“Tummy Tuck and Lipo Scheduled for June 27th - Dallas, TX”

Hello everyone, I am 31 year old mom of 2 kids - 5year old son and 15month old daughter . After 2 pregnancies , my body changed a lot and tummy is the part which bothers me the most . I was at 110 when i started with my first pregnancy and gained 60 pounds and lost all of it . It was bit more hard to loose weight with the second pregnancy though . I am 5'4 and weigh 118 now .

My tummy tuck with muscle repair , Hernia repair and lipo on the flanks /abdomen is scheduled for June 27th .I am so anxiously waiting for this to be done . I have already gone thru the pre-op appointment and done with financial stuff .

I have lined up some help and mostly done with my shopping list . Below is what i got -

Veronique compression garment
prescribed pain meds/ anti nausea tabs
gasex
laxatives / milk of magnesia
electric hospital bed with wedge pillow
stocked up on some low sodium soups / gatorade
Fiber supplement
calcium supplement
heat patches
comfortable button down shirts

Am i missing anything ?

This is my first surgery and i dont really know what exactly to expect . I have been reading all the posts/stories on realself and it has been a huge help .

I wish you all the fellow tummy tuckers the very best and god bless u all .

4 days to go and very anxious to get this done and be on the road to recovery . kind of weird that i am not freaking out yet ,probably bcos i am so busy at work and home both .

Wish me luck and please pray for me . I have 2 little kids and i am hoping i get out this alive :-)

Updated on 24 Jun 2011:
Now that it is two days away - it feels more realistic . All these days i have been busy with work and didnt really think much on it .Hoping i wont freak out on the surgery day . Knowing me i will probably try to fake it that i am brave and go ahead with it anyways .

Trying to get all of the necessary things for post-op setup so that it will be convenient .Hospital bed is going to be delivered and setup tomm . My bedroom is upstairs - so hoping i will be able to walk upstairs with assistance the day after surgery .

Mine is a no drain tummy tuck and it will be performed by a double board certified plastic surgeon .His name is dr.Fred L hackney . Although i have seen a whole lot more posts and experiences with having drains and all , i am super excited that i dont have to worry abt the drains. Hopefully that goes well .

Hoping to spend quality time tomm with my kids as i wont be for couple of weeks .Not really sure how i am going to dodge them - probably will put myself in a room :-) This is going to be tough .

Fellow tummy tuckers - Any word of advice or things that i need to lookout for or any tips provided will be really helpful .
Updated on 25 Jun 2011:
I just got a call from the patient co-ordinator at our docs office and she said i got moved from 11:00am to 7:15am and i have to be at the surgery center at 6:15am. Well , i might as well get it done sooner i guess .

Still trying to organize things up in my room and pack the bag for the hospital .One more day to go .

I will post some of my pre-op pics soon ...

Please pray for me that this goes well .

Updated on 26 Jun 2011:
Added my pre-op photos . So much sagging skin . Tommorrow is my big day . Sometimes i feel nervous and think of all the things that might go wrong .Some times i feel that everything will be fine . I surely trust my surgeon ,he is one of the best . I am just worried that if my body will be able to take on this much change . Probably feeling this way as i have never had any surgery and this is my first.

Please pray for me that the surgery goes well and recovery is smooth .
Thanks everyone - reading everyone's experience has been so helpful and it really helps when someone walks thru their journey . Thanks to all the people who put this great site together .

Updated on 4 Jul 2011:
Gosh the crazy session timeout - it took out the whole thing I typed as I took a break in between. Here is my post-op journey !!!

My surgery was on June 27th at 6:15 am -

I reached the surgery center that morning , signed the papers,doctor came in and marked up the tummy tuck and lipo areas , nurse put me on IV - that's all I could remember of that morning . I was in recovery room when I woke up and didn't really feel lot of pain , only tightness . The surgery center and the doctor took good care of me. I stayed overnight at the surgery center and the nurse made sure I walked every 2 hrs and gave me nausea / pain meds when needed. I got home the next day , went upstairs to my bedroom with assistance. Took it easy first few days - ate little and rested a lot . My husband was my main nurse and helped me with walking every 2hrs , taking me to restroom when needed and giving me my pain meds on time. I did find out that I was getting nausea every time I took antibiotics so after talking to my doc and getting permission from him to stop , it got much better .

I had my 5 day pre-op appt and doc said everything looked great.

It's one week post-op and recovery is going good . Using very minimal pain meds and have little bit of swelling . Only area that hurts sometimes is the lipo area .

Thanks so much everyone for keeping me in your prayers and hope the very best to everyone who is going thru this journey.lots of hugs and love.

Updated on 5 Jul 2011:
updating with one pre-op pic. I took this photo from my cell phone and it is kind of blur . I will post some photos later when i take it using my camera.

Updated on 7 Jul 2011:
Doing fairly well today . I still have soreness from MR and back pain from being bent over. I am taking Tylenol twice a day to take care of that . I do have very numb feeling on my tummy and that kind of scares me . Also I am seeing the front of my stomach looks bit pouchy , not sure if that is bcos of the swelling. Probably it is very early to judge . Only thing is I haven't seen this in other tummy tuck pals who are 10 days post-op . Hopefully it will become more flatter. Other than that doing ok. Wish you all a speedy recovery and all the best to my fellow tummy tuckers who are getting ready to get this procedure done.

Updated on 9 Jul 2011:
Hello ladies , hope u all are doing well and recovery is going smooth . I am doing good . Recovery is going ok other than the swelling part. My doc confirmed that pouchy part below the belly button is just swelling and not fluid so that is good news. I am wearing the compression garment 24/7 other than for shower. Swelling has gone down a bit from yesterday to now which is good.

I have 15 month old and it is becoming hard to explain to her why mommy can't lift her up .she doesn't like it one bit and obviously she is very small to understand anything I say . I am spending couple of hrs everyday with her but that is not enough. Do you guys know when I can start lifting my daughter?

Updated on 9 Jul 2011:
Also I forgot to mention that I weighed myself today and the scale showed 110 and I started at 118 . That is kind of weird but nice.so I am back to pre-preggo weight ,lol.

Updated on 9 Jul 2011:
What can I start using on the scar to make it lighter?i am dark skinned so it definitely shows the scar darker ,so I wanted to start using something regularly to make it lighter as possible.

Updated on 9 Jul 2011:
updating with 2 more pics. atlast a little bit clear ones .

Updated on 9 Jul 2011:
Forgot to mention i still have lot of swelling below the belly button and that area really feels rock hard . I asked about this to my doc in the pre-op and he said that is good thing .so i am not worrying about it at this point .

Updated on 11 Jul 2011:
hello ladies , hope y'all are doing well .I am doing much better today than last week . Started driving , shopping , doing chores etc . I started my period today(TMI) so it will be good to get that done before i start work next week . I initially took only 2 weeks off of work which is probably enough as i could have vey easily gone back to work today as it is a desk job . i took additional week off to spend some more time with kids and get some things done . Swelling s definitely going down and the tummy is getting much flatter as days pass by . I am getting really excited with the outcome . I will post some new pics as soon i take some .Good luck to all the tummy tuckers who are sceduled this week to get their tummy tuck done. It is so worth it !!!

Updated on 15 Jul 2011:
Hey ladies , Recovery day 19 and it is going good so far . So i had my painful moments yesterday - i did a crazy thing and initially thought nothing of watching a funny movie . I WAS WRONG!!! i couldnt stop laughing and almost split my muscle repair . I think my husband had more fun looking at me instead of the movie .He didnt understand whether i was happy or was in pain . Absolutely crazy , LOL . so my best advice - please do not , i repeat do not watch comedy movies for a while after TT with MR especially.

Also , i have noticed that since this afternoon when i stand up i feel some pain at the top of abdomen which stays for a bit and then goes away . Feeling some burning sensation sometimes in the tummy and cannot make anything of it . I am planning to start work on monday and hoping it will be ok .another thing is i am still not able to completely stand straight which is kind of weird . I thought i would be able to stand straight and not hunched over still . Is this not right ?

I posted some new photos of belly button and the front view . I still have some swelling that needs to go down from mid tummy to bellybutton . I guess it is a slow healing process .

Hope everyone is doing well :-)

Updated on 18 Jul 2011:
Postop day 21 - I went back to work today was able to survive around 10hrs including the driving time.I did get tired by the end of the work day but it wasn't bad at all.

One thing that still is bothering me is that I am still not able to walk straight .i am able to stand straight but once I start walking , I just hunch automatically .hoping this will get better soon.

Hope all you ladies out there are recovering well and having with those flat tummies.