I am a 20-year-old with PCOS. I had been diagnosed with it about two years ago but I had really started gaining weight when I got my period at the age of 12. I was unaware as to why I had gained so much weight in such a short period of time. I blamed it on a poor diet but it was something deeper. At age 17, I was 245 lbs. Mind you, I am 5' 3". After being diagnosed, I was prescribed Metformin which aided in my weight loss. I was restricting calories on a daily basis and even went as low as consuming 500 calories a day. Yes, I know that wasn't healthy. I started feeling weak which didn't help since I was also diagnosed with depression so I already felt pretty fatigued and unwilling to do anything. I started running on the treadmill at least three hours a day with a goal of 1,000 calories burned in mind. You could call it an obsession. I eventually incorporated different exercises into my regimen such as taking a yoga course in college and doing Callan Pinckney's 10 Years Younger in 10 Hours DVD everyday. After about nine to eleven months had passed, I was fluctuating between 140 and 150 pounds and I managed to maintain that weight up until this point. My belly and breasts were left saggy. My breasts had the "rocks in socks" effect when I bent over and you could knead my belly skin/fat as if it were pizza dough. My belly button frowned as well. I was fed up with looking like this knowing how much work I had put into getting all of that weight off and the results I had achieved showing on the scale but not in the mirror. I researched for quite sometime to find the perfect PS and my results eventually brought me to Dr. Brady who is an amazing doctor! He is very knowledgeable and is passionate about what he does. He performed a full tummy tuck/abdominoplasty (including suturing my abdominal muscles back together which had separated a bit) and a breast lift and augmentation. I had originally asked if I needed implants as I wanted to be natural but he told me the cons would outweigh the pros. I would be left with major scarring and I would be an A cup which is definitely not what I wanted! Before the surgery I was wearing a 36C to accommodate all of the loose skin. Back to the abdominoplasty, I am now day 5 post op and am looking and feeling wonderful. I can only imagine how I will look at six weeks. If you are looking into this procedure and are nervous about anything do not worry. If a 20-year-old can get through this so can you! Just make sure you find a reputable board certified PS who will treat your body and yourself with respect. This procedure was most definitely worth it! Updated on 5 Jan 2015: I am including some before and after pictures. I was unable to take a good picture right before the surgery due to being forgetful so I only have one quick snap that doesn't show the full damage. If anything, it makes me look like I just needed a panniculectomy but that was definitely not the case. The before pictures will be from my weight loss album on my phone. Since I didn't post before the surgery, here is a quick rundown of how I felt between day one and six: Day 1: I had awoken from anesthesia and I felt horrible (BTW: If you are afraid of getting the surgery because you feel like you'll wake up halfway through, there is absolutely nothing to worry about as I was in your shoes)! I was in a significant amount of pain. I felt VERY tight, my belly hurt, and I was groggy. My throat was also very sore due to the breathing tube they had inserted during the surgery. I could hardly speak and I found the doctors and nurses asking me "What?" multiple times. I already had a soft voice so the tube and tightness of my belly just made it worse. It was quite frustrating. I had sequential compression devices on my legs which felt amazing (the doctors told me most people don't like them which I was very surprised to hear) and I was hooked up to a machine that would administer Morphine every 12 minutes with a press of a button. At one point during the middle of the night, one of my doctors came in and gave me a dose of something stronger (started with a T) which put me right to sleep. I stayed overnight and was able to go home the next day at around noon. I went into surgery at 9 AM the day before and the surgery took nine hours. Crazy right!? Ah, my arms were also KILLING me since I was in a Jesus-on-the-cross position (sorry, don't mean to offend) so I needed a pillow under each arm to prop them up while I slept. As for going to the bathroom, I urinated about three times during the middle of the night. I had to call a nurse each time and my back hurt so badly when I walked to the bathroom about 10 feet away. They offered to let me use one of those potty seats for older people but it was out in the open and I just couldn't get myself to go. It took about seven minutes to finally pee when I had gotten to the bathroom and I could not hold a steady stream. It was frustrating and I felt like a nuisance making the nurses wait outside for me even though that's their job... Day 2: I went home at noon. My PS had given me prescriptions for Oxycodone, Zofran for nausea, and an antibiotic to take for a week after the surgery. He did not send me home in any compression garments because he said I was young and would heal quickly. The car ride home was tolerable. I didn't experience much nausea, just a slight headache which dissipated when I kept my head down. I immediately got into my mom's bed (staying in hers for the time being since mine does not have a headboard to prop myself up with additional pillows) and tried to relax. My back was killing me. My mom put one of my cats in the room next door since I know how attached she is to me. My bedroom is in our basement and my cat lives down there with me while my other cat roams the whole house. Sadly, I am allergic to cats, moreso the one that roams the house, but I still love them to death and would not trade them for the world. I just don't want them rubbing up against me or the sutures because they will start to itch and I may sneeze, potentially popping a suture. I visit my furbaby next door every now and then but I only let her touch my right hand which I vigorously scrub with Hibiclens afterward. Anyway, day two was the worst. My left drain sight hurt a lot, my incision hurt a lot, and my back was crying. I took five Oxycodones that day. Day 3-5: I started feeling a bit better on day three. I still had a lot of back pain and I would constantly wake up every three hours to adjust myself on the bed but nothing worked. I got up every now and then to use the bathroom and just get the blood circulating in my legs. Day 3 I only needed two Oxys and day 4 and 5 I was down to one. I had a lot of gas on days two and three. I felt it rumbling around in my belly but it was difficult to release it. Still no bowel movement since the day before surgery. On day five I got my left drain removed since it drained less than 25 ccs in a 24 hour period on day four. Day 6: Today, 1/5/2015 I feel pretty good. I can get up on my own, stand for a longer period of time and can even sleep on my left side if I choose but it felt strange when I attempted it so I'm holding off on doing that. Not having a bowel movement is starting to take a toll on me. I feel the pressure building up and I haven't been keeping up with taking Colace which is my fault so I have resorted to Milk of Magnesia. Not the best flavor but hopefully it'll help me feel better. I weighed myself which isn't advised, I know, but I am three pounds down from my pre surgery weight of 143. I can't wait until the swelling goes down and I get to start working out again. Five more weeks! Mini update as of 11:42 AM: MoM worked and I am taking a BM as I am writing this (sorry for TMI, lol). It's a bit difficult... I'm trying not to push too much. Anyway, sorry for the extensive rundown but I really wanted to be thorough so you guys know what I'm going through to show you that this procedure's recovery really isn't that bad. :) Updated on 8 Jan 2015: Hello everyone. Today is day 9 and I just took my first shower of the new year since I had gotten my drains removed yesterday at 10:45 AM! It wasn't a very pleasant experience for me to be honest. I was able to wash my hair and the rest of my body just fine. I then began to "tease" the steri-strips off which felt extremely odd on my belly moreso than my breasts. The sight of the dried up blood and raw skin made me a bit woozy and this is coming from someone who watched multiple YouTube videos of both procedures being done prior to having them done herself. I sat on the edge of the bath tub but that did not help much. My ears started to ring and I began to have tunnel vision which is when I just decided to lie on the bath tub floor in a reclined position because I just couldn't get myself to sit anymore. I know they say this usually happens when the blood vessels relax after taking your compression garment off and getting into warm water, but I don't wear one and the water wasn't very warm at all. This is something that has been going on for quite some time way before I even had the surgery but it was worse this time around. I never bothered to ask my general practitioner about this for reasons unknown. Anyway, I finished gently washing the incisions because my mom was rudely rushing me out of the bathroom, I lotioned my arms and legs, and put some Bacitracin on the incisions. There is a bit of puckering on my tummy scar which I hope smoothens out as time passes. The thing I'm most concerned about is having dog ears. I'm not sure if it's from the swelling or it's just too early to tell but I'm hoping it is just swelling. I've attached a few updated pictures. There are still steri-strips on my right breast because I just couldn't get myself to pull them off anymore so I'm just going to wait until they've detached themselves a bit more. I definitely don't want to force anything. At some point within the next week I am hoping to go to Champion to find one of their comfy frontal closure sports bras since my PS said it was okay for me to start wearing one. Updated on 21 Jan 2015: Just posting a few updated pics. I saw my PS today and he gave me the okay to start scar treatment. He gave me two Mammopatch Gel Z's and one for my belly. I can't seem to get the mammopatch ones to stick even though my skin is completely dry so I'll try reapplying those another time. As you can see from the pics, my right breast has dropped more than my left.
I was in a mid-life crisis stage- I was 46 and did not have a wrinkle under my eye. I trusted Dr. Brady because he is a hand surgeon and did a very good job at fixing my wrist. However, his decision to perform an unnecessary surgery on my lower lids was unethical. I've been having problems for 8 years because he excised too much skin-especially on the left eye. And so there is constant tearing, dryness, and irritation; Aesthetically it looks terrible. It wasn't till I went to 4 top NYC plastic surgeons who were not able to fix my eyes that I realized how horrendous a job he did. I have found a specialist who only works on eyes and I am scheduled for a fairly elaborate surgery on May 20th. It includes having a palate graft. I kindly asked Dr. Brady if he would at least cover the $10,000 fee. I sent him 4 doctors diagnosis-all stating that my eyes are in need of a surgery because of his harmful surgery. He never responded! And so that is why I've decided to write this review-to prevent someone else from making the mistake that I had made. He is a HAND surgeon first-you don't go to a steak house for a good piece of fish. Updated on 10 May 2014: Dr. James Brady of Southampton performed an unnecessary eyelid surgery; he won't acknowledge his mistake which is all I'm asking for at this point.
