Explant and Bellesoma Lift

5'3", 128 lbs, 46 year Mom of two explanting 24 year old 650 cc smooth saline over the muscle implants. I just flew to Houston yesterday to meet with Dr. Horndeski for my preop consultation today and my surgery is scheduled for tomorrow. At 22 years old (in 1995) in Canada I had implants to fill out loose skin caused by yo yo dieting in my then D cup breasts. I did not want a lift at the time because back then they would remove your nipples causing you to loose all feeling, function, and sensation and leave an anchor scar on your boobs. My surgeon at the time told me by putting in the implant my skin would be filled out, my breast would be lifted, and I would go down to a C cup as I would fill out my bra differently. I did not want bigger boobs, nor visible scarring, and I didn't want to loose sensation in my nipples so I elected to go with the implants. My surgeon at the time placed 500 cc smooth saline implants overfilled to 650cc. I woke up huge and they stayed huge. I've been an F cup every since. I have never been comfortable with this large a breast and it was never my intention to be bigger than I was naturally. I felt I was big enough before implants so it was a challenge to compress my breasts down to a reasonable level and always felt very self conscious in professional situations. The size of my breasts has made me self conscious, uncomfortable, and fat/matronly/larger than I am looking and feeling for 24 years but I didn't know what to do about it without under going a surgery that would leave me covered in scars and possibly without nipple function and feeling. Then I discovered Dr. Horndeski and his Bellesoma Lift procedure on Real Self. I requested information on Real Self and was contacted first thing the next morning by Shiloh via text message. She immediately answered my questions about pricing and set up a FaceTime consultation with Dr. Horndeski for a few days later. I was impressed that she was so responsive and it was easy to get a consultation with Dr. Horndeski. He facetimed me right on schedule and I was impressed at how prompt he was. He had reviewed the pictures I had texted over and explained the procedure. I explained that I had recently had a tummy tuck (2 months prior) and he said that he could do this procedure 1 week after tummy tuck. I asked him if I was a candidate and he said yes. I had thought I wouldn't be a candidate for this lift as all the women who had it had low placed nipples. My nipples are not low so I worried that I didn't have enough room above my nipples to build a whole new breast without visible horizontal scarring on the lower portion of my breast. Dr. Horndeski did mention during the consult that if there was a visible scar on the front of the breast after 6 months he would do a revision in his office. I felt that he was very through, nice, and present in our consultation and was ready and willing to answer all my questions. He seemed very nice and extremely smart. Overall I had an outstanding impression of him. After we hung up I had a couple questions that I texted to Shiloh. She responded right back to me and I was impressed with how quickly their response was. My experience with my tummy tuck surgeon was one of hardly ever getting to see or speak to him, waiting months for consult, hours at appointment times, etc so I was extra impressed with Dr. Horndeski and his staff. Although still nervous that I was a good candidate because of my nipple placement I was enticed with the 0% Care Credit financing for 2 years and the prospect of having beautiful boobs without implants. I love the boobs Dr. Horndeski builds using the patients own breast tissue. He is a genius! Although traveling to Houston by myself for a major surgery is less than ideal Dr. Horndeski is the only one that can do the Bellesoma Lift at the same time as explant so I checked airfare and hotel arrangements, and looked up a female friend and business college of my husband who lives in Houston. She encouraged me to do the surgery and offered to hang out and take care of me. It took a few days to work up the courage and I scheduled my surgery date and paid the $3000 nonrefundable deposit. Then I freaked out! I started stressing super hard that it was too soon after my tummy tuck surgery, that I might end up with a huge horizontal scar running across my boobs, scarring and or dog ears in my visible cleavage area, and that they would end being too small; that I would go from one extreme of being too big to the other extreme of going too small. I started spending hours online looking up stuff and found some old negative reviews that terrified me. I called and emailed Dr. Horndeski and Jana serveral times. They were super patient with me, discussed in length and detail my concerns, sent me recent surgery pictures of changes and improvements Dr. Horndeski has made in the procedure, and discussed options if my breasts came out too small. I reached out to and spoke with a few former happy patients some of which I found on my own and some provided by Dr. Horndeski's office. I was still super worried but didn't cancel although I considered it a thousand times. I even received approval from my husband if I just wanted to write off the $3000 deposit if I didn't feel good about the surgery, and my parents even offered to give me $3000 to walk away from the surgery. My Mom started to put her anxieties and pressures on me about traveling by myself and having surgery, etc which made things worse. When I stayed the course despite encouragement to cancel my Stepdad (under pressure from my mother no doubt) offered to travel from Canada to Houston to take care of me while in Houston and accompany me back to Palm Springs. I almost agreed because I really could use the help but the hassle of trying to arrange his flights and having him stay in my little hotel room with me and me having to accomodate his personality and idosyncrasies while I was going through potentially one of the biggest emotional experiences of my life was too much and I politely declined. Then another close friend gave me a very hard time about traveling for surgery on my own. I was worried that my husband's colleague wouldn't be able to take care of me but she totally stepped up to the challenge even though she has never met me and has been an absolute darling and super supportive and encouraging. Without her support I probably would have canceled. I know this is super long but I wanted to convey how crazy you can start to feel once you commit to doing something major like this. I didn't expect myself to become so uncommitted and uncertain once I committed. I've been waking up to the prospect of being cut open again and I don't feel ready. I also don't feel ready to loose my boobs either. I feel like how you feel when you make a doctors appointment because you are sick or something is wrong and then when you are before the doctor you feel fine. Since being able to stand straight which took 2.5 months after my tummy tuck I have been happy with the size of my boobs. They actually look better now that I don't have hernia pooping out of my belly button and a distended abdomen from recti diastasis. So much skin was removed they actually seem to have lifted a bit. I would like them positioned higher, closer, and a bit smaller though; D cup would be ideal with little to no visible scarring or dog ears so I am moving forward with hopeful trepidation. I am prone to hypertrophic scarring so I will be taking extra steps to try to avoid this. I pray my surgery and recovery goes well, my boobs come out looking awesome and a D cup. I remind myself it is going to take 4 months of 24/7 bra wearing for them to heal and shape so I can't get worried before that. I am trying to prepare myself for another big recovery, 3 months of not being able to do anything, after a big 4 month tummy tuck and hernia repair recovery. I am scared to death of the shock I will probably experience the first couple times I see them without my implants as explanted boobs look terrible at first no matter what procedure is done. I might not look for a couple weeks! I don't mind wearing a bra 24/7 as I have been doing it for the last 24 years as my boobs are so big I am uncomfortable without a bra. Wearing a bra 24/7 for 4 months has been the biggest complaint that I have heard from former happy patients. This isn't such a big deal to me but I acknowledge the bra will probably get really uncomfortable as I tend to really swell and I imagine it will get super tight. Wish me luck! Pray for me! Here's to a wonderful surgery and an exceptionally good outcome :)

I just had my first post op appointment. Every looks good. Don’t mind the markings, bruises, and weird swelling. It’s just part of the process. I’m not to wear bra yet. They’ll let me know when it’s time. They don’t want any compression on my nipples. Once I have a bra on the weird swelling will go away and my breasts will be shaped with the bra.

500 cc smooth saline implants overfilled to 650 cc. They always felt too big. I wanted to downsize but didn’t like the idea of a lift with smaller implants. I was a loose skin D prior to my breast augmentation so I thought I would have lots of tissue to work with but apparently I didn’t have much tissue left in the left breast and almost none in my right breast. Dr. Horndeski said I was one of the most difficult and complicated cases because of the lack of tissue in the right breast. My surgery took 5.5 hours. I’m still very sore and my boobs have some weird swelling but that’s all to b expected only 2 days post op. I’m not wearing a bra yet. I sent a message asking if I should start now or wait til my next appointment on Monday. It will probably b Monday as they didn’t want any compression on my nipples, especially the right one because of the difficulty Dr. H had with that breast.