Tuesday, September 30, 2008

My day - so far

I just got home from the plastic surgeon. It was quite an uneventful visit. The excitement was, as always, the traffic getting there! It was a little unusual. Where the traffic is usually bad, it wasn't. Where it was usually good, it was terrible.

The nurse removed a few stitches, he looked and affirmed that the right breast is bigger than the reduced left. He said he might try to remove some from the right when he does nipple reconstruction. I vetoed that!

I have wondered how the reconstruction would be done. I got an idea when he said I might want to have the reconstructed nipple tattooed. Wow. I could get really silly here, but I'll refrain.

So, I have a two week interval before my next appointment. I'm sure we will set the date for the final procedure.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm sure you will be glad when this is all over with. I don't blame you for not caring that one side is bigger than the other....who wants more surgery. But why would you need to have your nipple tattooed?

LeeAnn

Grandma K said...

As I understand it - the nipple will be "fashioned" from the skin that was grafted on. So it wouldn't match in color. I'm not sure this whole thing is important. I may skip the entire thing even though the nipple replacement is supposed to take 30 minutes. But it is yet another surgery. So . . .

Anonymous said...

I thought that when someone wanted breast reconstuction surgery,after a mastectomy, the surgeon would save the nipple area for use later on. Guess that isn't a current practice anymore.

I don't blame you for not wanting to go through another surgery.

LeeAnn

Grandma K said...

My mastectomy was Feb of 2007. My surgeon didn't do reconstruction. In fact, the radiation oncologist wanted me to wait even longer to have reconstruction. Anyway - I have one natural and one missing. At this point my chest looks like a crazy quilt!