Surgery #15

On June 18th I had my 1st breast reconstruction surgery.  This was my 15th surgery....I am a pro.  Here is the best explanation I could find to describe my Latissimus Dorsal Flap surgery: "Skin, tissue, and muscle will be moved from the upper back to the mastectomy area through a tunnel created by the surgeon under your skin.  Then a tissue expander will be placed under the flap."

PRETTY CRAZY STUFF!

 We had to wait FOREVER to be taken back for surgery prep......here I am trying to be patient.  

I was SO SO SO SO HUNGRY!!!!!!

 Here is a nice close-up of my scrubbed face ready and waiting for surgery.

I have NEVER been to a hospital so concerned about making sure I was SUPER clean before surgery.  I had to use a special soap at home when I took my morning shower AND they had me scrub my whole body down before I put my hospital gown on.  I have NEVER done either one of those things in my past surgeries.

 Here I am resting after surgery.  The first 12 hours after surgery are a TOTAL blur for me.  I do NOT remember a thing.

 I am AWAKE!!

 As far as hospital food goes, it was pretty delicious.  The best part is you picked whatever you wanted off the menu and called it in whenever you wanted.  I will admit I had cheesecake at EVERY meal.  

 This was my pain ball.  It was my friend.  They had a tube inserted into my back and it continuously released pain medication straight to the source of my pain.  My doctor even had them fill it up before I went home.   I spent two nights in the hospital.  At home, when it was empty Corey pulled the tube out.  I had ZERO pain in my back until about 24 hours after the pain ball meds ran out.  It was awesome.

I had three drains post-surgery.   One for my back and two for my chest.  This is a picture of the drains.  This picture was before the drains started having some serious nasty clots, tissue, & heaven knows what draining out of me.  They would get clogged  (and it would hurt so bad when they did) and Corey would help me try to unclog them.  I had to empty them and chart how much was draining out of me each day.  It was kinda gross....it takes A LOT to gross me out.  At my one week post-op they took the back drain out.  At my 2 week post-op they took the 2nd drain out.  By this time the drains were DRIVING ME CRAZY.  I was so dosed up on pain meds for the first 2 weeks that the drains didn't bother me too much.  But, by week 2 I was weaning myself off the pain meds and the one remaining drain started to drive me crazy.  I couldn't get comfortable.  It really started hurting.  By the end of the week it hurt so much that I would just lay in bed and try not to move at all.  If I moved even a little I would have terrible pain at my drain site.  I went back on my pain pills for this.  My huge nasty surgery scars didn't really hurt that much anymore...it was that stupid last drain.  I was up most of the night Saturday crying and wondering why I was so miserable.  The next day I was desperate that I had my husband cut the stitches and pull out the drain.  As SOON as he took it out the pain subsided.  Oh relief....my husband saved me.  

Here is a picture of my fresh new back scar.  I thought about taking a picture of my chest too, but I figured that was a little too much information.   The front scar looks like Frankenstein (see illustration below).  The back scar actually extends all the way under my arm and connects with my chest scars.  It is pretty ugly.

The first month after my surgery I had not much of an appetite.  I basically lived off fruit and smoothies.  Before my surgery I had worked hard to lose my chemo weight and I DID!!  After my surgery, due to my low appetite I lost about 10 more pounds.

It has been 5 1/2 weeks since my surgery and I still feel like I am not fully recovered.  I thought for sure I would feel great after about 3 weeks....BOY I WAS WRONG.  BUT, I had a little set back a few days ago that is contributing to my slow recovery....I will explain in another blog post.