3 Day Post Op - Before and After pics

[mediaguy28]

36yo 5'10 200# struggling with man boobs my whole life. Always taping my nipples and wearing overly tight undershirts to suck everything in. My friend is a bodybuilder. Years of abusing steroids left him with horrible gynecomastia. He went to see a ps and I decided to go with him. Before I know it, I had a procedure scheduled. I couldnt believe I would go for it.

My procedure was yesterday. I had glands removed as well as lipo on the chest. I also had lipo done on my stomach.  Total removed was a little over 4000 cc's. My first post op appointment is tomorrow.  The surgery wasnt bad. It was about 4 hours long, local anethesia with IV sedation. I dont remember much. No drains, just open incisions. Leaked like a dripping faucet  when I got home.  I am wearing a compression vest (with a big piece of foam under it) as well as an abdominal binder (with foam). It feels like Im wearing a bullet proof vest.  I went for a 1 mile walk today as instructed and taking darvocet for pain.  

Thing is, I still dont know what I look like under all this padding.  The pain is more a soreness but its really manageable. Tomorrow at the docs I'll know how it looks. Probably very swollen and bruised but im ready for it. keep you updated.

[mediaguy28]

Day two,  I saw the doc and saw my chest for the first time since the surgery. Bruising is minimal and it looks much flatter.  My abdomen where I had the lipo is another matter. I am bruised and horribly swollen around the hips. My groin area is black n blue and my penis is swollen with blood. It was so swollen this morning that I thought my penis was going to explode. According to the doc, this is normal and due to gravity pulling all the blood down.

I cant believe what my chest looks like and its only been 2 days.  When the doc was pulling that compression garment off I was a nervous wreck thinking I am going through all this pain and money for nothing. Hopefully my stomach will have decent results too.  I have to wait until day 4 to shower and I have to use the compression garments on my chest and stomach 24/7 for at least another week. Its like wearing body armour.  Here is a before pic

[jph]

Good luck on your recovery and hope you keep us updated on your progress. I am having the same procedures as you in a few weeks (chest along with lipo of abdomen/love handles).

[mediaguy28]

When I was cleaning myself up, I snapped my first "after" pictures.  This is 2 days post op so the bruising and swelling is pretty bad but you can already tell the difference

[mediaguy28]

Day 3. Slept pretty well last night. The swelling in my groin has gone down. My chest feels suprisingly good, just sore. I have to go back to the docs next friday to have my stitches taken out.

My stomach muscles feel awful and the bruising on my hips is killing me. I went for an early morning walk, about 1.5 miles. I wanted to walk early. I live in the NE of the US and its going to be a scorcher today. As I cant take a shower until tomorrow I didnt want to sweat too much. I am also horribly constipated and my stomach is spasming. I took a stool softener yesterday but it hasnt kicked in yet. I stopped taking the pain meds on thursday. Just tylenol now. I think the tylenol actually works better for me than the pain killers.

It is starting to get annoying walking around all day with the vest and stomach garments. BUT, if its to help with the final results I can put up with it for a few more weeks. The good thing is that right now I have women's maxipads covering the incisions. On top of that is about an inch of foam covering the front of my chest and stomach.  On top of that is the garments.  After tomorrow I can stop with the maxipads. A few days after that I can stop with the foam.  Once the doc takes the stitches out I can probably get away with underarmour or spandex. So it will get progressively easier. Sorry to ramble about all my bulls#@t but it was helpful to me reading about others people's experience. AND, I got nothing else to do lol