What have your boobs been up to?

There's no dainty way to approach this topic so I'm just going to be frank:
I have recently become obsessed with boobs (as I typed that I realized how wrong it sounded) because mine have gone into hiding and in order to find them I have to use a map and a magnifying glass. Since I know this is quite common with weight loss I thought I'd ask for some advice from the experienced ladies who can proudly say "been there, done that."

I know I want to get a lift but I haven't decided on enlargement yet. I have an amazing plastic surgeon who I love and trust. He did my lbl but wanted to wait 6 months before doing the arms and breasts. When I went in for my initial consultation we were focused on my lower bits so we only briefly discussed options for upper bits. It went something like this-
Me: "While I'm here I should mention my boobs have disappeared. I don't think I want implants so are there any other options?"
(my wonderfully supportive father, who wanted to meet the surgeon with me, adjusts awkwardly in his chair and turns his eyes towards the ceiling as he pretends to have become a sudden victim of hearing loss)
Surgeon: "No problem. We can do a lift and use fat injections from your own body. This can actually be done at the same time we do your arms as an out-patient procedure."

After the holidays I'm going in for a check up and a more informative discussion on the other operations. He is obviously the expert and I absolutely trust him with this procedure, even though I know it is less common and rather new, but well... it's hard to be a total breast expert when you don't actually own a pair.

This dilemma has led me here:
To the women who have gone through this or are in the market for upgraded boobs, like me, can you please share your experience? 
Additionally, does anyone have any experience with the fat injections?




ps... I'm not against implants and I'm keeping an open mind about getting them but it freaks me out a little to have unknown objects in my body... a natural look and feel is important but I'm really more concerned about that fact that I'm neurotic and would probably assume they were ticking bombs just waiting for me to sneeze. Has anyone found their implants kept them from certain activites? 

I didn't have fat injection for my breasts but I did just have it done to fill out my face and so far so good.  If you're interested in having the fat injections for the breasts (which sounds good me), I'd ask the surgeon if he's done the procedure on someone you can talk to.  Good luck

There are not that many surgeons that still use fat injections on breasts. I would do more research in that area before having that doe. I just had a lift and implants. Love them! Check my profile for pics. Good luck.

I haven't had plastics (yet) but I do have a friend who had WLS then did the fat injections for her breasts.  They did not last.  A year later she got implants.  They are really big (in my opinion, triple DDD's on a 140 pound size 6 woman) and she's had issues with her skin and how it ended up laying over the implants.  She's been back four times to try and fix things.

I don't think that is the normal experience, though.  Seems like the ladies here have had really good luck with theirs and from the pics I've seen, great looking boobs, lol.

 I had a BL 5 weeks ago.  I was in the same boat as you - I wasnt sure if I wanted implants or not.  As luck would have it, my surgeon doesnt believe in doing implants and a BL at the same time. His reasoning is that for the BL, he is trying to reconstruct the breast and lift it up using a Lejour technique.  For the implants, he is stretching the skin in the opposite direction to fit the implants.  His feeling is that you get better results from the lift if it is done separately and allowed to heal. He believes you also get better luck with the implants this way too as they are more likely to stay in place and not sag or stretch that newly lifted skin.

The perk for me is with this plan I get to see exactly how I look without implants. I have been reduced to a C cup, but lack any upper pole fullness.  I am deciding now on implants. At the moment, I am leaning towards less so that the top of the breast will match the bottom.

I just had my UBL, arms, boobs, bra line lift on 11-2.  I ended up with silicone implants under the muscle.  We talked briefly about auto augmentation, but I was kind of leary as I have heard that it doesn't always last.  As far as size, I told my PS I wanted to end up a full C, and would leave size and type of implant up to her. At some point I felt I needed to trust her judgment and artistry. I'm very glad I did. I look totally natural. Soft and round and they have already settled.  She said that in the OR she tried quite a few different impanlts out to get the right one. I'm so glad I left it up to her.  I am paying for er expertise afterall.  Best of luck.

 I felt a lot like you about implants object In my body wanting them to be real blah blah so.... I talked to others met with surgeons my son was getting married and all the dresses I tried on looked horrible all because I had what I called hot dog boobs felt like they were a long pair of socks that I had to roll up and stuff in a bra well after one shopping trip I decided after all this weigh loss stuff I had been thru I deserved to look the best I could and opted to have a lbl ba bl I got tear dropped shaped gummy bear implants they look and feel so real no one even my girlfriends that have seen me naked can tell they are fake I love them it did take a long time for me to feel normal and like they were mine my nipples were tender for 18 months but .... Now I couldn't be happier with my decision. I don't know much about injections but I'm sure no matter what decision you make you will be happy with it best wishes to you 

It wasn't until that last 10 pounds that I realized implants would be necessary. It seems that going from 145 to 135 all came from my boobs. I just wanted to be a nice full B and was completely shocked when discussing it with my husband that boobs were really important to him. After 24 years I really had no idea. I'm kinda glad he kept it to himself.

Deciding on size was really hard for me, right up until the last minute. We looked at lots of pictures together and had lots of discussion. I wanted him to be happy, after all in my clothes and padded bra nobody but the two of us would ever realize how National Geographic my old boobs actually were. And the primary reason I wanted to do plastic surgery was for the two of us - me to feel good about how I looked with and without clothes and to increase our appreciation of each other and our intimacy. Years of infertility and pregnancy loss and being 220+ pounds had taken their toll.

I tried on impants in the office twice and drug my husband up for a third and final visit. My breasts and chest wall are narrow so, even with moderate plus, I couldn't go very big or they'd have been too wide. So I had three options in high profile. I decided after looking at lots of before and afters that high profile was my aesthetic preference - I like the perky look that sticks out ala a 1950's bra. And when I did the try ons boobs that extended out to the side made me feel frumpy again.

A also had a feeling of dread about making a wrong choice. I was worried that I'd look fake with D or bigger boobs. And I also worried that if I went too small after they dropped and the swelling went down I'd feel too small. My doctor told me that there's just now way to know for sure how things turn out but that the patients she had who were happiest made the best choice they could and then just let it all go. They resolved to be happy with what they got and they were.

My friend got 400cc a few weeks before I did and I liked how she looked. She looked vavavavoomy in some clothes but looked unaugmented in workout wear or neighborhood mom attire. So I chose 400cc and my doctor chose 375cc and took temporary sizers for each into the OR. She told me she'd make the final decision about the size and the scars at that time and I trusted her judgment. I'm really glad I did. When I woke up in recovery the nurse told me I would be thrilled, that she'd gone with 400cc implants and they were beautiful - he said I had a very curvy and nicely proportioned body.

That first night I was dying to find out whether I ended up with anchor or just the vertical scars. I was bandaged up so tightly I couldn't tell. When we went in for the first day follow-up it was the first thing I asked. The doctor and her nurse both smiled and said they had a surprise for me I'd have to wait to see after they unwrapped me. They put a mirror in front of me and at the last second the doctor said, "Ta da, no scars!". Turns out she always starts with the areolar incision first, tries on the implants and then clips things together to determine where to make the rest of the lift incisions. But when she got my implants in they were just the right size for my skin. She lifted just by doing the purse string or peri-areolar incision and making my nipples smaller. They lifted to the right place and the skin and exisitng breast tissue were right where they should be. I was completely surprised, it wasn't even an option we'd talked about. I'd read that it was rarely done becaue for most women it couldn't give enough lift or the right shape. i suspect that going high profile made it more doable because i got the upper pole fullness and projection without having to pull the breast tissue up too high.

My areolas are now pretty small and there are lots of sensations I've had to live with during the healing process that I don't like. For much of my recovery I've felt like I did when I was nursing and engorged but it doesn't go away. At least with nursing you'd get that awful feeling and once you nursed you'd feel fine. My nipples are sort of perma-erect. The tape on the incisions, while better in this last week, drive me nuts. But I have to do it. She said tape for this kind fo incision is critical because you don't want any pulling on the incisions and the tap holds the pressure so your skin doesn't have to.

I also don't like the feeling of the under the muscle at all. It's kind fo a pulling, burning, stretching sensation. Especially if I'm driving the car around a corner, trying to open a child-proof cap, or doing anything that involves my pecs. I really hope that goes away, I hate it. It seems to me that in a few years over the muscle with fat transfer would be a viable alternative for people like me that don't have enough tissue to cover the implants well. I'm actually going to challenge my doctor to she if she can figure that one out - she loves to be on top of new techniques. I really hope it gets better as I heal. My neighbor had her surgery 3 years ago and looked at me quizzically when i said how much I hate that feeling so it must get better. But frankly, the boob recovery has been unpleasant enough that I can't imagine I'd be up for any kind of revision unless in like 15 years it was absolutely necessary.

Let's see, I'm just rambling on and on. Hate doing it but I also know how much I appreciated the detailed posts of others when I was making all my decisions...

Aside from the physical, getting new boobs has had some ups and downs thinking-wise. As I mentioned above, deciding on a size was a huge challenge. I was annoyed by how much my husband cared about the size (even though i fully invited his input). And for a couple of weeks after surgery I went back and forth between hating them and loving them. My whole body felt fake, like I was wearing some sort of costume. My boobs felt too big and I felt fake and sleezy. Every time my brain went down that path I tried to just tell myself to let it go, to wait and see, let them drop and heal a bit and to not worry about it.

At this point they feel much more like they're mine. They've dropped into place and I can wear normal bras which makes me feel normal. I've gotten a lot of attention with them that I'm totally not used to, a neighborhood holiday party where I wore my first low cut top. Going back to work for the first time. It made me really glad I'd told everyone and joked about it in advance. The difference between old and new is unmistakable and I was a little uncomfortable but, because everyone knew beforehand, they didn't gossip or seem uncomfortable. They openly talked about how I looked and joked with me and it made it much better than if I'd just shown up one day with 34 D boobs and no explanation. My co-worker took me aside last week to mention that I'd given one side of the conference table an eyeful when I leaned over to dial the phone. I'm really glad he was comfortable enough to tell me. I'd worn the shirt before with my padded bra and size A boobs and it wasn't really sexy. But with the 5" depth of cleavage I have now the shirt operates entirely differently. I think I'll need a few camisoles that I didn't need before :-).

My husband's reaction has been great but sometimes annoying. Wants to look at them and touch them and has a hard time understanding that even 5 weeks later he has to be careful around the nipple area. He quickly volunteered for the scar massage duty but I decline his offer, it's about as unsexy a thing as I could imagine and didn't really want to feel like a cow at a milking machine with him. Would set a bad mental precedent. Mostly I feel flattered and sexy and I'm really happy that he finds me so attractive. But part of me is annoyed that he's so fascinated with them and kind of pissy that he's been more touch feely in the last month than in the last 5+ years. I mean, I was still the same person at 225 right? But then I remember that, if I'm truly honest with myself I find him a little more appealing when he was a size 32 than at a size 40 with love handles. It's just how we're wired. I think it'll get better when I'm up for some real interation, between the LBL and the boob sensitivity I'm probably a few weeks away from wanting to horse around.

Ok, that's enough torture for you. The net-net is that I was unsure about implants but decided that feeling and looking sexy and having a youthful shape when naked was important too me. I hemmed and hawed about size before hand and then let it go and have focused my efforts on healing physically and letting my head mentally integrate my new boobs into my new mental image of myself. I'm 44 and appreciate having the new male attention from my husband (and other males too). At my previous size and physique I mostly felt invisible. I get a little shy about how big and busty I look in some tops but it's fun to play it up when I want to and play it down when I don't. And, lastly, I don't miss my old boobs at all. When I was having my moment of "too big regret" I got out my before pictures and looked at myself and realized I wouldn't go back even if I could. Things just got better after that.

Respectfully submitted for what it's worth ;-).

Britt

Oh, forgot to mention (although it's probably pretty hard to imagine there's anything I could have forgotten in my XL reply) that I was anti-foreign object too. My road with the lap band and the lap band port was long and miserable and surgery riddent. The idea of implants didn't set well at first. But I suspect that because they're soft my body is handling them better. That darn lap band port never felt good, ever, always clearly felt like a slightly painful foreign object. After all the boob massage there appears to be no webbing or casular scarring issues. The implants are definitely there and are firmer than my breast tissue but i can't feel their margins just when sitting here - couldn't tell you exactly where they started and stopped without pressing with my hands. So far, so good.

 Thank you so much everyone! All these answers really helped. I've actually started to look more into implants. I see my Dr. next week so hopefully I'll be able to get handsy with some of the options