Breast Reconstruction: Stories

Like many others, I found the expansion process very painful (non-stop burning pain and feeling like I am wearing a tourniquet). I expected to have significant relief when the expanders were replaced with implants, but almost 1 year later the life-changing pain is still there.

My PS sent me to a pain specialist who prescribed gabopentin, lyrica, and most recently Cymbalta. I also tried 6 weeks of bi-weekly acupuncture. The acupuncture gave me intermittent, mild relief, but the pain continues to be overpowering and life-changing no matter how positive I try to be. Finding things to take my mind off the pain has been the most effective, but it's a constant struggle and depression is making me find less and less things that I care about anymore.

The pain specialist is the only doctor (GP, gynocologist, oncologist, PS) with whom I've spoken who has treated a patient with the same symptoms and that patient was the only one in his 15 years of practice. All the others say that many women have pain up to 2 or 3 years, but not like the pain I describe.

My last option is to have the implants removed, but no one knows whether that will resolve the problem either.

I would be interested in hearing from anyone who has experienced the non-stop burning pain I've described whether they've had a mastectomy or not. Did removing the implants resolve the pain?