Surgery Friday, so why am I depressed :(

[Aimster82]

I have been living with gynecomastia for 10 years now. I am 29 years old and I finally decided to get the surgery. I haven't been to the beach or pool in years. I have trouble in the bedroom because when I am on top I feel the breasts hanging so I feel uncomfortable and women hate a man who is not confident.

I picked a doctor based on experience, recognition and photographs. I was reading this forum and I feel like I might have picked the wrong doctor and my surgery is on Friday. What do I do?

The procedure is going to be liposuction (UAL/PAL). I verified with him if the glands would be removed using this procedure and he assured me they would be. I saw over 50 pictures of patients he did the surgery to. Their chests were FLAT. Surely one of those patients had to have had breast tissue, they had much more severe cases than me. So how did their chests get so flat?

Ok I know I am rambling on. I am just depressed. Waited my whole life and I think I messed up. What if I am not satisfied with my surgery? What do plastic surgeons usually do in these situations? Should I go ahead and cancel my surgery?
I paid $4,000 already upfront but I think I'll only lose $500 for "booking' it.

Surgeon is board certified, many awards, appeared in many magazines and has pictures to prove his work. Am I being overly paranoid?

Just wanted to add I checked his record online, no complaints. He is clean. I kept asking him during the evaluation why he doesn't cut it out like other doctors do and he said it minimizes scars and there is no need to. My chest will be flat he says. All he had me do is stand up, he took one look at me and told me to lay down. He pressed down on my chest and said good news for you, this is going to be easy. I keep believing in him because of the pictures. I saw cases like mine but then I read what people say on here so I am confused.

Help

[Rocky76]

Make sure he is well versed on muscles in motion. Simply looking at static pictures can be useless. My Dr. has a lot of pics of standard shots that where awesome. I even look OK in certain static poses.. but I look really bad in animated flexing situations. My results are poor in animated real world situations. I cant stress how important it is to make sure your Dr. is in full understanding of this concept. One does not live their life with thier hands to the sides. I now feel just as concious about my chest when moving around as i did before the surgery. Thats not the result you want to risk. Press your doc on it. If he dosent have an answer you like.. you should be as worried as you are now. Good Luck

[Aimster82]

Do you have before/after pictures ?

[jojo82]

I have been living with gynecomastia for 10 years now. I am 29 years old and I finally decided to get the surgery. I haven't been to the beach or pool in years. I have trouble in the bedroom because when I am on top I feel the breasts hanging so I feel uncomfortable and women hate a man who is not confident.

I picked a doctor based on experience, recognition and photographs. I was reading this forum and I feel like I might have picked the wrong doctor and my surgery is on Friday. What do I do?

The procedure is going to be liposuction (UAL/PAL). I verified with him if the glands would be removed using this procedure and he assured me they would be. I saw over 50 pictures of patients he did the surgery to. Their chests were FLAT. Surely one of those patients had to have had breast tissue, they had much more severe cases than me. So how did their chests get so flat?

Ok I know I am rambling on. I am just depressed. Waited my whole life and I think I messed up. What if I am not satisfied with my surgery? What do plastic surgeons usually do in these situations? Should I go ahead and cancel my surgery?
I paid $4,000 already upfront but I think I'll only lose $500 for "booking' it.

Surgeon is board certified, many awards, appeared in many magazines and has pictures to prove his work. Am I being overly paranoid?

Just wanted to add I checked his record online, no complaints. He is clean. I kept asking him during the evaluation why he doesn't cut it out like other doctors do and he said it minimizes scars and there is no need to. My chest will be flat he says. All he had me do is stand up, he took one look at me and told me to lay down. He pressed down on my chest and said good news for you, this is going to be easy. I keep believing in him because of the pictures. I saw cases like mine but then I read what people say on here so I am confused.

Help

Stay calm. Realize that the pictures you see on the internet are the best results the doctor has gotten. It's marketing. It's a business like any other. There's a lot of stuff between great and bad- and odds are, you'll end up there. You have to be comfortable with the fact that you will probably end up with mediocre results- which isn't a bad thing, by the way.

Another thing to keep in mind is that gyne surgery is not rocket science in the plastic surgery field. I have interviewed two prominent professors in breast reconstructive surgery. Both said that gyne surgery is very common and fairly simple. Doctors can market their certain "techniques" all they want, but at the end of the day it's just marketing and not much else. If your doctor is board certified, has a good online reputation (be careful of doctors who employ SEO spammers, which includes some on this forum. I may even publish a list of doctors who scam google results), has a lot of experience, and has done the procedure a lot, then you have increased your odds for a good result. As bad as it is to say it, a lot of this is a "crap shoot" of sorts. Nobody can tell you how your body and skin will react to trauma. That's a variable that no surgeon can hedge against.

It's common to feel nervous before surgery. The litmus test I always give people is this: even if you had a mediocre result, will your quality of life improve over what you deal with now? If yes, proceed with the surgery.

P.S. If you PM me the name of the surgeon, I can give you feedback if I have information on him/her.

[morpheus11]

hey jojo, could I pm to see if you have any feedback on my potential surgeon?  I've been itching to get it for about 2 months now, but like the poster, I'm just not entirely sure. My potential surgeon just took one look, a quick feel, and kept saying it was a breeze--that it wasn't hard and just to do it. He was very personable, almost to the point of making me feel like he could do it right then and there. 

[morpheus11]

@Aimster, hey man, you have it all set it up, just go through with it.  I know you're probably nervous, I would be too, but you've waited this long.  Why not head over to the "Stories" section on this forum and read up on other people's surgery experiences.  I'm sure that should get you excited about going through with it. 

You'll do just fine. Be brave, and best of luck to you.

Keep the community updated.

[Rocky76]

hey jojo, could I pm to see if you have any feedback on my potential surgeon?  I've been itching to get it for about 2 months now, but like the poster, I'm just not entirely sure. My potential surgeon just took one look, a quick feel, and kept saying it was a breeze--that it wasn't hard and just to do it. He was very personable, almost to the point of making me feel like he could do it right then and there.  

This is exactly the cavalier attitude and false sense of security my initial Dr. gave me. In the end his over confident and casual "matter of factly" attitude did damage to my chest. He threw up  a few circles around my chest, told me he does 200 surgeries a year, how he is the best, how fantastic I would look, and how I will want to show my great pictures all over the net. Well he was right about one thing but not for the same reason.

Looking back now he was all Ego and very little substance. The reason why my chest came out bad is becuase he didnt listen to me and my concerns. I specifically told him I did not feel I needed to be Lipo'd as I am muscler with little body fat. I was pure Gyne and nothing more. He didnt listen to me and raped my chest of the little adipose fat layer I had and created all kinds of problems for me. I can't tell you how mad I am at this Dr. for performing a precedure on me when I told him I didn't want it. Not to mention to just do something like that and not go over all the risks it's associated with it. So when you say this Dr. is taking it so lightly I get flashbacks.

I would be wary of any Dr. that is overly casual, who dosen't listen and or dosen't clearly discuess his plan of action and what risks are involved.

[morpheus11]

thanks for sharing your story with us Rocky--I just hope that if I do go with this surgeon, he isn't as careless. 

Have you done anything to remedy your situation? 

I'm also curious to know if the poster went through with his surgery?  It's sunday and I think his surgery was scheduled for this past Friday.

[805spec]

It looks like you have some great advice already on here.  I didn't see anyone bring this up but I figured I'd chime in on it.  Definitely be sure you're confident with the doc you choose but don't let one doc scare you away from getting it done.  The reason I say this is based on your description of how much it has affected your life (i.e. not going to the beach or pool and during sexual situations).  I was always depressed about my gyne and had similar feelings as you did.  I got scared a few days before the surgery all the way up to the anesthesia.  I couldn't believe I was subjecting myself to go under the knife.  The doc had good reviews but I was exactly like you... you can never be too sure.  In the long run I'm so much happier I got it done.  I'm sure there are others who have better results than I do but my chest looks a thousand times better than it did before.
Good luck with everything!

[Aimster82]

I didn't have the surgery. I spent hours reading this forum and looking at before/after pictures of many users. I lost $1,000 by canceling.

I found another doctor.
I asked him why he is doing an incision and not liposuction ONLY. Both he and his nurse said that liposuction will not remove the gland that liposuction is only for the fat. It's impossible to get the gland out via liposuction. He will do liposuction first then remove the gland. , Check.

I asked him if he was going to remove all the gland and fat. He said he was going to leave a little in there otherwise the chest would not look right., Check

I asked him if my chest was mostly fat/gland. He said it was impossible to tell until he went in there but it didn't matter he would do what it would take., Check

I asked him how many operations he does a year. He said he averages about 1 a week, sometimes 5 a week. Overall he does 50 a year he estimated., 50 is not bad. Check

He is not going to use drains, so that's a plus too.

I am scheduled for this Friday and it should take an hour. He offered to do it in his office for $3,500 without anesthesia but I said no way I need to go under. Total cost $5,500.
Very affordable for a doctor who knows what he is doing.

The fact that his nurse knew about gynecomastia really impressed me. She knew more than my first plastic surgeon. Can't believe there are plastic surgeons out there who advertise that liposuction removes breast tissue. How do they have a license?

[teetit]

Good for you - this plastic surgeon sounds way better.  $1000 is nothing considering the time/turmoil you would have to go through by dealing with a revision surgery (which you would've needed).  Also you'd have to pay an additional amount for that.  That previous plastic surgeon sounded like he didn't know what he was talking about.  I mean, if it's true he has a bunch of pictures of his patients which have had the gynecomastia surgery successfully, he should be able to explain to you how his specific process removes the gland which most of them had.  Who knows, maybe his liposuction method does actually remove the gland in addition to the fat, but if this is the case that is very unusual and worth explaining extensively to you if you ask.  It's not worth risking botching it up the first time. 

[805spec]

I can't believe they kept $1,000 of your money because you canceled.  They get $1,000 for what exactly?  I'm sorry I just feel like there are so many things wrong with policies nowadays.  But like the others said you're most likely better off now rather than risk a revision surgery.  Good luck!

[Rocky76]

I gladly pay 1000.00 to not make a wrong decision. Money well spent. It won't affect your life one bit but a bad result would