Mommy Makeover: Stories

Hi! I'm a 32 year old mommy of a 7 year old and a 21 month old. My sugery is less than 2 weeks away!! I spent 2011 losing about 55 pounds that I had been hanging onto since the birth of my oldest. I now weigh about 125 pounds (5'4") and this is the skinniest I've been in my adult life.

Looking at my naked pics though, I would never believe that. My stomach has always been my problem area...I've never worn a bikini. I've also gone down about 4 cup sizes but have very heavy, sagging breasts. Insurance has approved a reduction with 400 grams removed from each breast but I've opted to pay for the procedure up front so that I don't come out too small.

The PS will make me about a c-cup. If that happens to remove 400, then they will bill it to insurance. I've found this site so helpful, reading other people's experiences, viewing their before/after pics. I'm so excited and nervous at the same time.

My husband plans to be home with me for a week but I know I won't be ale to hold my little one for awhile and that is what's upsetting me the most right now. I plan to keep this updated as I progress...wish me luck!!

Before pics added.

This time next week I should be coming out of surgery! I'm getting really anxious and trying to prepare my house,etc. for my recovery. Of course, my husband is traveling for work this week and my son has Roseola. I'm so paranoid about getting sick myself before the surgery. I took him tone doc today and then slathered us both in Purell. I have all of my prescriptions ready and this weekend we are picking up a recliner (the kind that helps stand you up) from my hubby's grandmother.

The countdown is on!!!

So...I'm 3 days from my surgery date and it's been quite a week at my house. We'd been dealing with ear infections with my kids and I got a cold sore on the roof of my mouth that makes my glands swell, sore throat, etc. My doctor gave me a script for valtrex. Then, my daughter came home from school Thursday crying about her throat, stomach and fever. I was waiting for my husband to return home from a business trip to take her to the doctor. When he walked in he obviously had pinkeye. Ugh!! They went to the doctor and Gracie was positive for strep. The doctor also sent them home with a zpack for me, just in case.

I'm a wreck over all of this. I so don't want surgery to be canceled. I called my PS office and they said the anesthesiologist will determine on Monday morning if I'm okay for surgery. I started the zpack last night, disinfected my entire house today, and keeping us quarantined until I take the kids to my sister's on Sunday. Ahhhh!!!!!!

Ok, let me try this again. I started typing up an update last night but dozed off and lost it all. I guess I'm now post-op day 2. I arrived Monday morning for surgery, met with the nurses, anesthesia, and the doctor did my markings. I think I went to sleep around 9 AM. They started with me on my stomach for Lipo of flanks, then turned me over for the reduction/lift and tummy tuck. Surgery took about 5 hours and I woke up in some good pain. They gave me some morphine but still needed to get my binder, etc on. I asked if they knew how much the dr removed from my breasts and she said only 38 grams from one and 44 from the other. That really freaked me out! I hadn't expected at all to meet the 400/each that insurance required but those numbers seem so low. Im afraid of still being too big, but they said I didn't have much density, just a lot of skin. Everything is so swollen now so I'll have to wait and see. I had my first dose of OxyContin and some crackers before leaving. Make sure you eat something with your meds! I forgot once and ended up with horrible nausea. I used the suppositories the dr had prescribed to help the nausea. The first evening home wasn't too terrible but once all of the meds from surgery wore off, the pain really kicked in. I didn't get the painpump, but he told me he did out some anesthetic inside before closing up.

Tuesday was pretty rough. I had a post-op appointment with the surgeon at 2:30. I increased the oxy from 1 pill every 4 hours to 2 pills. At my appt, dr told me I could do that every 3 hours. That has helped some in staying on top of the pain. Also said I could include Tylenol. They removed all of the gauze and tape, then just applied new gauze without all of the tape. That was a relief. I mentioned that I had some knee pain that I thought was from sleeping with my leg twisted in the recliner. He told me if the pain increased to call them...long story but I ended up at the ER that evening for a sonogram of my leg. The ER was a madhouse. We were there about 4 hours and luckily my husband tracked someone down to get the results from radiology so I didn't have to wait all night. Dr still wants me up every 2 hours for the first 2-3 days but I need to pee about that often anyway.

Doing slightly better this morning. My kids came back home last night but my hubby is home all week. I have to remember that I'm not even 48 hours post-op yet. I got on the scale and was up about 4 pounds from my pre-surgery weight. My husband did take a pic when my bandages were off yesterday. Il try to get that downloaded later. Does anyone know if u can do that from an iPad or iPhone? Getting sleepy again. I'll have to retread this when I'm more awake to see what I left out.

Post Op Day 3 - Just got the pictures from yesterday uploaded. I'm still a bit nervous about the size of my breasts but hoping that they will calm down when the swelling goes. My belly is also very swollen still. You can see it puffing up around my belly button. But no more stretch marks! I think in the end I'll be very happy with everything. My neighbor cam Dover today, who had a TT by Dr Lowe last year. I remember hers looking just like mine that first week and now it's flat as a pancake.

I was thinking today that I'm so glad I didn't just let the insurance dictate my reduction. In that case I would have had to have 400 grams per breast removed. I think that would have left me with little to no breasts. You just don't know the density until you get in there. Something to think about.

I had another not so great night. The evening was pretty good, walked into the kids rooms and kissed them goodnight. But then my stomach started rumbling and the gas pains kicked in big time. I was miserable by midnight and my husband went out to find Gas X. I felt like that made me belch a little but I really needed it to come out the other end. I also started taking Colace (Was only using Miralax until then). That's kind of continued thru today but I'm a bit more comfortable. I open the binder periodically to see if that will help move things along. The doctor's office said I could do an enema if I really get desparate.

I'd been starting to feel a bit wonky from the pain meds and thought I could cut it back to 1 pill every 3 hours. I was wrong. Definitely not ready for that yet. Right now I'm trying 2 pills every 4 hours. Speaking of which, feels like nap time!

Post Op Day 5 - The past 2 days have been an improvement. I've been able to straighten up a lot and stopped taking the Oxycodone on Wednesday night. I felt like it was starting to make me feel a bit crazy. I kept nodding off to sleep and having dreams about me getting hurt in frightening situations. Also, I wanted to get off of it because of the constipation issues. I've just been taking Tylenol since then. I ended up using a Dulcolax suppository 2 nights ago which was supposed to cause a bowel movement in 15 min to 1 hour. The next morning I still had nothing and the gas/bloating was so uncomfortable. I decided to use the Milk of Magnesia and that did produce some small loose bowel movements and I was able to pass some gas. Not very satisfying, but it was better. Still working on that.

My mom came yesterday and was able to wash my hair. I kneeled on a chair and leaned forward over the kitchen sink. It was very nice to feel somewhat clean again. I also removed my garments so they could be washed. We took a picture and you can see my hips are still really swollen from the lipo, but I'm really happy with my shape so far. The breasts are still on the large side but it's crazy to not have them hanging down by my belly button.

I slept for the most straight hours that I have since surgery last night. But I woke up drenched in sweat. I got up and changed my soaked clothes and fell back asleep for about 2 more hours. Soaked again. My body temp is also pretty low. I've been registering between 97-98 degrees. I looked up the night sweats and a lot of people reported having them and say it's the body healing. But I couldn't find any official medical explanation.

My son woke up from a nap today when someone came to the door. He started crying and I could hear my husband was caught up with something so I wobbled in there. I tried to lay him back down but couldn't even manage to try to assist him back into a laying position. My hubby is going back to work Monday and my mom will be helping next week but not full time. I still think it'll be tough.

My weight before surgery was about 124. Right after I was up to 130. Today I was down to 123 and hopefully more to come. My drains are still putting out about 40-80 cc's each in a 24 hour period. It's going down but still not where it needs to be to have them removed. Hoping it cooperates for my appointment on Monday afternoon.

Just added Day 11 pics. I got my drains and tape removed on Monday (Day 7). I'm pretty tough when it comes to pain but that really made me sweat for some reason. I had to lay down because I was feeling a bit faint after they pulled the tape. The drains weren't as bad as a was anticipating but one was definitely worse than the other. It was a relief to have them gone though. Since then, I've had some minor oozing from the drain sites. I was putting gauze on them but it kept sticking and then I'd have to pull it off, opening the wound again. Yesterday, I started just putting a small band-aid over the spots and I think it's drying up better.

I feel like I'm more swollen now than I was in the Day 4 pics. My pubic area is really swollen and it feels like my crotch is being yanked forward. Nice. I'm still slightly concerned about the breasts being too large. They are bruised and sore, and I'm hoping still very swollen. My PS said he made me look like the pic I brought into him so hopefully they calm down.

I've been on my own during the day with my 22 month son for the past two days. He's been very cooperative and seems to understand that Mommy has a boo boo. I'm using the stepstool to get him into his crib at naptime. I feel like I'm starting to get antsy about my limitations. I'm anxious to feel normal again.

Oh, this morning my weight was 119! Yay!! I'm sure my bout with diarrhea helped to get me there so I wouldn't be surprised if that's a low number but I haven't seen that since early high school.

It's been a few weeks since my last update. I added 2 recent pics, including my first bikini ever! I've been improving little by little...it's just a process. I'm able to stand pretty straight now but ususally by the end of the day I'm feeling tight and hunched over a bit. The swelling in my pubic area is much better. Still some swelling in the abdominal area. I asked my PS if my breasts were still swollen when I last saw him. He said maybe 10% swollen...the right one seems larger to me and I don't know if it's just more swollen. I have some stitches popping through the incisions and a few tender spots on the incision under my breasts. Hoping it's not an abcessed stitch. I'm allowed to wear the compression garments just 12 hours/day now. I've gotten a lot more mobile lately. Until last week, I still hadn't taken my son out alone. I feel fine lifting him now. I'm still looking forward to the day when I don't feel this soreness anymore. I guess that can take months. All that said, I'm really happy with the decision to do the surgery. I feel like it's already boosted my confidence. I'm anxious to be able to work out and really try to get some definition in my mid section. Hope everyone is healing well!!