Ready for my New Beginning - North Carolina
I have always had a large chest that has made me...
I have always had a large chest that has made me uncomfortable physically and emotionally. The first time I felt ashamed of my breasts was in the third grade. Some of my peers were starting to wear "training bras," not because they needed them, but because they were in Limited Too and everyone wanted them. Unlike my peers, I actually needed a bra. As soon as I sheepishly wore my bra beneath a white shirt, my secret was out. Incidents like this continued to pop throughout the years. As a 12 year old in the seventh grade I was filling out a 36C bra, garnering stares from my suddenly pubescent male classmates. Maneuvering through school with my large breasts was only the beginning of my struggle. During these pivotal times where I should have been embracing these changes in my body (or at least not feeling SO ashamed), I was heavily involved in competitive figure skating. I was not a large girl by any means, but my breasts gave that sort of appearance. I felt self-conscious about how my body looked in a tight dress as I jumped and spun about on the ice because very few skating dresses could accommodate a bra.
I first began to seriously consider breast reduction surgery when I was 19 and a sophomore in college. Around this time, my bras began leave indentions in my shoulder, and the skin under my breasts would become raw and painful. When I visited my plastic surgeon (the same one who is doing my procedure in a few weeks), she felt that I would make a great candidate. My mother and I tried to go through insurance to cover the procedure, but my company would not allow it. If I had to guess, I would say it is based upon my BMI- technically, I am overweight in spite of my body fat percentage being in a normal range. I've always been pretty muscular. My parents offered to pay out of pocket for it at the time, but I was scared of the scarring and simultaneously going through a difficult break up. I decided that I wasn't ready at the time.
I'm 22 years old now and the last six months have really opened my eyes to how much my breasts are holding me back. My neck and shoulders are always in pain and I get severe headaches. To make matters worse, I feel like a [RS bleep] star every time I put on a bathing suit or a shirt with even the slightest v-neck. Buying clothing has become particularly problematic; in dresses I have to buy a size 12 or 14 just to accommodate my breasts. The rest of me ends up looking like I've just been swimming in a potato sack. Buying a dress in a ten looks good for the most part, but my breasts press so tight up against my body that my back just hurts. It's all just exacerbated from my dressing rather conservatively.
Recently, my mother generously offered to take me back to the same plastic surgeon I had seen a few years before and we have booked the surgery for June 19, 2012. We are not going through insurance which is quite a ding to the wallet, but after much discussion we have decided it is for the best. Often times when you go through insurance, they mandate how much breast tissue to remove, usually around 500g. My doctor believes that she can put me into a C cup by removing 300-400 grams and lifting my breasts. I had originally wanted to be a B-cup, but she said with my height a C would look much more natural on my body (I'm about 5'5).
I'm really excited about my surgery in 9 days, but also pretty scared. I don't exactly know what is making me so nervous- I've been under anesthesia before and I am in very good health. I think all surgeries are unsettling and it would probably be more weird if I wasn't nervous. Of course, I'm very excited that by the end of the summer I will look significantly smaller and taller. I'm from NC so we have beach weather until October, so I 'm very certain that I will be able to lie on the beach in my new bikini body by the season's end.
I look forward to hearing what others say about the procedure and would love to hear tips for before or after!
I'm trying to figure out what it is I need to do...
My surgery is on Tuesday morning and I have to be at the surgical center at 7:15 or 7:30. They'll knock me out at 8 and I should be home by 12 or 1. I've never had a surgery this major before. I try to remind myself of a friend who has cystic fibrosis and who has survived multiple lung transplants. Comparatively, this is nothing. It can just be hard at times to have perspective on what's going on. My pre-op appointment is tomorrow morning. Mom and Dad are both coming along (although Dad will leave the room and give me privacy when necessary). I'm making a list of questions for my doctor:
(1) I remember you saying you don't use drains. How will that affect my healing?
(2) Will I be given an antibiotic? Which one?
(3) Can you prescribe Zofran for nausea?
(4) What clothes should I bring for when I leave the surgical center? What shoes would be best?
(5) How do I go about cleaning my dressings? When do I do it?
(6) When do I come back to the office for you to check how I'm healing?
(7) What sort of things do you recommend I have on hand?
(8) What will you be giving me for pain after the procedure (I'm allergic to opiates so this is a biggie)? Can I take tylenol or advil if I prefer?
(9) When can I shower?
(10) When can I begin to talk walks?
(11) Will I look and feel different when I wake up?
(12) When can I drive?
I'm trying to make a list of things I should purchase when I go to target. I figure a few more pairs of lounge pants couldn't hurt, and perhaps some loose fitting button up shirts. I might grab a puzzle or two, some magazines, books, and movies (although I still have quite a bit of Grey's Anatomy left on netflix). Does anyone have any suggestions for what else I could do?
After surgery I will be staying with my parents until I'm able to function on my own. How long does it usually take for someone to be able to cook, clean, and do pet maintenance (I have a bird who is quite needy)? I figure it won't be MORE than four weeks. My surgeon told me that most of the time, people can gradually start going back to normal about a month after surgery. It's really important to me that I can because I start graduate school in the fall and need to be able to lug around a very heavy backpack.
Thank you all for the comments and the support :)
Replies (4)
Welcome to RealSelf!
I am happy you joined us and so glad you shared your story. I look forward to seeing you in the community.
Hey Becca! Thanks for your review. It is totally normal to be nervous before surgery, especially one where the end result is such a big deal. When you have an appendix removed, the only sign that something happened is the scar, but with a breast reduction many more things are at stake than a scar. It sounds as if you have amazing parents who are very supportive as you. I wish you the best of luck on the 19th and will be anxious to hear from you!
You will be healed by grad school...no worries there.
Your questions list is grea. I know Piggles made a list of questions too. Maybe check out her review, as it was quite detailed.
I think staying with your parents is a great idea. You will need to be kindda easy with yourself for the first couple of weeks. And I would urge you to stay away from the bird cage until incisions are fully healed. I'm sure your bird is spectacular, but birds can have a lot of bacteria in their [RS bleep] and you don't want to take any chances with any type of bacteria getting into your breast tissue.
My pre-op meeting went really well. I feel so...
I got some interesting answers on some of my questions that I thought I would share with everyone. I think it's cool to compare/contrast what sorts of instructions different doctors give. For example:
* How long until I sleep on my stomach again? She said if it wasn't horrendously uncomfortable I could as soon as I felt able. She also told me that I could sleep on my side, although the side I slept on would be more swollen as a result.
* How long will I be in a surgical bra? She told me to leave on the surgical bra for two weeks. After that mark I may begin to rotate between a sports bra and the surgical one. At six weeks I can go new bra shopping!
* Like many of you on here, she suggested with the painkillers that I keep some miralax or something similar on hand. I figured I would go out and buy those metamucil cookies because feeding myself/preventing constipation is like killing two birds with one stone.
* She told me it was crucial that every few hours I walk around to prevent a bloodclot from forming.
* I was also told that a few days later I could take walks and go on the elliptical lightly without using the arm things. I think she gathers I'll go mental if I have to be 100% still. As of right now my weight is about 5 pounds up from where I'd like it, so getting to even work my legs is important to me.
* Finally, I could start working on moving my arms when I felt comfortable enough to.
Overall the office visit was a very positive experience. She had to do my pre-op pictures as a baseline for when I come in for post-operative visits. She made me laugh by saying "these are the pictures your mother always told you not to take!" It put me right at ease because I am so shy about my body. I asked her about liposuction on my sides. She said I didn't really seem like I need it, but doing a tiny bit will make me look trimmer overall. It is included in the price of the procedure, so of course I took her up on it. Life is too short to be self-conscious. At the end we went over the pictures from her previous breast reduction patients and I picked out the size breasts that we both agreed would look proportional on me. I think it's a smaller C. I added that if in doubt, I'd rather her go smaller than bigger.
One thing I didn't think of when considering this procedure was how it will change my taste in clothing. For so long, I've been trying to find things that hide my chest. I almost can't picture myself in normal clothing, bathing suits, or bras. The thought of a strapless dress or top seems as foreign as hell freezing over. I keep asking my friends, "so you really CAN wear a standard size shirt with a C?"or "You mean to tell me I can wear a string bikini if I wanted to?" I've been so limited because my age has never matched my chest size. When I was 9-11 I could have worn halters and stringy bikinis, but it wouldn't have been age appropriate. Now I'm simply too big to wear those things. It's weird to think about. It really hit home when I was doing laundry and folding up my bras. I realized, no more 36DD. Sorry about that brief tangent but it seemed sort of relevant.
I ordered a nice top online to wear while I'm recovering. It's loose-fitting. I also ordered a really cute pair of shoes. At this point I don't know how I will bend over to put them on, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. I still need to go and find a zip up sweatshirt (or two) and some button up shirts to wear. I have several, but they aren't really comfortable enough for me to lounge around in (although with enough painkillers in my system that probably won't be important).
So I'm finally uploading a few pictures of me in a bathingsuit. The bathingsuit definitely hides the sagging in the front, although it's significantly more cleavage than I'd ever like to have again. The side view is the one that troubles me more because i have to tie the top so tightly to hold them up that my neck shows signs of it for days and they just look very out of proportion. Please ignore the cellulite on my rear end.
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