Surgery With Levick - COMPLETE 16th January (Pics now added)

[Supersonic123]

Great results! I'm saving up money to travel from Sweden to the UK just so I can have the surgery done by Levick. He seems brilliant at his job judging from pictures like yours!
Do you have any pre operation pictures to compare with?

[Ricardo7]

supersonic, sadly I don't. Levick took some pre-op pics himself so I've asked him to email me them along with the post op pics. I'll post them when he does

[Ricardo7]

Found some, not that good though

PRE OP

[thisonehere]

Hows it going mate? I imagine the bruising is just starting to kick in fully now?
How did are you dealing with it mentally too? (i.e who did you tell, do you feel completely new?)

[Ricardo7]

Hows it going mate? I imagine the bruising is just starting to kick in fully now?
How did are you dealing with it mentally too? (i.e who did you tell, do you feel completely new?)

Its going great thanks, the bruising is gradually disappearing tbh, you only experience bruising after surgery for a week or two. After that it's the swelling that kicks in, which hasn't happened yet for me but probably will in the coming weeks.

Mentally, I'm in as happy a place as I can remember. Again, this might change if/when the swelling kicks in but you've just got to get past that stage and remember that the swelling isn't permanent. The only people I told were my mum, brother and girlfriend.

[thisonehere]

any more updates/ pictures on your progress?
sorry for this, its just that my condition is very similar to yours so i'd like to see how well you recover etc
did you receive general or local anaesthesia btw? one thing that has always made me a bit nervous is the chance of paralysis or death from general anaesthesia (I don't know why, I realise the chance of these happening is almost the same as being struck by lightening). Did levick give you a choice?

[Ricardo7]

Levick never offered local anaesthesia, but then I never asked. I was bricking it about getting put to sleep too but it wasn't bad at all.

Before and after pic from Levick - sorry about the quality, they never emailed me the pics they sent them through the post.

[Ricardo7]

By the way, I have a lot of red/purple marking on my chest, is this scar tissue? It looks like bruising but doesnt feel like it. I must admit, I don't know a great deal about scar tissue.

2 weeks post op on wednesday, is that when I should start massaging?

[sjwsjw]

Any colour on the skin will be bruising, some people get a little rash from wearing the vest but just looks like normal bruising. Scar tissue is hard lumps under the skin, it won't mark the skin if/when you get it. You might find you have areas of bruising turn up from where the vest digs in while your chest is still swollen, I had that happen around the arm holes of the vest,  that'll sort out after a few days. 

[sjwsjw]

I didn't massage til about 3 weeks. My chest was still a little tender at 2 weeks. How's it feeling?

[Ricardo7]

sjwsjw, cheers man, I was just a bit confused as I expected it to hurt like bruising when I touch it but it doesn't!

I'm feeling very slightly tender still but nothing major. First day back at work tomorrow.

[Ricardo7]

2 Weeks Post Op

Well, today sees me reach the two week mark. Not a great deal to report, wearing my compression vest 24/7 and letting myself heal as best I can and my chest is getting a little less sensitive as each day passes. No major swelling/scar tissue has ocurred AS OF YET other than a small amount under each nipple and on my outer chest near my armpits where the incisions are.

At this stage, I'd say I'm 95% happy with the results. At this moment in time the shape of my chest is perfect and exactly how I would want it to be before I had the operation, this may change in the coming weeks if swelling kicks in. The incision scars are pretty much non existant and even when I raise my arms it cant really be seen amongst my armpit hair. Each incision is around 1cm long if that.

The other 5% is only because of my bruising (which is mostly around the area where the bottom of my dressings were) and this is beginning to yellow and fade so will hopefully be gone in a week or two.

[sjwsjw]

Congrats, the vest will be doing its job in restricting swelling. Just need to be ready for it mentally if it does flair up in a few weeks. Looking good 

[Ricardo7]

sjw, do you reckon swelling can be minimised if the compression vest is worn for longer? Might be an idea to wear it full time for a while longer to reduce the chances of swelling

[sjwsjw]

I'm sure people have tried it and there must be reasons not to. It says in my information pack to wear the vest 24/7 for 14 days then reduce this to 12 hours for a maximum of another 14 days. Healing means swelling when it's internal its just what the body does. When you think you are told full healing can take up to 12 months I'm sure an extra week of compression won't make or break the body's reactions to healing but you noticeably get feeling start to restore once the vest is removed and you start massaging, all be it gradually.