My Surgery with Dr. Karidis and Progress so far

[boredofthisnow]

Hey dudes,

I said I'd put up a quick account of my surgery sorry it's taken a while but hey, here you go...

So decided to go with Dr. Karidis after alot of reading on this board, had my consultation mid October and got offered a surgery date for 13/11/07 luckily it wasn't a friday, so thought I might aswell go for it.

I couldn't get to sleep the night before and had to be up at quarter to 5 to catch the train so only got about two hours sleep, this turned out to be a god thing though. Wasn't really nervous or anything until I was actually there and then I was crapping myself lol, I had to be there for 8am (was about 40 minutes early) and got shown straight to my room which was all ready for me.
Room was nice with en-suite, TV, phone etc. Shortly after I arrived Mr K's nurse came to talk me through the procedure and sign some forms etc, then wasn't long before Mr K came in to see me, took a couple of photo's and marked my chest, I double checked about removing the gland and the puffy nipple problem being sorted and he said he'd def take it all out just leaving the smallest bit he could to stop it being inverted. My surgery wasn't gonna be till about half 10 so had a couple of hours to wait.

Luckily I was knackered so went to sleep in my room and didn't have a chance to worry about all the stuff that was running through my head. Was woken by a friendly nurse who said they were ready for me and still half asleep I was off to surgery.

Went upstairs to the anaesthetic room which was very bright, cold and clinical (that's kinda a given i suppose but yeah didn't like it lol) lay down on my bed and the anaestheatist was prepping me asking me some random stuff.......

.......next think i know i'm awake (well kinda) in the recovery room with a few nurses standing around, i asked when they were gonna operate and they said it was all done and went well! Seriously felt like two seconds, you know when u go to sleep and it feels like you blink and it's morning, kinda good in this situation though. so must have been about 12 o'clock really groggy with my oxygen mask and drip on I'm brought back to my room and left alone for a while. i think I slept for about an hour then woke up feeling quite re-freshed, I had a compression vest on, Mr Ks nurse noticed it was a little loose so gave me two more smaller ones (all included in the price i guess) i changed my vest over myself and got a look at my chest, there was a large bruise that kind of covered the whole chest area and a bit of swelling but looked good and flat, was pleased although couldnt see nipples as they have plasters covering them.

Nurses came in every half hour or so to check my blood pressure etc all very friendly and had some sandwiches and ice cream which i'd ordered earlier, pretty tasty. Anyway by about 3 o'clock was feeling pretty good bit of discomfort and tightness in my chest but no real pain.

Had to wait till 5 for my dad to pick me up, he was a bit late lol so checked myself out and got some fresh air outside for a few minutes. my chest began to hurt a little on the way home but took a couple of painkillers and really wasn't that bad. I realised this is actually quite a long post so will put updates as seprate posts. Anyway tht's pretty much it, hospital was nice and staff were all very friendly a pretty pain free day really, would highly recommend Dr. Karidis to anyone considering surgery.

[boredofthisnow]

So here is a bit more and a couple of pics.

I had a week off work and pretty much stayed in bed for the first couple of days, then gradually went out and pretty much back to normal now (3 weeks post-op). cant quite lift my arms right over my head but getting there. I'm still wearing my compression vest most of the day and all night, i found it a real pain in the arse at first and really uncomfortable especially under clothing when out, but almost got used to it now lol so prob wear that for another weeks or so like advised.

Chest is looking pretty good imo, when i first saw it after the op it looked very flat almost too flat, but seems to have filled in a little and looks more natural now. My main issue was puffy nipples which Mr K seems to be pretty good at sorting. Atm i have alot of little lumps around the area but am massaging twice daily and can already notice this improving, but you wouldnt even notice this unless you lifted your arm up when standing under a bright light, or had a good feel.
There is only a very feint bruising now and pretty much all swelling has gone. The only thing is the area especially the nipples are still very sensitive, but i'm sure this will improve soon. If I'm being really picky the left nipple looks slightly larger than the right and there is also a slight crease in both nipples but this is no big deal compared to how it was and may well improve. The nipples are small now like they used to be when they were hard except now they are like this when soft too which is all good.
Pretty pleased with results so far, and earlier in the week I went out without my compression vest, just a light t-shirt and didnt have to worry about slouching or anyone noticing or anything, was a pretty awesome feeling, something every non-gyne sufferer wouldnt give a second thought to but great for me anyway lol

Arghh can't figure out how to post pics, they're not on the net just on my comp, anyone?

[Bob1981]

Arghh can't figure out how to post pics, they're not on the net just on my comp, anyone?

I don't think you can upload them directly, you'll need to open an account with an online photo site, like Photobucket, and then use the 'insert image' buttom, which creates a link to your image.

[img]http://www...etc, etc[/img  - (you'll need another ']' on the end as well)

[boredofthisnow]

Hmm........ok so either I'm an idiot or not letting me upload pics for some reason but here's the links anyway

before.....
http://s258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/boredofthisnow/?action=view&current=before.jpg

3 days post-op........
http://s258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/boredofthisnow/?action=view&current=3dayspost-op.jpg

7 days post-op......
http://s258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/boredofthisnow/?action=view&current=7dayspost-op.jpg

22 days post-op......
http://s258.photobucket.com/albums/hh269/boredofthisnow/?action=view&current=22dayspost-op.jpg

[TommyA]

Thanks for posting the photos, looks a really great job

[boredofthisnow]

Thanks guys, and I know what you are saying bkkross, alot of people have it worse, but I'm sure you'll agree having it at all is the problem not how severe it is, just glad to be rid of it lol

[boredofthisnow]

Just an update...

So 4 weeks post-op now, area has gone quite lumpy now with a large noticeable lump just below each nipple im told this is pretty normal and massaging twice a day to sort it out,
got my check up in January so hopefully things will be looking a bit better then, bit disappointed cos things were looking very good early on but sure it's just the healing process and will all be ok in the end fingers crossed

[GynO_DuDe]

Lovin it! fantastic results ... as mentioned before your gyne technically wasn't that bad, but considering the results, it does look like he had a handful to take out! so thats good!