My arm looks awful after brachioplasty

I have no idea how to post pix inside my comment. So I will give you a link to go to and see my arms and the progression of a wound that began 2 weeks post op and got worse until 3 weeks post op. But please come back here to comment.

sorry for the inconvenience!

here is the link http://www.realself.com/review/ramsey-nj-arm-lift-flankplasty-breast-lift-body-lift-medial-thigh-lift

Pretty scary looking. I'm glad there's no infection and doc says its healing. I know pictures are almost always worse than reality, but yikes!  Sound like everything else is doing ok?

Oh yes, it looks awful but as you correctly identified the pic looks worse than reality. That said, I will have a scar from this that Dr. Capella already said he will revise in his office. It will take a few weeks for this to heal. So it is very annoying to not have full used of my arms between this wound and the skin dehiscence in both arm pits. The few clothes that I now own almost all require being pulled over my head so I am very limited in what I am able to wear. I had to get rid of my entire extensive wardrobe because I lost so much weight after my tummy tuck. Not complaining about that!!!

As for the rest of my recovery, this surgery was easier to recover from than the tummy tuck as both dr. Capella and Scott, his PA, said it would be, but not quite as easy as they made it out to be. Of course everyone responds to surgery differently, so I may be outside the norm, I just don't know. For example, dr. Capella said I would be walking erect  in a few days but it actually took me nearly 4 weeks. I knew that I would have to take a step backward with this surgery, which took place six months after my tummy tuck, to take a few steps forward. But actually having to go through it is a downer. You know how recovery can be, your normal life is interrupted or put on hold for months. Many of the simple things that you take for granted, such as doing hair and makeup or raching items in the fridge or pantry are very challenging if not impossible to do. But this shall pass.

I am having some problems along the right side of my body. My right arm has the wound and dehiscence and my right groin opened. The right side of my butt incision is red and inflamed a bit. Most troublesome is that my right leg has a limited range of motion and is painful to extend my leg when walking. Not a lot of pain, but it is beyond discomfort. Initially I could not fully extend that leg straight and dr. Capella told me it would loosen up over time, which is seems to be doing.

I am only 3.5 weeks out so there is a lot of healing ahead. Everything seems to be moving in the right direction but not as quickly as I would like them to move! Even my right arm is looking better today, which is a very good thing.

I'm on my iPhone and too lazy to copy-paste but you know from reading here on the Boards and other research they this could happen and I'm sure if you had not had this info you would be even more bummed out on the delayed healing.
Keep taking pics to see the progress as it can change vastly from day to day and week to week.
You have been vigilant in your health care before and after along your journey so this too will pass in time. Hang in there and keep following your PS's orders.
Mikimi in Israel

You are too funny, Mikimi. I will email you a pic of the awful right arm. I was made aware of the skin dehiscence probability by dr. Capella and I fully expected it would happen to me. But I was not made aware of this skin necrosis, and I do use the term necrosis lightly because this is only superficial skin cells that died and the tissues underneath are in tact and very healthy. I will have to ask dr. Capella how often this happens. It may be that it is a rare occurence so was not mentioned to me. I want to also ask him if wearing compression sleeves would have prevented this. He had told me pre operatively that compression sleeves would not prevent the arms from opening because they would open in the arm pit where you could not put a compression sleeve. But this wound is along the arm incision line and I wonder if it could have been prevented with the sleeve. Not that it matters for me now, just thinking of patients in the future... as well as I am curious!

Oh darling I had wound dehiscence;and slough to gangrene with my TT and I think what saved me emotionally was postings by others who had had complications.
I think Siberian Cat was one.
I have iPhone pics (i can email toi whatever you want) of the gangrene and dehiscence and on my boobies Righty was renamed Yucky when opened on areola. I am a medical mystery.
Mikimi

Thank you! 

Thank you for sharing those photos with me. I think if something like that had happened to me that I would be very scared, especially if it was my first plastic surgery. I am much more calm with this recovery than I was with my first recovery because I understood better what to expect having been through it once before, as well as I had a history with my surgeon and have come to trust what he tells me. There is a lot of relief in that for someone like me who is always researching and involved in my health.

I had a very nasty opening at my T on my anchor and your arm is not nearly as bad. And your incision line is so light colored that I think you will heal well. I think because you can so clearly see the incisions that it may look worse.  Plus about 3/4 weeks out is when my depression really hit so you may be suffering from some of that. Also you are a self proclaimed perfectionist, I think you should try and distract yourself for a few weeks. Maybe start your Christmas shopping early?

 

Good luck and keep us posted.

Thanks for sharing about your T incision. Sorry that you had a complication. How does the scar look now?

I am not depressed about my arm. So sorry if I gave that impression. Well, at least not yet I am not depressed. If it did not heal well then I am sure that I will be. But I believe it will heal safely and perhaps "ugly" enough to need a revision, which is a fairly simple procedure. So I am prepared for that.

what has me down is that first, I look like crap, I feel like the blob that I was before my tummy tuck 6 months ago. I am inactive and cannot wear my nice clothes, do my hair or makeup. Blech! And next, most importantly, is that I do not like my results right now. I know that I have to be patient and wait a few months to see them. It took 3.5 months to see the results of my tummy tuck. What is different this time versus last time is that last time I looked and felt like crap before I had my tummy tuck, so anything that happened during recovery was an improvement. This time I looked really good before my surgery, and now during recovery I look and feel like crap.

 I do not like feeling and looking like the ugly fat girl again.  Sometimes I fear that my waist will not get small again, even though dr. Capella tells me I will get it back. After my TT and weight loss, I lost nearly 10 inches from my waist and I was trying to get it even smaller as it still was not clearly defined as most women are. Since my body lift my waist is like 4 inches bigger than it was pre op. I look like a tree trunk and I hate it because the rest of me looks pretty small. I know another woman on this board who had a body lift w th him and she said she is boxes. 

Dr. Capella told me that I am swollen, that I may have 10lbs of swelling. He told me to jump on the scale and see. Bbt I actually weigh 10lbs less than when I had my body lift. And I have lost inches in some places where he did my upper and lower body lift, except my waist. So sometimes I fret that I will remain boxy just like the other woman said she is after her body lift.

I am happy that my arms are smaller and I know once the swelling goes down thwt they will look great, aside from the scar needing to be revised which is pretty minor I think. My old ladies back is very improved as are my flanks on the sides of my beast, and I know my back will continue to improve as the swelling goes down. As for the remaing part of the body lift, the part that was most important to me, the breast lift. Well, I hate it. Dr. Capella said he will revise me but that is months away and I liked my beasts better before the lift. 

As for the LBL and thigh lift, I love the way that he revised my mons. I am thrilled about it. It took him two rounds because it was monster crotch and now it looks beautiful. I was so ashamed of this part of my body. Right now my belly button is not aligned with my cleft and it also looks to be a little too close to my cleft, but I think this will loosen up over time and be OK. Otherwise he may be able to tweak it to an extent, but it may be that to get the crotch I wanted that I had to make a little trade off with the belly button being low. If so, it is well worth it to me.

I loved my thighs post op but now I see dimpling like cellulite above my knees and wrinkles in my knees and some fatness in the very upper thigh where my legs still touch. Dr. Capella told me this is swelling but that I will have some loosening up. I am not too concerned because I think that whatever I do not like can be tweaked in the final surgery he will do. Or maybe I will be happy with the way my thighs look in a few months. They certainly look nice but as I said I have high expectations and so I may want a tweak, just like he did with my mons. He also tweaked my tummytuck and my lower abdo looks great now.

Lastly I do not like my ass. He said to give it some time and he will revise me if needed. My ass was an old ladies ass before surgery and he assured me he would make it pretty. It is not. I hope that I am able to get the as I want without implants because I do not have the money for them, nor am I so sure I would want them. Hopefully he can give me a pretty ass in the next surgery. For now the tailbone hurts and I have lost projection, although there were some improvements on other areas I cave say year overall I looks better than it did before surgery. My hips look great though!