For the most part, I don’t have any open wounds right now. The only ‘problem’, if you could call it that, is that the suture line is PURPLE and even nearing black in some places. It’s not painful, though, and there are no sores or blisters.

I doubt I will be seeing my PS again, however. I am moving to another state 12 hours away on Saturday and don’t plan on heading back here to just see my PS unless something goes severely wrong. At this point, I am just going to wait and let my body heal at whatever snail-like pace it wants to heal at. Considering how rapidly the blisters formed with the last surgery, I feel rather confident at this point that I won’t have THAT particular problem this time around.

Am I happy with my breasts? I guess. I think, however, I’ve grown a little blasé about them. It’s like the family member that calls to tell you about their ailments all the time. You care, of course, but after a while you just don’t want to be bothered with it. This is where I am at currently with my nénés (and if I haven’t said it before, nénés is French slang for boobs).

I’m glad that my nipples are closer in size now, even though it’s not perfect (nothing ever is, though). The right one, in my opinion, could still be a BIT smaller. On top of that, I have no idea why it is now inverted. Before the first surgery, I KNOW it wasn’t inverted. But for whatever reason, it is now. I don’t like it, but I’ve gotten used to living with it.

And now that I feel I am done with all the surgery mess, it’s time to start re-shaping my shape, so to speak. I can only tolerate being so pear-like for so long. It’s starting to bother me. Now that I don’t have such large boobies preventing me from exercising, there really is no excuse for me NOT to be exercising. Will this turn into a weight loss blog? No, I doubt it. I’ll talk about my boobies but would rather keep my fat to myself! Nevertheless I think this is something that some women who undergo a breast reduction will face. It’s hard adapting to a new body shape that’s radically different from the one you knew for years. And sometimes, after your breasts have been altered, you may feel that the rest of your body will eventually need to follow suit.

And that’s where I am now — healing yet still not healed, but ready to move on to the next level of a new Rowan.

My “scar excision revision” surgery (say that five times fast) was on Friday. Two days before the surgery, my nose started to get runny. I developed a slight cough. Now, most people would call their doctors, tell them of this and probably have the surgery re-scheduled. Not Rowan. No sir, not me. I self-medicated. I drank hot tea with lemon and honey. I took Tylenol. I took Benadryl. I used decongestant nose sprays. My unruly sinuses were not going to get the best of me. So, on the day of surgery, I took a Benadryl and a Tylenol to mask any fever or runny nose and in I went! The entire time there I suppressed my urge to cough and kept my head back on the bed to keep my nose from running. I made it through. I.V. was inserted and into surgery I went. My med school friend will probably read this and shake his head and curse my name for my foolish actions, but c’est la vie. I lived to tell another tale for another day.

Hindsight being what it is, maybe I should have re-scheduled. But no, I’m stubborn as an ox and I will always do things my way. Coming out of surgery, I hurt. My goodness did I hurt. My chest hurt and my throat hurt. My throat felt like an angry wildcat had ravaged it. To say the least, the tube that placed down my throat for the general anaesthesia did not help out the tonal qualities of my voice. It’s Monday and I’m just starting to sound human again.

But most importantly, my boobies hurt. MAN did they hurt! I didn’t remember being in this much pain after the first surgery. Sure, I was achy, but I didn’t really HURT. I said I hurt. The nurse gave me this and that, hair of dog and eye of newt and eventually a shot of morphine. No, I still hurt. It was a subdued hurt, but a hurt all the same. Fast forward to getting home and the hurt began to return with a vengeance. That pretty much sums up how I am right now, awake since 4 am: hurting.

As for how my boobies look, they look like trussed up, sore, and angry ta-tas. And they hurt. I am supposed to go see my PS tomorrow — we’ll see what he says himself about how they look and my level of discomfort and pain. I am supposed to be leaving for Stockholm in 18 days. To say the least, this trip should prove interesting provided how much pain I am in right now and how easily I get exhausted due to the after-effects of the anaesthesia.

I apologise for the rambling of this entry. The pain killers are turning my brain into mush. If only they’d do something about the pain …

To start, I’ll answer the most important question: What the hell caused all that blistering and general post-op nastiness? It’s a rather simple answer, really. I had a very bad allergic reaction to my internal dissolving sutures. My body rejected them like a fat kid rejects brussel sprouts. The blistering was essentially the sutures being pushed to the surface and then being “spat” out. That’s right — instead of the sutures dissolving, my body pushed them out. Thankfully the affected areas have little to no feeling and so this doesn’t hurt. Once, however, I yanked a suture out of an area with feeling and I’ll just say it wasn’t the most pleasant sensation in the world.

All that blister-forming and suture-spatting has lead to some rather unsightly scarring. It has also lead to my breasts not retaining a pleasant shape. And for whatever reason, my left side has also formed what is called a “dog ear”, a little flap or tag of skin which pokes out to the side. Dog ears on dogs can be cute, but I can’t say the same for dog ears on my boobies.

So, I hope anyone could clearly see why I wouldn’t want to talk about any of this–I’ve been grumpy for months. I do want to say, though, that even with all these general unpleasantries, I don’t regret the surgery itself. I like having smaller breasts, even if they are not that pretty. I like the fact I can walk around without a bra and without having the “slosh and sway” that my old breasts had. I’ve gotten over the fact I’m more of a “pear” than an “hourglass” now. You couldn’t pay me to go back to the way things were.

Now that I’ve caught you up to speed, we’ll continue on to “what’s next”. Next being a reconstructive surgery recently approved by my insurance company. Essentially, I will be cut back open, the dog ear will be removed, nipples will be appropriately resized, boobs re-shaped and I will be closed back up with a new suture — this time one I hopefully will not react so poorly to.

And that’s this in a nutshell. It’s not over yet, even though my one year reduction anniversary is only 3.5 months away. More to come after the date for the next surgery has been set.

Until now.

Sometime last week I noticed a growing redness on the underside of my breasts. I didn’t think much of it since I had an appointment coming up for this Thursday (21st) and my PS could just look at it then. Well, between Friday and this morning, the reddening worsened, part of my skin started looked abrased and chafed and a blister developed on my left breast. So, I called my PS’s office and went in today to have it looked at — especially since it was becoming quite painful.

Apparently, I have become an anomaly. My PS has never seen anything like it, and this is coming from the man that performs ~150 breast reductions a year for at least the past 8-10 years. His first assumption was that I was having an allergic reaction to something, but I have no known allergies and haven’t changed anything in my regimen except for one thing: I’ve been using Hibiclens, an antimicrobial skin cleanser that was recommended to me by him in order to keep possible infections at bay. As he put it, “I’ve never heard of someone being allergic to Hibiclens!” Well, maybe I am!

So, I was told to put an OTC hydrocortisol cream over them, cease using Hibiclens for the time being and come back on the 2nd of September (or call them if it doesn’t approve by then).

We’ll see how it all pans out. But for the time being, as far as my plastic surgeon goes, I’m one of a kind amongst all his other cases.

I haven’t decided if this is flattering or not yet.

To say I’m miserable with it is an understatement. I’ve drained about 35 mL in fluid so far and emptied my bag today so we’ll see how much I manage to leak out tomorrow as well. If I have to keep this in much longer, though, I’m going to demand another prescription for painkillers. This drain is VERY, VERY painful! Just breathing with it in hurts.

There’s noting quite like lying on your back while a doctor wiggles and jiggles a hollow needle around the inside of your breast, suctioning out as much fluid as possible. To add insult to injury (and at this point I am definitely feeling the ‘injury’), he then inserted a drain — one of the main things I was hoping to avoid. So now I have to walk around with a long tube hanging out of the bottom of my shirt with a plastic bulb attached at the end to collect all of the fluid.

I feel drained (pun intended). I would say this is perhaps one of the most uncomfortable and disgusting moments of my life. I generally have a strong tolerance for such things, but it even makes me cringe to gently move around my breast only to feel the tube and hear the fluid squishing about. And to watch it all travel down the tube to the reservoir in my pocket? YUCK!

I don’t know how sleeping with this thing is going to go, but I’m pretty sure it’s not going to be pleasant …

Ah yes. Some people have asked how long the drain must stay in. The answer is: I don’t know. Sunday at the earliest, but it could remain in for a longer period of time. As I was told, the worst case scenario would be that not all the fluid drains and they will have to RE-OPEN my breast to get it all out. How charming.

But now? I can choose to be free and braless (which is great), but I’ve noticed that bras in my new size range have a refreshingly LOW number of hooks — only one to two! Part of me (the part that doesn’t realise I no longer have massive boobage) wonders if one or two hooks is ENOUGH on a bra?

That plastic surgeon stated he’d like to take a look at it and that I should come in tomorrow. The available time slot for me? 7:30 AM. Now, for those that DON’T know me, I’m not a morning person. I don’t even start to turn until 9 AM! So, to say the least, I’m not going to be a happy camper tomorrow.

It feels strange to hear my female friends say, “Wow! I never thought I’d see the day when I had bigger boobs than Rowan!” I am truly a member of the IBTC (itty-bitty titty committee) now. While walking in a department store today, I stopped by the lingerie and while I didn’t try any bras on just yet, I did hold some cups up to my boobs and it does seem like I am a US B cup. Some ruder people (women) keep harping on me that my boobs are now “too small”, that I should have gone to a D. But I think they’re just jealous that they can’t wear shirts without a bra and I can!

That said, it was brought to my attention that lavender essential oil has some (supposed) scar reducing properties. Because I had access to free lavender essential oil, I thought Hey! Why not? If anything, my breasts will smell like lavender, which I find to be a very pleasant smell. So, yesterday I began applying the oil to my incision lines twice a day. We’ll see how well it works, though I have to sadly admit this cannot be a truly scientific investigation since there is only one subject being tested and no control.

Through much discussion with many male friends, I had been under the generalised impression that scars didn’t matter so much. However, it’s recently come to light that scarred boobies really seem to bother some men. Perhaps because I have a strong, frank personality, my reaction to this is simple: if the fact my breasts are scarred PERMANENTLY bothers someone, then they shouldn’t be with me. These aren’t the only scars I have. I have a large scar on my knee from an accident when I was 6 and I had to get almost 60 stitches in that knee. Now, my right knee cap looks slightly different from the left. I have stretch marks — and not from child bearing, either. They’re simply there from growth or weight gain. While I sometimes strive for perfection in some areas of my life, over the past few years I have come to terms with the fact I will never have the perfect body. The fact my areolae were different sizes bothered me at first, but given a few days of thought, reflection, and support from friends, this doesn’t bother me anymore, either. I have accepted it.

I debated on and off if I would show pictures of my naked breasts. I’m still prone to bouts of shyness and I don’t know many women who would willingly bare their breasts on the internet for all to see. But the bottom line is that I am not ashamed of my scars — no woman who undergoes this surgery should be.

My surgical vest was really irritating those bruises, so I slept Friday night braless and spent a bit of Saturday without a bra, too. I think the best thing about this surgery so far is that I CAN go braless. It’s the best thing ever. No swaying, no wiggles and jiggles. The ta-tas stay where they’re supposed to be, my nipples are even with each other so even if they show through my shirt, they are where they’re supposed to be!

I’m still not totally comfortable with my areolae being different sizes, but it isn’t upsetting me as much as it was last week. After doing some research, it seems post-surgery depression can be common for the first two weeks, but shouldn’t exceed that. It’s been almost two weeks since my surgery and thankfully I’m starting to slowly feel more emotionally comfortable with my new body.

I’m still not used to it, though. Often I catch myself just looking down and staring at my chest. When I undress to take a bath, I’ll spend 10 minutes just examining my new body shape. I still don’t recognise myself when I look in the mirror.

Perhaps one of the grossest things thus far (aside from the leakage) are the scabs that come off when I take a bath. There aren’t many left anymore (thank goodness), but a few days after the surgical tape was removed, they were coming off against my hand, towel, washcloth, etc. Yuck!

My left nipple, for whatever reason, almost feels MORE sensitive now than it did pre-surgery. My right nipple is the one that gets nerve regeneration pains and is probably at about 65% sensitivity. Overall, I suppose I should consider myself lucky to have kept so much sensation in my nipples — and I’m not even fully healed yet!

There is a lot of fluid in my right breast, which contributes to its uneven size from the left one. This was especially noticed by me when, while jumping around one night, I heard “sloshing” noises coming from my right boob! It seriously sounded like a water balloon. Hopefully the fluid will either leak out or be reabsorbed by the time my appointment on the 7th rolls around, otherwise my doctor may feel it pertinent to insert drains in me.