TE TROUBLE
Comments
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Alilou,
There is a forum called get togethers and there is a 4th annual weekend getaway to Las Vegas in late September. I'm thinking of going. Also in this forum, BC sisters from particular cities have get togethers on a monthly basis. I just discovered there was one in San Diego....
Take care,
T0 -
Just wanted to throw this in...My friend Meme went with me to our sons' Math meet today. She has been in stage 4 metastatic BC for almost 10 years! She's such a pitbull. She works full time and is enjoying every moment raising her 2 boys. She has had 14 surgeries! And she's still not "even". She's going to see my PS soon when she gets a port issue cleared up. She had one side with a TE then implant, and a DIEP on the other. What a woman! So when I get down on myself sometimes, I think of and admire her tenacity.
Hope everyone has a great weekend. The muscle spasms seem to have stopped. PS said that it definitely sounds like I overdid it yesterday at the gym and to take it easy. That was scary.
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alilou - I am always up for a party! Tell me when!
OK - the water main underneath my front lawn broke yesterday. My sidewalk and lawn are mostly gone and I had city work crews in my front yard until 2:30 a.m. They had to replace 5' of pipe, and I have an 8'x8' hole in my front yard. We are on a "boil water" order on our street and I am hoping my garage doesn't fall into this giant hole! You Florida ladies know my sinkhole fear here! All is good so far and we are now waiting on the dump truck load of dirt to come fill in the hole. They will re-sod my lawn at some point. Crazy! I came home from my good-news echocardiogram, to find water spewing up from the street!
momof3 - sounds like it might be nerve pain, if not muscle spasm. I had this too and it was caused by some swelling or pinching. Maybe your workout caused a minor shift and something is being pinched. Hope it goes away soon. I have a veritable pharmacy at my house so come on over!
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Hey that Las Vegas getaway in late September that Tatina is talking about sounds great. We should look into and meet up. That would be great. Can you imagine a bunch of women comparing TE stories, scars, foobs and everything else, sounds like a blast to me.
hahahahah
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Ugh SpecialK...maybe you can turn the hole into a swimming pool?
I had yesterday and today off from my sub teacher job and it has rained most of the time. Cleaned, cleaned, and cleaned some more. Right now I have a stupid bird banging into my big great room window pooping each time he does it.
I met up with Hale0811Today for a breakfast snack. Had a great time talking with someone who gets it. Hope to get together with her over the summer, our boys sound very similiar!
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Hi ladies, so sorry to hear of the troubles that have cropped up again. I hope those of you who had surgery this week will be feeling great soon. Wish I could give you a hug, or bring you some homemade cookies (chocolate, of course, because it really does make you feel better!).
Mom-thanks for sharing the info regarding your stage IV friend, it's very encouraging and a great reminder that there are women who've gone before us who have endured far more than we have (so far....) so yeah, some days we just need to put our big girl panties on and deal with things. Easier said than done at times, believe me I know!!
I had a call from a Wellmark Case Manager today. We discussed my care, my doctors, my meds..and then I dropped the bomb that the PS didn't do what he said he would do and asked if I had any recourse via Insurance. She is going to check on things and get back to me, but she (as has been EVERYONE I tell the story to) was appalled. I'm trying to let go of my irritation about it because I don't want to live my life crabby. However, I don't want to just accept what they did either. So there ya go, I'm in a pickle of sorts. And a mid life crisis it seems. Hubby and I are flying out tomorrow morning (thank you frequent flier miles) to go pick up my midlife crisis car in Chicago. A Nissan 350Z convertible. Yes, this is midlife and I'd say it definitely qualified as a crisis. If you ladies ever decide you want to meet up, I'm in! And...if you're the praying sort, would you mind keeping my dad in your prayers? He's having his prostate removed Monday due to cancer. Thanks and have a great Friday!
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Yikes, SpecialK---that is scary! Hope it was just a fluke & NOT a sinkhole of any size, shape or form!
Alilou, glad you made it through the procedure okay.
Olgah, sorry for your continued troubles.
Momof3, hope you are over the spasms now.
Tatina & chickadee, I also notice that is pretty uncomfortable to sleep any way other than on my back now. The implants kind of pinch in the sternum area if I try sleeping on my side.
Evebarry, congrats.
Hi to everyone else--hope you are all doing well!
I am doing weekly fills, have had 2 so far & have another on Monday. PS mentioned having me start wearing an underwire bra soon to help shape the saline side as he fills it.
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Well, Dr. Buck (PS) just pulled up next to me in her cute little convertible. What are the chances? LOL. I yelled "Hey Lady!" and she started laughing, said she'd call me in some Valium and to use a heating pad. I think I'm OK now so will forego the Valium, but it's nice to know she's looking out for me. Too funny.
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Too funny, momof3!
MTNester, I gotta ask---what is your tattoo? I see a pink ribbon in there...
(I met with a tattoo artist a couple of days ago & have an appt for next month. She's working on my design.)
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DLL-it's a pink ribbon with black "art nouveau" ribbons around it (tattoo artist's words, not mine). I had a photo I liked and showed it to him. He went back to his "studio" and drew up the design you see in my photo. I absolutely love it, it's like my own badge of courage.
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DLL66 - thanks and congratulations. You are coming along. That is great.
MTnester - Hope all goes well with you and I am the praying sort. Will definitely pray for you and your dad. BTW that tatoo is awesome.
Special K and everyone else - we really should think about meeting up in Las Vegas during this reunion. It would be great I know it. They will be having the details and everything in the Get Together Forum and I think its the 4th Reunion in Las Vegas topic. Check it out.
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dll - the hole took a full dump truck of dirt and is only half full. I think the worker peeps went to lunch and are coming back with another truck. It is not a sinkhole as far as they are concerned - just a water main break - just happens to be on my lawn!!
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momof3: Whenever I sleep on the side where the new TE was inserted, I have a lot of discomfort afterwards. Half a muscle relaxer seems to help with the pain.
Olgah: Have you gotten a second opinion?
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hello all, I haven't posted much lately, been spending too much time on the compute, taking a bit of a break. Congrats to those who had procedures this week.
Olgah, I would think about a 2nd opinion. You have time now that the TE is out. You've had such trouble that it would be good to have another set of eyes review your case.
My little pin hole continues to heal. This is a minor (no, major!) miracle as y'all know! I'll post a pic on the pic forum. I see PS on Tuesday and that should be interesting. I want to hear what his colleague says about my case. I haven't told PS that my pin hole has closed. (I didn't want anything to stop him from talking to his buddy about my case!). Everyone, enjoy your weekend!
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I had another fill yesterday. We are three expansions away from being done
My PS mentioned doing some fat grafting to get a better shape on the problem side. I'm nervous about this! He mentioned taking a small amount (like 50cc) from my tummy and relocating it to the breast area. I know some of you have done fat grafting with implants. Are you happy? Did it really improve the appearance of your reconstruction? How much fat did your doc relocate? Did your insurance pay for this? So many questions!!!0 -
SpecialK - Oh my gosh! Is everything okay now on your street?
Alilou - I'm going to Vegas....I wouldn't miss this for anything!
MtNester - your tattoo is amazing.
Momof3 - Same thing happened to me this week. I was covering a fundraiser for a newspaper and my PS was there. We stared at each other for about 60 seconds until it registered how we knew each other. I introduced him as my PS, the one putting me back together again.... I resisted the urge to flash him to make sure the TE's were OK.
DLL66- Yeah on the fills!
Sunder mom - so happy for you....
Ren - Tell us how Tuesday goes. I wouldn't have said anything either about the great pinhole update.
Night!
T0 -
alilou, the reason my plastic surgeon wants to do the other breast is because last year I was dx with idc, but it was grade 1, slow growing that rarely mets. My breast surgeon said it was a favorable type of cancer.. It seems that surgery alone was enough for the left breast. Mammograms has never shown anything more than the rare mucinious cancer found in the left breast. However, the right breast had to go because it has been dx 3 times with idc, high grade with the her2+ factor.
I saw no need to take off more than the right breast, due to the left breast is NED. i see no need to remove it just to remove it. It would be nice to have them match and to do so I will probably have to go to another plastic surgeon. If anything is done, it needs to be done this year as it will cost me less due to deductables. I do like the feel of the natural breast than the implant which feels like a implant.
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sundermom-I had fat grafting 3 weeks ago. He took aout 100cc (50 for each side). I think it made them look more natural in the upper pole area and cleavage area. I am glad I had it done despite the pain I had early on (I was in pretty good pain for 2 days in the lipo area). Fluff is having fg in a week I believe.
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I have been avoiding this thread. I spotted it early on and told myself, "DO NOT LOOK!!! But I looked because now, I belong here.
At at the very beginning of this process. Just went for post op second optinion and had my suspiciouns confirmed. My right TE needs to be repositioned. It's too low and its been this way since the beginning. My "rockstardoc" who I fired last week, tells me it can be easily corrected during the exchange but that didn't make sense to me especially since I can't take a deep breath without pain - feels like a bruised or broken a rib.
I have included a picture of it on a blog post called GROWTH. This is the link:
http://greenmonkeytales.blogspot.com/2012/03/yes-theyre-fake.html
I would like to know what you TE wearers think of the positioning. My bmx was 3/5.
Thanks! Shannon aka Monkey
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greenmonkey - I am curious if you (or actually any of the ladies who post on this thread) took pictures of your natural breasts, pre-mastectomy. The reason I ask is that I also had a TE that was much lower than the other - and it was my problem side (the non-cancer side). That TE had been placed at BMX, removed once and put back, then removed again and left out for 7 months, then replaced and finally filled. My PS also said we will correct the asymmetry at exchange. He also said that nobody has even breasts, it is natural for one to be lower than the other. I went and looked at my original picture and he was absolutely correct. I have now been exchanged and they are much more even. I looked at your blog picture - it was difficult for me to tell very much difference between sides. You have to understand that shaping of TE's is, and willl continue to look, very weird throughout the fill process. They will also change shape as you go through the fill process. You are still experiencing swelling and scarring internally, your BMX was not very long ago, so this is also contributing to odd shaping. I am not saying that the TE does not need repositioning, just that even if you do that it may still look odd to you. Please let us know what your PS consults say.
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Thanx Special K ,I will probably look around for a suit thats lined or whatever so I can adjust with "chickn cutlets" if needed cause dunno how the fills will look by July. I am still a growing girl!!Lol. I dont see how our new boobs could sag much,they put them up so high. The docs are actually hoping for a little droop so we look natural. Some lady told me they took out her muscle and she has everything under her skin but I dont think she knows what she is talking about. I can feel my TE but I can also feel the pain from the muscle if I try to reach too high. The muscles get sore from the stretching because they are supposed to lie against the chest wall but the TE is under there pushing them out..guess its ok to do,they do it to lots of the patients that way. the weird stuff docs do to us,how about those stomach staplers? I have some black dots also but those are pieces of the stitches dissolving I think and now that the swelling is going down I am surprised what a thin line it is from the bmx! The stitching made it look like an earthworm sort of. The node cut is actually thicker cut than the bmx! Strange. Thinkg of putting scar silicone on them later on. Hope my PS doesnt get into this website and find out about me.
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Welcome to another thread, GM! SpecialK is one of our resident TE experts!
My TEs are also lopsided. I was told it would be fixed upon exchange. Its one of the items on my list to ask at my second opinion. I need to take new pics and post in my FB surgery album. The left has dropped quite a bit I feel. While I know my right is still relatively new, it was replaced at Halloween last year, it's still higher. My current PS assures me it's nothing toworry about but it is concerning what your 2nd PS told you.
Rain is coming through again. I've got SO many errands to run today too. Ugh.
Michelle0 -
Layla - I posted something similar a few days ago. I think my TEs were placed under my skin. I have an appt in a week and a half. I'm going to ask. I havebeen back with my personal trainer for three weeks. I've been working with weights and resistance bands. I don't see any movement in my TEs, like I had before BMX, when I'm doing certain movements. I can feel my TE directly under my skin. If I pinch the skin around it, there's just a very thin layer of skin and then there's the TE.
Michelle0 -
Layla, I forgot to mention, Amoena makes really nice bathing suits. Specially designed of course for prosthetics. They are a little pricey but very well made. They had some suits at the place I got my prosthetics. I thought about getting one then but have since gave up my prosthetics.
Also, I read about scar silicone. Do you have the strips? I'd like to know if those work. The scar on my right side has started to get puffy instead of fading like my left side.
Michelle0 -
Last summer I found a tankini top @ Target that had removable cups, which means there's an opening for forms. Never had a chance to try it out though -- I didn't want to risk it with my healing incisions, plus I was told to stay out of the sun by my PS & my RO. Maybe this year!
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Welcome Green Monkey!
My TE's are not exactly even either. I had my right one removed due to infection, waited 6 months and had it put back in. The left one has been in for over a year and is really hard, lots of scar tissue. It sits much lower than righty. My PS said that this happens, and really the name of the game at this point is to just stretch the skin. Once the implants go in at exchange surgery, adjustments are made and they will be symmetrical.
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Not even, either, Green Monkey. But I'm sure that will change after the exchange.
DIFFERENT QUESTION: I am overdue for a dental cleaning but am terrified because of the infection risk to the TE's. Ladies, please calm me down about this. I know I need to go on antibiotics before, during and after, corrcect? I'm wondering whether I do it now or wait until after my exchange?
Thanks,
T
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I think we discussed this already. My PS doesn't think it necessary to go on antibiotics. Neither did the dentist. I'd ask your PS and dentist. I have seen the dentist once after the TE was put back in and once since implants. Have not gone on antibiotics either time.
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Thank you, Chick! This is news to me.....
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I'm to chicken to go to the dentist until after I'm done. Im supposed to take antibiotics before, during, after also if I go to the dentist. I'm taking extra care with flossing and brushing.
Michelle0
