Bye bye booby

 So here we are again. I’m now 6 days post a full mastectomy and I’m actually feeling ok.

Physically I have very little pain. Whether this is due to nerves being cut, I don’t know. I also have a wound vac across my chest at the moment which may be protecting me from soreness. That’s due to be removed tomorrow and replaced with a normal dressing so I’ll find out then if pain levels rise. This nifty little gadget is called a Pico Vac and is supposed to make healing much quicker! So I lose that tomorrow but I also have a surgical drain to get rid of excess fluid. That stays in until the fluid draining is less than 30ml for 2 days. Yesterday it was 70ml so I’m heading in the right direction.

The actual operation day was fairly smooth. I’d pleaded with my consultant and he’d put me first on the list this time so no hanging around this time. The only hiccup was when the anaesthetist had got the cannula in my hand to administer the meds (I have very small veins so that’s a bit of an achievement) but then managed to trip on the tube and yank it out of my hand! He was very embarrassed and then had to place it in my arm instead. 

So I was back on the ward by 1:30pm and texted the girls who set off to trek to see me bringing plant milk with them as hospitals really do not cater for lactose intolerance! I had a heated blanket on me for a while post op which made me a bit sweaty! The registrar who assisted in my op came to see me which was nice and told me everything went well but I had to stay in overnight for the wound to be monitored. As usual this meant I got very little sleep but managed to escape home by lunchtime the next day.

The next step is to go see my consultant just to get final pathology results and then he refers me to the medical oncologist to set up chemo. At least I get a few weeks to heal until then! 

I said I would explain why I was choosing not to have reconstruction. There were a few reasons really. I couldn’t have reconstruction straight to implants because I have to have radiotherapy so I would have had to have expanders placed in my chest and then 3 procedures to stretch them and my skin. Then I would have needed a further op to switch the expanders for implants once I’d finished all active treatment. This would have left me with a boob like shape probably with no sensation and definitely with no nipple. On top of all this I would then have needed a boob reduction on the other side to give me symmetry. That’s a lot of treatments especially when you consider chemo and radiotherapy are planned too. At least now I can say I’m done with the surgery part.

So well done if you’ve got this far! You’ve earned a reminder that my Amazon wish list is still open

https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/3GZPJYORL1AEL?ref_=wl_share

So onwards and upwards and check your boobs ladies!!!

PS: Nurse took the Pico Vac off today and I’ve healed really well. I’ve got a normal dressing on now which is more comfortable.

PPS: a couple of hospital pics

Back on the ward post op with my lovely heated blanket 😂

Always happier once they’ve fed me!


Wrangled a fan!


My poor battered arm







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