New Breasts After 11 Babies

I'm excited to announce that at 3 weeks post op, my extreme dizziness finally went away. Hallelujah! I had started to fear that I was going to live the rest of my life in a constant state of vertigo.

A few days ago, at 4 weeks PO, I noticed that my implants were ever-so-slightly less hard. I was able to poke them and have my finger sink in, instead of it feeling like I was poking a rock. Hallelujah again!

My incisions are healing nicely. No open areas. (But, knock on wood, because I have heard from a couple of women that their T-junctions opened up at 8 and 9 weeks. Omg.) My areolas are so cute and symmetrical! I hope they don't stretch out in weird ways or become distorted as my scars heal. (Gosh, there are some scary outcomes throughout realself that make me nervous. I need to just focus on my own healing and not worry myself with what-ifs.)

I had the genius idea to put butterfly bandages across my lift incisions to alleviate some tension, in the hopes that it would help keep my scars thin and light. Well, upon carefully removing the bandages to replace them with fresh ones, they literally ripped my skin off! I started bleeding from several rip-wounds. I felt so dumb. I thought I was being careful, but apparently having numb boob skin is not always a good thing. I was happily tearing my skin off without even knowing. Grrr. So, those are the red/irritated areas that you see in these photos. I'm putting bacitracin and gauze over those areas.

I am *still* wearing the torture device known as a "breast compression strap." I hate it more by the hour. It chafes my armpits and makes my arms go numb. My implants are still riding super high, so I wonder if the strap is helping at all, but who knows. It seems to make my chest muscles spasm and become more tight. I have another post op at 6 weeks, so I'm praying that I will be told that I can throw the darn thing into a bonfire at that point. ???? I'm massaging my implants vigorously, 3 times a day. I'll add a funny illustration that I drew of how I am massaging them.

Oh, and I know it is far too early to be accurately sized for bras, but I measured them anyway just for fun. So far, I am measuring a 36G. Wow!! It will be interesting to see if that changes as my boobs settle.

I'm 12 days post op now, and I think things are healing pretty well. I have an appointment on Thursday to remove my tape and sutures. I'm hoping that everything will appear to be healing well under the tape. The soreness and tightness has lessened, my bruising is fading, and my implants appear to have dropped maybe a centimeter. (Yay!)

I am still battling dizziness, daily. Sometimes it is debilitating. I have not taken any meds since a week post op, so I think it's safe to say that the meds are not a cause of the dizziness. I'm chugging water and taking elecrolytes today to see if that helps. This is making it quite difficult to care for my 6 kids at home. Maybe I'll request a blood draw to check for anemia at my appt.

I feel like I've been recovering for months now, but it has only been 6 days. I think part of my issue is hearing from all of the women in my surgery groups that they felt fantastic by day 3 or 4 post op. Meanwhile, I feel just as awful as I did day 1 & 2, haha.

Still very swollen, and as always with my melodramatic body, the bruising is intense. But I am happy to report that my nipple/areola complexes look great! The nitro paste may have helped, or maybe my right NAC needed some time to perk up, but it is nice and pink now with great blood flow. What a relief.

Implants are still miles high; I'm wearing the compression band across the top at all times. It has started to make my arms go a little numb at times, so I fold a couple socks under the band at my armpit for comfort. My sternum also has some discomfort, so I have a small sock rolled up in between my breasts as well. (I worry about the dreaded uni-boob. My boobs are now nearly touching, when right after surgery they still had an inch in between. Could be just swelling though. I am swollennnn everywhere, even my abdomen. I look pregnant! Lol)

I had awful head nausea last night, like the feeling you get when you spin on a playground merry-go-round for 15 minutes and then get off. It was so bad that I started crying and was regretting my surgery. I just wanted my floppy granny boobs back, and no nausea. Zofran didn't touch it.. I stopped taking my painkillers last night to see if that would help with the nausea, but I'm not sure if that was it, because I still feel a little barfy today. Not as bad, though.

My muscles are still uber tight, which makes it feel like I cannot breathe. I consciously am abdominal breathing instead, which feels fine.

All in all, I've had a rough couple of days and I'm feeling those post-surgery blues. Sometimes I wonder if general anesthesia depletes all of your dopamine and serotonin, haha. Hopefully I will turn a corner soon, and feel better over the next couple days!