Breast Implant Revision: Stories

11 years ago, when I was 18, I had saline breast implants placed under the muscle, taking me from a small a to a full c. Over the past few months, I began to notice some funny changes in my breasts and I thought one was slowly deflating, but it turned out that I was actually developing cc on the other side, so it made the breast that was normal look deflated by comparison. In any case, I had the revision done by a different doctor--(I moved from the West Coast to the East Coast)--about 3 weeks ago.

I was amazed at how easy the second surgery was and I was really pleased with how much better I felt, at first, but now, three weeks out, I am getting really worried. My breasts are hugely different sizes and I worried that I already developing CC on the side that had it before. Meanwhile, the breast that my doctor thinks looks normal looks very small and funny to me, but that could be because of what I am used to my breast being like. I thought I was going a tiny bit smaller and my doctor said that my new implants are only about a tablespoon smaller than my old ones, but at the moment, I just don't know what to think. I will upload photos and I welcome people to let me know their thoughts--(please be kind).

My doctor said I'm fine to ski this coming week, but I am nervous.

It has been exactly one month and two days since my surgery and although I was quite nervous about it, I followed by doctor's advice and went downhill skiing today. The first couple of runs were fine--I kept my upper body as still as possible and really used my legs and feet to steer, avoiding any and all use of my upper body. I had two men buckling my boots and snapping me out of my skis, so that I would not put too much pressure on my arms and I avoided the black diamond runs I normally love. I skied all morning and although I had moments of not feeling totally comfortable, I felt that I was not pushing myself too much and that all was ok. By the time we sat down for lunch. I was truly miserable. I felt like one of my breasts had literally moved under my armpit and both breasts just felt terrible. I was wearing quite a supportive sports bra, but just the vibrations made by turning quickly on icy patches and moguls, made my breasts move a lot more than I wanted them to and felt just incredibly uncomfortable. I am here on this ski trip for another five days and I love skiing, but I am in incredible pain after my day on the mountain and I think my breasts are both a bit swollen after just one day on the slopes. Most of the doctors on this site seem not to think that it's a great idea to ski a little over a month after sub-muscular breast augmentation or revision surgery, but my doctor has alway assured me I would be fine to make this trip--we even discussed it prior to my surgery and he told me I would be good to go. My breasts are stinging and aching and they are both swollen and hard, in a way they had really not been up until now. I have a ski pass for the next four or five days and right now, I truly want to keep skiing. but I am beyond freaked out about what this might be doing to my breasts. If I can find a garment that keeps me totally secure, which my sports bra today failed to do, do you think I am fine to continue skiing, or is there a chance I am risking really hurting myself? I am less and less inclined to trust my own doctor and I am sick of trying to track him down for answers and I am terrified that he lead me in the wrong direction, by telling me I would be fine to ski in the first place. As I am not in the United States and am in the mountains, it's tricky for me to see a doctor here, so I am hoping some of you will be able to assuage my fears, or at least give me the information I need to make an informed decision. Thank you so much in advance!

I am now just about 6 weeks post-op and I feel like my breasts are still quite different from each other. I am also seeing rippling already, which is upsetting, because if I have rippling now, I can only imagine what my breasts will look like in five years.
I am also concerned about the placement of the incisions, because they don't actually appear to be below the natural fold of my breasts and I think I may be developing a bit of a double-bubble situation. All around, I feel like a bit of a hot mess. My husband says my breasts look good and he thinks they look more natural than they did before, but I know he's not looking as critically as I am, which is probably a blessing.
I am now rethinking sticking with saline, I have all sorts of questions I wish I had asked my doctor prior to surgery---(mainly having to do with his experience)---and I kind of wish I could just have a complete do-over. Ugh. Not at all how I was hoping to be feeling.

I just wanted to add that the pain subsided while skiing, thanks to a very good sports bra and an ace bandage--- and I took a day off, after my first agonizing day on the mountain. I was in so much pain after the first day, I bought a compression bandage typically used for broken ribs, but I tried skiing in it and I felt like I could not breathe and was even more miserable.
My doctor never got back to me while I was away, so I just had to use my best judgment. The temperature on the mountain was unusually cold and the cold was actually more painful than anything---I felt like my breasts turned into ice blocks at one point.
If I could do it again, I would not have skied so soon after surgery, but I really don't think I damaged my breasts by skiing.
I was unhappy with the way my breasts looked prior to the trip and I'm unhappy with the way they look now, but I think my issues are not ski-related.
What's really getting to me is the feeling that my doctor does not care. He has never called to check-up on me---not once. I always have to call him and he makes me feel like a crazy paranoid lunatic and is quite flippant and glib about my concerns. I am due to go in for a check-up and I am dreading it, because I feel like he is just going to deny all of the problems I can clearly see with my own eyes. I would love to get some honest feedback about the way my breasts look right now. Am I freaking out for no reason? Would you be happy with these results? I really want to know what you think---try not to be too brutal, but please do be honest. Thank you in advance.

My breasts have gone from bad to worse. I think the pictures speak for themselves. I took my old implants for granted! I wish I had taken more/better pictures of them, when they were good, because I miss them so much! I never realized how lucky I was to have such a great surgeon the first time around and even if there are some who think my old breasts were unnatural looking, no one can say they were not the same size. I miss having a pair of breasts that look like they belong on the same human being!
I wish my PO had thought to actually examine my breasts, to see if one had truly begun to deflate, prior to telling me that I definitely needed surgery. It's crazy to me that he had to open me up to realize he was wrong and that both my implants were totally in tact. Whatever was wrong with the one I was worried about, is much, much worse now--I am basically experiencing a worse version of what prompted me to have this revision in the first place. I am so unhappy with my breasts now and I just want to get them fixed and move on with my life. I have not had babies yet and I had not wanted to have my breasts redone, prior to getting pregnant, but my PO really insisted that a deflated implant needed to be removed and replaced right away. So crazy that it had not deflated---(but I knew a "slow-leaking" saline implant sounded unusual and I should have trusted my gut). Now I have two sets of incisions and crazy breasts that I can push all the way up to my collar bone when I massage them. My PO "opened up" the area between my breasts, because he said doing so would allow me to have more cleavage, but I don't think he did much else to the pockets, before placing my new implants and because they are smaller than my old ones, they have way too much room to move around and they are clearly not the same size. My incisions don't seem to be in the right place and they also don't match. I am 31 and I would love to begin to think about getting pregnant, but with my breasts the way they are right now, I cannot even imagine it. I feel like I have to get my breasts under control, before I can even begin to think about pregnancy, but I am terrified that every time I operate on my breasts, I am further reducing my chances of being able to breast feed successfully. Also, I realize I may hate my breasts after pregnancy, but at this point, I am stuck. I also feel like my surgeon over-disected the pockets, because I now have incredibly visible rippling and it looks like any natural breast tissue I had to begin with is long gone. The breast I thought I had deflated prior to this surgery is now both small and rock hard and it's becoming increasingly painful, despite the fact that I am massaging, sleeping in a slightly elevated position on my back, trying not to pick-up heavy things etc. I'm so over this and I don't want to give the surgeon who put me in this position another chance, because I only have one body and he's already screwed it up enough. I'm really feeling gloomy about all of this. I emailed and called my PO yesterday, just because I feel like he at least owes me an explanation, but he has yet to get back to me. What kind of a surgeon forces his patients to track him down after he operates on them? Such an icky feeling. :( I think I need to stop worrying about hurting his feelings and just list him by name here, so that other people don't find themselves in bad situations.

Update: I finally got my plastic surgeon on the phone and when I told him that my right breast has become rock hard and hurts, he told me to "take a lot of valium" and he said that my breasts look "practically perfect".
I think his words and my photos speak for themselves.

There have been some changes, but none for the better! My right breast just keeps getting smaller and harder and it definitely seems to have developed a contracture. I have now gotten a second and third opinion from excellent doctors here in New York and now I am just trying to decide how to proceed. It's clear that I need to have another surgery, but I'm nervous about rushing into something and I don't want to have any regrets this time. I also got my chart from the PO who did this last surgery today and it's just really upsetting. The bottom line is that he was sloppy. What's really crazy is that he told me I had a deflated implant and on my chart, he wrote that his pre-op diagnosis was capsular contracture, despite the fact that he still has not used that term with me. One bit of good news--he did note the size of my former implants--they were 330 cc, but I don't know what the final fill size was. I feel really let down by my surgeon and I feel stupid for falling for someone who clearly had no business performing this surgery.

I am so sick of my breasts being like this! I have definitely developed a contracture in my right breast and both breasts have rippling and visible scars and they are completely asymmetrical. It turns out my po lowered the crease of my left breast, because he said it was higher than the right, but they are definitely not anywhere near even now and I have visible scars under both breasts. The quotes I have been getting from surgeons average at about $20,000 and at the moment, as desperate as I am to fix the problem, I am feeling more fear about another surgery than I did last time and I want to make sure I choose the absolute best person to do my surgery. My first ba was basically great and it took me seeing the results of my second surgery, for me to realize just how bad the work of a mediocre ps can be. I went to see the ps who did the surgery the results of which I am living with now and he was quite defensive and nervous and made a lot of suggestions that made very little sense. He also took my pre-op photos out of my chart and gave them to me--he did not even make a copy to keep for his own records. His suggestions ranged from telling me to gain weight, to suggesting i take Valium for three days to see if i actually have a contracture or if i am actually just having muscle spasms. One of the craziest moments was when he said that maybe the pockets need to be bigger--part of my problem is that he put smaller implants in my existing pockets, without adjusting the size of the pocket at all. My breasts both had a ton of room to move around and about and up and down, up until the point when my right breast became incredibly hard and difficult to move at all. I am so frustrated with myself fir trusting such a clearly mediocre doctor. After a miserable 30-45 minutes of listening to him tell me that my results will never be perfect, that i will always have rippling and will always have asymmetry, I decided it was time to go. The last thing my ps said to me when I was walking out of his office was, "sorry".

I have been reluctant to put my doctor's name on this review, because I did not want to say anything bad about him. However, at this point, I am done worrying about his feelings and I am more concerned about the people who might end up having similar experiences to mine.
I should have trusted my gut. This doctor might not be the worst person to go to for lots of other things, but a breast expert, he is not. He is relatively inexperienced--(20-30 breast surgeries a year was what he told me at our last meeting)--and he not at all detail-oriented. I realized once I already had my top back on, in our last meeting, that he had not even seen my crazy looking incisions and at that point, I did not want to get undressed again to show him. However, it really said something to me that he had not thought to look at my incisions. He took my word for it when I told him that another surgeon measured my breasts and thought the smaller one was also wider, which interested me more than it interested Dr. D, who barely examined my breasts. After meeting with other doctors, I noticed that Dr. D was the only one who did not ask me if I wanted a woman in the room during the exam, but he was also the only doctor who looked and did not really touch. My mother was present at my last appointment and he seemed so rattled by both of us, I thought he might pass out or cry. I think Dr D trades on the reputation of his partner, but she also has fines and although their med spa has won awards and is said to be a favorite in the area, I would be reluctant to go back to this office for anything. Also, although the women at the front desk are totally friendly, Dr. D's assistant/admitting nurse is anything but. Don't ignore your instincts! I learned my lesson the hard way and I am paying the price. I've said this before and I'll say it again---I took good plastic surgery for granted, because it was all I knew. I had no idea how bad it could be, until I had this surgery. This is what a bad boob job looks like and feels like and now I'm out $8000 and am probably going to need to spend twice that, just to get back to feeling comfortable in my own skin. This doctor has been fined for negligence and it's clear why. Looking at my chart, I realized that he was more interested in pleasing my mother than he was in making me happy---and it's my body! I never cared what anyone else thought, but he wrote on my chart that he made my breasts a little smaller, so that "I could say they were smaller"---which is not something I ever asked him for! I just wanted my breasts to look the way they did for the first ten years after my last surgery and now, they are far worse than they were at the point that I began to really worry about my breasts. Asymmetry was never an issue before, but it definitely is now and I have ugly new scars and mismatched implants and it became pretty clear in my last meeting with my surgeon that he could not tell my left breast from my right. He got them mixed-up and became red-faced and even more defensive and even less coherent. Remember, a doctor who gets C's in med school is still called Doctor. I am ashamed that I let myself get bullied into surgery by someone as unprofessional and unimpressive as this doctor.