Well yesterday was the magical Friday the 13th; Full moon, and plastic surgeon appointment. It went really well, as well as these things can go.
I asked him if we could do the type of surgery I wanted - nipple sparing with inframammary incisions, and he said it was a go! Which is super exciting, because one of the biggest fears of mine is that in doing this, I will hate what is left of my "breasts." Which is kind of silly, because technically, besides the nipple that is, there will be nothing left of my breast.
The mastectomy will take care of that, which is a good thing, but it is just so strange to think about it all and how they do it. The PS will put tissue expanders in under my pectoral muscles, and will over a period of weeks or months will slowly stretch them out by injecting saline to stretch out the muscles so there is a pocket to put the implant in. It is so weird to think about this process, which I have always looked at in the abstract before, as something that has happened to so many other women that I know (well know online from different support groups) and now it is happening to me.
So in the next week or so I will know the big date. The first day of the rest of my life where my cancer risk will be cut down so drastically that I wont have to think about it like I do now. That every time I hear a story about another young woman dying from breast cancer and leaving her husband and children behind, I can be thankful because I know, not 100%, but a hell of a lot better chances, that that wont happen to me. And even though I am scared of the pain, the process, the whole thing, that will be a beautiful day. And I SO look forward to marking that day on my calendar.
SO scary. I can't even pretend to imagine what you're going through. As a medical transcriptionist I type a lot of oncology which includes a great deal of breast cancer, so I'm familiar with the process you've described. I've been doing this a long time now (almost 9 years) and the results are overwhelmingly positive, the cosmetic result excellent. I admire your bravery.
ReplyDeleteThank you Auntie. It is a scary thing to have to deal with, but having known about it for the past 5 years, it is more just something that is, that I have no control over so I have somehow managed to get past most of the fear. Don't get me wrong, I'm still scared of it all, but it is more of a dull ache as opposed to a raw one. I hope it all goes positively for me and we have good results, that is one thing I am nervous about, but the benefits are so much higher doing it than not, so we will go for it! :)
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