prophylactic mastectomy after RNY
on 9/20/13 2:20 pm
That's great to hear about your compression garment time getting shortened, and your scars being better than expected. And wonderful for going back to work. I bet it did feel good. Hope you are gietting enough rest.
My surgery is Monday morning at 530. My roommate has a nasty cold/bronchitis/allergies something like that. I am hiding out in my room, trying not to touch anything and bleaching the house every time I turn around.
I just this week started feeling normal after the mastectomy/reconstruction. Just started sleeping regularly in the bed. Someone stole my car out of the parking lot at my apartment so I am back in my wheelchair on the bus til they find it or my insurance settles.
I am more nervous about this surgery Monday. I told the doctor there is no way I can handle being on the maternity ward, where she had me scheduled originally. She agreed to move me to a surgical floor. I am hoping it goes smooth and no big deal. I think I was pretty much about halfway done with menopause anyway, so maybe it wont be so bad. Trying to think positive. I quit reading the message board at hystersisters, because it was freaking me out After the mastectomy, I figure if something comes up I will deal with it. I am only supposed to be in the hospital for a day, overnight.
So glad you are recovering and doing well.
on 9/20/13 2:44 pm
Yesterday when I went for my three month check up at the bariatric surgeons office, the doctor sort of reversed his original position of advising me to wait on the mastectomy. I explained to him again about the brca issue, and the insurance issue, and that the ulcer had healed, and it became sort of a "choose your poison" sort of thing when it comes to which dreaded illness I was willing to face without insurance. One thing I found out after doing a TON of research was that the kind of cancer that is usually discovered in brca positive patients is fed by estrogen, which excess estrogen is stored in fat. Which is why so many fat people are at a higher risk of cancer. There hasn't been a lot of research about if estrogen is released into the body somewhere during weight loss, especially rapid weight loss. I darn sure did not want to trigger any cancer cell formation by an "estrogen dump" as I lost weight. My bariatric surgeons nurse was all excited about that, and wants me to see if i can find any more research. I guess she collects statistics for their office on which health conditions get resolved because of bariatric surgery. She is all about preventative care. It's sort of interesting, in a way, to think about starving some kinds of cancer by cutting off it's food supply. And, if we can healthy and not fat at the same time, so much the better. I had been dreading telling them about the mastectomy and hysterectomy because I was only 2.5 months out, and just had an ulcer. Now we are all on the same page. whew!
Good luck on Monday. I am hoping that this surgery is a non-event for you as it was for me. Aside from my back surgery many years ago, my hysterectomy and oopherectomy was my first surgery. I think the fact that it was so uneventful and the recovery was so quick is what made me move forward with the mastectomy and bariatric surgery. Glad to hear that your bariatric surgeon is on board now as well. Perhaps they had a chance to do some research and realize how important it is to eliminate this possibility for you. Or maybe they just finally understood your insurance issues. Who knows why they finally got on board the good news is that they did. The threat of breast cancer is one of the reasons that I had the bariatric surgery. I knew of the obesity link - surprised the nurse wasn't aware of it. I believe there is lots of literature out there talking about the link between obesity and breast cancer.
Glad to hear that they are getting you onto a surgical floor. I can't imagine being in the maternity ward. How bad is that to put you on the floor with women doing the one thing that you will never be able to do. Even if you had no intention of having children. Just putting it right in front of your face. I spent many years in infertility treatments so this is one thing that still bothers me to some extent. I don't let it run my life but certainly every time I hear a horror story regarding children, it just breaks my heart.
It was nice getting back to work. I was feeling really good but I was still pretty tired. It took me some time to get back to my normal 6 hours of sleep each night. That was the last thing to fall into place. But all is good now. Wearing the garments at night is working out ok now that the weather has turned. I go back to see the doc in a couple of weeks. He is going to do some kind of laser treatment on my scars from all of my surgeries. Most of them are fairly light but I have a few that are bad in spots. He says the laser work will make them look better. I have two spots on my right breast that are ugly looking - those are the ones that bother me - he said this should make them look alot better. I had bad necrosis on my breasts after my mastectomy but the left one healed much better than the right. So we will see. It certainly is something I can live with if this doesnt work.
Again, good luck on Monday. I will be looking for an update at some point.
JoAnn
on 9/25/13 8:46 am
I made it home. This hospitalization was much better than the last one. I figured out to bring my medicines with me. I lost a LOT of blood. They almost gave me a transfusion. I was right on the edge of needing one, but made it through without. I am really tired. My NUT has me increasing my iron for a week or so. So far so good, only one hot flash, and not much pain. Still pain from the mastectomy. But not an incredible lot from this surgery. I brought the abdominal binder I had for my RNY with me, and that helped a great deal I think. The frustrating part is not being able to lift much. But that will pass. I am glad to be home. Already glad I did this.
Prayers and good thoughts coming your way. Glad to hear that this didn't hit you too hard. Its a shame on the blood loss. Were things more complicated than they expected? I would imagine it will take a while to build up your blood supply and iron levels. They say rny patients don't do this as quickly as regular plumbed folks. I had a complication with my thigh lift - lost some blood. The ER doc wanted to give me blood - so we agreed to 2 units and it still took a couple of days after that for my hemoglobin levels to come up. I would imagine the blood loss is why you feel tired. That will take some time to get back to normal. But you are on the road to recovery and that is wonderful news. Now just rest up, get that iron in, and get your protein in so that you heal up more quickly. You are a very brave woman. You have gone through alot to ensure that breast and ovarian cancer risks are as close to zero as they can get. Even in the face of recovering from these two surgeries, the sense of relief is wonderful and a good reason to look to the future. JoAnn
I am doing good. Experiencing a little bit of swelling still in my ankles by the end of the day. I started wearing spanx during the day and that seems to be helping some. I also started some bromelain - that usually helps with swelling. I go back for a followup on Monday. The PS is going to do some laser treatments to some of my scars to make them look better. That has me a little freaked out because I don't really know what to expect. But in the last appointment he indicated that it is no big deal and he hasn't steered me wrong yet.
Take care,
JoAnn
