Post surgery question.

[Imbackagain]

Hi mate... I had surgery with karidis also... I believe it's down to the individual and how much they benifit from the compression... The vest helps with swelling, but will not change the final look,(according to karidis office)... However having heard that I decided to wear the vest for three weeks full time, and then 2 weeks either day or night. I believe that after the 3 week mark of wearing the vest, the benifits reduce drastically (my opinion). With regards to the armpit area being unfromfortable, get a sock, cut it in half and pop it over the painful Part of the vest- trust me it works a treat.

[shiftend]

Haha, thanks for the sock tip. I'm only 3 full days post op, so have not been moving around that much, however im back to work in 7 days, so Im sure that tip will come in handy! I will do a bit of further research re how long to wear the vest for.

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Today's a milestone in my recovery, this is my ninth day in the house taking it easy. Cabin fever is at the max and I’m becoming a strange recluse! I'm hoping having these nine days rest will pay dividends in the long run though. Out with the GF this evening to cinema followed by her secret recipe stew and mash, then driving an hour or so for a surprise breakfast at premier inn (actually the best  breakfasts in the world) followed by watching my sister swim for the county team for the first time. Simple things...I can’t tell you how much I'm looking forward to getting out the house and doing these things!

As for the recovery, things look good so far, I'm pleased with what I see. My chest still looks very flat, it’s quite sore, numb and feels hard in places, and its yellow all over, though this is fading nicely now. This is my second day of putting Arnica cream on it, and I’m still taking the arnica pills I was given, though just 3 per day, instead of 5 as in the first week. I've made myself a brief document of all the key mile stones/timescales in my recovery based on what Karadis office has given me, what I've read on this site, and my own experiences (I've had surgery before unfortunately) and am changing each one to green once I reach it. Please see it below, you may have different experiences or disagree with some bits of it? I'm finding this is helping me to stay motivated by seeing what I have already achieved, and also keeping me focused on the fact it’s a long recovery process, made up of different stages.

Day 1-2- Immediate post op recovery/safety.
Day 4 - Bruising and swelling should peak. Can drive.
Day 5 – Finish taking pain killers
Day 7 - Switch to Arnica pills x3 per day. Stop wearing plasters, start arnica cream.
Day 10 - Can resume salt and caffeine, slowly increase activity.
Day 14 - End Arnica tablets, switch to vest 12 hour per day. Scar tissue starts forming.
Day 21 - Bruising and swelling should begin to decline. CAN start massaging if appropriate. Can bath.
Day 28 - End wearing vest, bruising should have gone.
Week 6 – Visit Karadis for checkup. Can sunbathe with protection. Can start back exercising, check with Karadis.
Week 8 – Obvious main swelling should end.
Week 12  – First indication of final result
Week 24 – Second indication of final result
Week 36 – Third indication of final result
Week 52 – Good idea of final result, will probably continue to soften and settle

[shiftend]

Day 15 tomorrow. Am going to finally be able to take compression vest off for the day, cant wait. Had letter from Karadis today to say had the following removed:

Left side: 250mls fat, 51 grams gland
Right side: 300 mls fat, 6 grams gland

This is probably not very much compared to allot of people, but considering I've had liposuction on the left side and gland removal (via mamotome)on the left side, twice before, through two seperate surgeon's, its leave's me feeling that the other surgeons must have been really quite shit!

[Imbackagain]

All the best with recovery... It's a crazy rollercoaster... Be sure to post some pics up so we can see your progress.

[Nipper]

Grats on getting to the other side dude, keep us posted

[shiftend]

Day 22. Have started massaging with bio oil today, managed to get a large bottle from boots for £12 today, which I'm pretty chuffed about, usually £20 by the look of things. I'm planning on doing 5 mins, so around 2.5 mins on each side of my chest, a.m and p.m for at least the next 3 months. Did people on here take this approach for the amount of time each day and the amount of months, or did anyone do longer?

I'm only wearing the vest at night now, 12 hours off 12 hours on, doing this for 6 more nights. The last night or two was the first time I can comfortably sleep on my side, I don't intend to do it, but just wake up like it. Up until then I always woke up still on my back, so I guess my body was telling me not to roll over in my sleep. After 2-3 weeks of bad sleep, its nice to be getting some good sleep in.

Not really any pain in my chest, even when massaging. It's just a bit sore when I have the vest off, I think it must be my clothes rubbing on my chest, or maybe my regrowing chest hair stabbing me! When I have the vest on or have nothing rubbing on my chest it feels fine. I have a bit of swelling on the left side, which is where the majority of the gland was removed from. Hopefully massage will help this go down. I'm pretty pleased with the result so far, I know it will only improve, and I have a solid gym program waiting for me from weeks 12-14, which should help shape my chest. I cant help think about the prospect of going for a swim one day, that would just be about my ultimate dream at the moment. I swam competitively all through my childhood and teens and surfed too, haven't swam for a good 12 years now. Im not going to count my chickens just yet though!

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Day 22 pic. The black bits above my nipple are tape/glue left over from the dressings. Its all gone now.

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Day 22 pic

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Day 22

[sjwsjw]

Looks good to me. Give it another week or 2 and the bruising will be gone, the nipple incisions will have fully healed and on the surface things will look even better.

P. S yea £12 for the large bottle was a nice buy I paid £20 for mine so it's not one of them false offers  it's good stuff but I found it gave me a spotty chest for a while.

[Donut]

Looking nice and FLAT! - any before pics?

[shiftend]

Thanks donut. Afraid I dont have any before pics. I will ask Karadis for a copy of the pre-op ones that he took, when I see him in two weeks for my 6 weeck check up. And hopefully get some good 6 week ones too.

Tonight's my last night of wearing the vest. After 27 nights on the trot, I'm looking forward to a vest free night tomorrow!

[Donut]

You'll be sorted for t-shirt weather! (If we ever bloody get any!)

[shiftend]

Yeah the one good thing for me about this cold weather, is that being wrapped up and inside has been the thing to do for the last 4 weeks.