope Proudtospin... he says let it leak - Better out than in...
I told him, you already took my nipple, I don't need to be leaking anymore LOL... He smiled... told me it would close eventually... 0 -
Gma, my incision leaked for weeks, literally. There was one small area that stayed open for a long time but finally it did heal. If the fluid wasn't able to escape somehow I suspect it could be quite painful. I just kept the area very clean, covered it with gauze when I was dressed and would lie in bed and watch tv in the evening with nothing on it to let the air at it. Finally I was able to wear old (clean) t-shirts to bed at night as the amount leaking lessened.
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Marple, the weird thing is it was healed - 6 weeks post surgery actually... and my breast was painful from the LE and I guess, a seroma no one knew about.. It just scared the life out of me when it burst through... It reminded me of the time my water broke (many years ago LOL)... It was just a real tiny hole between my old lumpectomy scar and my new surgery scar (8/8/12).. Surgeon said there must have been a weak spot.. I really thought it would relieve the pain in my breast... it didn't, in fact it hurts more.. it woke up more nerves I guess. But this soon shall pass, and all will be well... The truncal swelling is almost in control and all but the good arm swelling, my LE looks in control... We shall see about the good arm later today after the U/S..Thanks for your encouragement... it is always welcome...
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Man do I relate to that photo. I slept two hours last night. I had my six month chest scan today. Bring on the anxiety...only four more days till I find out if the spot has change and if they still think it is scar tissue. grrr. I hate weighting. On the plus side...that darn contrast today has made me pee all day. As you said better out than in when it comes to that extra fluid we don't want.
Good Luck GMA
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Man do I relate to that photo. I slept two hours last night. I had my six month chest scan today. Bring on the anxiety...only four more days till I find out if the spot has change and if they still think it is scar tissue. grrr. I hate weighting. On the plus side...that darn contrast today has made me pee all day. As you said better out than in when it comes to that extra fluid we don't want.
Good Luck GMA
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Kittydog, looking forward with you to great news before the weekend! Nice that they're so careful of us, but -- man! -- what a waiting game!
Keep us posted!
Gentle hugs,
Binney0 -
Kittydog - Hope all did well with your testing... I haven't ventured to having any contrast tests with anything because of my allergies - I did have the radioactive fluid for a few bone scans though.
I get the results of my arm ultrasound weds. But I was able to watch the screen most of the time.. bad part is I know what I am seeing
. The tech was having trouble finding the flow in the veins and the lumps didn't really show up at the same time... I think the swelling in the arm was making it hard on her to get good shots... therefore: I don't think the radiologist has anything to go on... We will see what he says on his report - 2 days..0 -
Well, this is strange... not sure until I actually hear from one of the doctors... I called to ask if my report came in and just remind the doc about it..(he usually calls me back with the results). It is a big clinic but the receptionist that was to relay the message, said my file had a note on it - "to tell patient everything is normal" Ok... if you say so.."everything" labs, u/s, arm????. But as I said earlier - I couldn't see anything either.. so here I sit with my good arm swollen and have no clue what is going on with it... I'm waiting for one of the docs to tell me - "its just FAT" ... can you tell I'm depressed today.. need to go out for a walk before my eye appt this afternoon - whether I leak or not
Edit - Talked to the Surgeon's office and all the veins are normal... They made no mention of the lumps... so - oh well... I have main lumps that you can feel and they were ignored and not mentioned in the report..
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Went for a pet scan today and this time I asked them to be sure to do the blood ck and iv in the foot as I am now bilat LE. She made a big deal asked the supervisor who said to call the doc who said yes do it in the foot. The blood prick took 5 toes before I could give them enough blood to do the glucose ck. Then the chaos ensued when they tried to do the IV. The pet scan tech has never done one so got another "more experienced" gal to do it. She tried the first one with a blood pressure cuff inflated on the leg and NOPE...tries again up near the inside of the ankle and NOPE and then goes to the other foot and again NOPE. At this point I am in tears more from the frusrtation of the experience than the pain--although it really hurt like H**L. I am having my recon next month and know that they will use the foot for the surgery IV and was imagining how aweful that is going to go. So I finally say "Just do my right hand and I will accept the risks" They asked if I was sure and I said yes...go for it. Really hope I did not make it worse in the arm. It has not been swollen for a bit and I wear my sleeves everyday so here's to hoping for the best. Anyway just wanted to let you know that GRRRRRRRRR I hate LE!
Maggie
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OHHHHHHH MAGSSSSSSS I know that feeling - I gave in when I was leaking and it was a BP in the forarm... My upper arm had slight swelling after that but i managed enough MLD to get the swelling back down... I hope and pray nothing happens... NO Swelling for you!!!!!
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Heres to us GRRRRers. I've got a GRRRR. I took a good gouge out of my thumb with a knive today. Damn Damn Damnit. Anyway, you can't go back. I knew better at the time, the way I was cutting.
Peroxided it well.........once I got the bleeding stopped. Antibiotic ointment all over liberally. Couldn't hold the gauze in place so went to my dog's veterinarian and got some vet wrap. Works well. Steri-stips would have been better to hold the skin flap in place but it seems nobody has them in this town and I really did not want to go to a human Dr. and wait. I was already at a Dr. this morning. The Dr. is a dermatologist but still, he'd have had steri-strips!!! Believe me, the next Dr. I see, I'll get some.
DH and I are going out with friends for supper tonight. That's the upside of cutting my thumb. I mean really!! Who can work in the kitchen with such an injury?
Here's hoping I don't 'see red'.
Hugs to all and here's to a GRRRR free evening.
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Marple - here is hoping your thumb is ok this morning...
U/S came back - "normal" no blood clots - no mention what the lumps in my arm are, my leak has slowed to almost nothing even though it looks a little red this morning - watching it... and Bilateral ladies... as of today, I have joined the club... my doc said, if the U/S came back normal, to treat my good upper arm swelling as LE... So I am donning both sleeves for work this morning..
Have I said, GRRRRRR...I hate LE...lately???Imagine God in His HUGE rocking chair, rocking you and saying, "It will be ok, you can do it. I will be right here for you".
Ok off to my computer work ladies.. have a good day
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Marple how are you doing??? Been thinking about you???
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Just reread some of the pages - Thanks Binney, kira, kittydog and Nibbana - I haven't tried Vanicream yet.. others seem to bother me including the Eucerin.. I will look for the "lite" version..
I also noticed, I have kinda taken over the pages again
- sorry.. Round area of pink is ok??? Red, hot, fever is not??? The skin around my little hole - noticed last night I had a circle of pink about 1.5 inches in diameter.. Doesn't seem warm..
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GmaFoley, even though it doesn't seem warm, it would probably be a good idea to use antibiotic ointment on it and keep a CLOSE watch on it.
Sigh. So much for preparing before surgery. I thought having the port accessed before the surgery would take care of the IV problem and then I'd just have to argue with everyone about the foot IVs. WRONG. My port was accessed, I was put under, and then it was decided that the port was too close to the mx site and it would cause problems for the surgeons. So they had to remove the port needle and ended up using my hand. I wish I had known that beforehand since then I would have just had them do an IV in my neck (foot wouldn't have worked, they had pressure bandages on my legs so protect againist clots). My hand was slightly swollen the next day - not bad enough to look swollen but my ring was tight - but I haven't had any problems since, and didn't have any infection problems. BS did make sure the IV was removed ASAP instead of 24 hrs after surgery (standard at this hospital) with orders that if I needed more IV fluids or meds the port was to be used. I was more worried about the BP, but every nurse who did BP for me had the same reaction when I said to use the foot: "Oh, OK". It's now 3 weeks since surgery and I haven't had any problems since the day after surgery. I'll probably be going to my LE PT in the next week or so and I think I'll ask about doing MLD on both sides a a precaution.
Leah
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Leah - I'm so sorry that happened to you - how can you protect yourself when you're knocked out??? Grrrrr. I was so afraid of that happening to me as well that before the last couple of surgeries I made sure they wrote on my arm with NO RT ARM PROCEDURES. Then, during that pre-op parade of surgeons, anesthesiologists, OR nurses, etc. I specifically drew their attention to the warning on my arm, and stated directly to each one of them that I did not want to wake up with an IV or BP cuff on that arm. I felt a little foolish like I was over-reacting, but hearing your story makes me glad I did it. Sad that we have to go to those extremes to protect ourselves.
Gma - on your pink spot - I'd do the standard draw a line around it, then it'll be clear whether it's getting larger or not.
Trying to get back into doing that opening sequence of the Lebeds each and every day. I'd kind of gotten out of the habit, but that's made me realize how much they help with the truncal LE. My new LET gave me a gentle whap upside the head about the need to do the Lebeds and the need to keep well-hydrated, something that I also tend to get lax about. So, I'm trying to get back into the Lebed and water habits again.
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Maybe we should start a "Have You Done Your Lebeds Today?" check-in thread where we'd be encouraged to post if we'd done the Lebeds each day?? It might inspire us to keep up with it if we have to be accountable to each other. What do you all think - would you find a Lebed check-in thread a useful reminder to keep you on track? Or is it too much trouble or something you wouldn't use? I'll be glad to start it if some of us think it would be useful - let me know!
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I am ignorant on Ledbed
anyone care to give me the site to learn this??? 0 -
me too, ignorant and want to learn
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NatsFan - Circle drawn.. Sitting here working on computer all morning - haven't paid attention to it.. think it is growing - I just said yesterday I'm on a anti-doctor diet - Not going back for a month .. HMMMM... 0
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Or, just start reporting Lebed time on the kick-LE's-butt thread, which is about exercise and LE self-care. We tend to say alot about exercise there, and more reminders on Lebed would be both welcome and helpful.
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Good idea Carol - I just posted there.
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OK ladies, going to the website has increased my confusion. Is it this one?
Healthy-Steps Class DVD #1 HSTS Class DVD #1
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What are these Lebed exercises anyway? Come on, don't keep us in the dark!
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I had a great visit with my Oncologist's office. Chest scan no change and they even think now that the spot is something benign as in dead cells or even a cluster of dead blood vessels. My CA 27-29. was down to a 16. Last December it was a 22. So I repeat all my big scans the first week in Dec. Thanks for all the prayers. I felt everyone. My anxiety was a lot less this time despite it being a very frustrating week....now just tell my blood pressure to go back down. lol It is 90% always high at there office.
As far as my LE...I am having a bad week. I haven't worn a thing and can honestly say it is no wrose than when I am wearing them. My fungus-yeast spot actually is looking better finally. I think it needed to have fresh dry air.
Hope everybody has a great weekend!
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Nibbana - Lebeds are a series of slow, tai chi like exercises that when done in sequence can give you some of the same benefits of MLD. There's a 15 minute opening sequence which starts at the neck doing exercises to help drain those nodes, then the exercises progress to move fluid along, involving arms and trunk, eventually doing some exercises to help drain the inguinals. There are other sequences that concentrate on arms, legs, etc. totalling a full hour, but all I have time for is the opening sequence. You don't feel like you're doing much exercise when you're doing them, and frankly I don't notice a lot of immediate benefit, but I do notice is that my truncal LE absolutely gets worse when I skip doing them for a week or so. That's how I know they're effective for me. They're one of my primary maintenance exercises.
Quail - you're right - there are a lot of options on that website! I got my DVD from my LET so I never had to figure out which one to buy. Based on the look of the cover, I think this is the one I have: http://www.gohealthysteps.com/store/?productID=3 I think it's one of her early ones, and frankly the production values are lacking, but the exercises are effective. I'll try to dig out my DVD to verify. I actually haven't watched the DVD in months - after I'd done the opening sequence for several weeks, I had them pretty well memorized. I wrote out a "cheat sheet" to work from if I can't remember the next move so I can do them anywhere. Now I can watch the MLB Baseball network in the morning while doing my Lebeds - much more fun!
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I have to confess, I went to my gym during my radiation treatments. Stopped the old spin classes~~but did other junk. At the end of my treatment I signed up with a personal trainer. Anthony was great, no knowledge before me of any BC stuff but do think I taught the guy~He was a grad student in public health at the time. He got me doing weights, worked with me on my balance issues and basically, got me in the gym more often!
Lymphedemia, well got some but managing it.
I remember my BS when I asked about going to the gym....endorsed it completely as she said, many of her patient just sat and got stiff!
Love my PT guy Anthony! he should be a lymphedemia trainer guy!
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KittyDog, HOORAY!!!
And whew! May every onc visit go so well!
Now let's see, what to do about the blood pressure...hmmm, I think the cure for that is chocolate.
Worth a try, anyway!Big hugs,
Binney0 -
Just another voice here to say that the Lebed video really helps me too. I've only ever done the whole thing twice ... but I do the lymphathic opening almost every day and it really, really helps. I think I bought mine on Amazon.
http://www.amazon.com/Healing-Through-Therapeutic-Exercise-Movement/dp/B000HWY60G
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