adieu, nénés

It’s been a bit of a while since I’ve written, though really, nothing much has happened. My drain was removed about 3-4 days after it was put it, which was a HUGE relief. And things were relatively uneventful after that.

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.

I have to say, this drain has been THE most painful part of my entire surgery. Yesterday I had a lot of leakage outside of the tube as well — so much so that the entire right area of my surgical vest was soaked. So I decided I should take it off and wash it. Just taking off my top and vest was so painful it almost brought me to tears. Really. This drain is NOT fun.

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.

So I went to see the other plastic surgeon this morning. At this point I have mixed emotions about how it went. He decided that the fluid needed to be drained.

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.