Tummy bulge still there but definitely not as bad as it was. Tried a HIIT aerobic class last week on mini trampolines!! WHAT was I thinking??
The instructor is cool though and I just hide at the back bouncing around at my own pace!! Will be a while til I’m race fit ?, but ladies, it is completely do-able! (I could have started classes 6 months ago, but my head was not in the right place)
Boob still has odd lump down the side and oedema lump under aureole, but I’ll be honest, not been doing my massage ?? so probably my own fault ?
Abdominal exercises make me feel very strange the day after, not quite pain, just very taught (doing Joe Wickes low impact beginner 15 minute hiit training on Youtube… brilliant!! After Christmas going to try his 90 day weightloss program…
Happy New year to you too Milli and all the ladies on here.
Christmas was lovely. Had my sister and 91 year old dad over, he was in great form. Amazing guy.
I managed to fight off catching my son’s cold all December, only to catch it NewYear’s Eve, so I missed the one party I was looking forward to and am ill first week back at work! (Always looks dodgy!)
Shook it offafter 2 days, congratulated my immune system, only for it to decide to come back with a vengeance overnight!
Currently creaking about the house glands up in my neck and groin… I look like a hamster!
Part of me panics now at any swollen glands. I’m sure it is the cold, but not sure if I need to phone doc or not (ours are logged jammed cos everyone seems to have this damn cold)
What do you think? The glands one side in my groin really hurt. Never had any issues with them before (always had issues with throat, that does not worry me)
Gargling with warm salt water, taking paracetomol, ibuprofen and vit C supplements.
Vicks on chest.
Off to get some echiachae.
Vickio I recommend massage and mobility exercises… I did not do these religiously and so did not break down internal scar tissue.
12 months later my abdomen still feels uncomfotably taught, but yoga is now helping (should not complain about a taut tummy but if I lean backwards it almost hurts. Think more exercise would have prevented this.
There is a link on this thred to a great doc from St Thomas Physio dept… 24 page guide post DIEP (My hospital/surgeon discharged me with NO post op advice. I found this doc myself and suggested to my surgeon they should produce similar but he said ‘everyone’s recovery is different’. So you don’t give any advice and hope we just recover without any guidance?? Ridiculous.
If in doubt call your breast cancer nurse and ask for physio referral to teach you what you should be doing.
Hi, I’ve just come across this site as I am on the waiting list for a diep construction of my left breast, I had mastectomy in 2014 with chemo and radiotherapy. I get on absolutely fine with my prostheti, I’ve been in bikinis but I do have a slight indent at the top of my chest that I don’t like along with 2 hideous scars on my good breast where the port was put in and taken out. I’m due to have surgery around easter time and I’m still in two minds whether to go ahead, the more I look into the less likely I feel like it but the PS was so reassuring. Just wondered if anyone else had had reconstruction at Salisbury hospital and if so what were your views please. I’m 48 btw. Many thanks for any aid to help my make a definitive decision.
But do not massage your scars until they are fully healed (I was not given any post op advice and like an idiot massaged mine when still a bit scabbed! Absolute idiot ? Scabs fell off too soon and I ended up with horrendous infection and complete wound failure on one boob!)
Hi i had prophylactic double mastectomy in May 2015 and have had nothing but dramas ever since , I have had seven surgeries on my breasts and the most recent April 20 2017. this last one hopefully is successful. My query is that ever since my first surgery I have had Abdominal swelling and bloating which is very uncomfortable. I have spoken to the surgeons and Medical practitioners and gastroenterologists who say there is nothing wrong. I know my body and there is something definitely not right. I have had scans and tests and they say there is nothing there. I get up in the morning and it is not too bad but by mid morning it is starting to get hard and tight and bloated. I am not stupid there is somrthing definitely going on. I have done a lot of research and think it may be Lyphedema of the abdomen after the surgery. has anyone else experienced this? could one of the doctors maybe give some advice if this is possible? What can be done? Help please,
Oh Vicki… your ‘Ken Doll’… that is brilliant name for it!!! (You mean the pubic mound?)
Mine is also verging on making me look like a lady boy in my pants!!! SO bulbous!!
What did your PS do to address it? Liposuction?
I still need to go back in for ‘tweaks’ and absolutely want this smoothed off… need to know what I should ask for though… are you happy with the results?
I’m coming up to 17 mths post op now.
Still have my bulge one side. Although it is not super obvious to onlookers, it feels awful… I can feel it pushing inside like a sponge. If I sit still for long then get up it feels really tight.
Should we still be massaging abdo scar area? I had some intense physio work at it on holidays (she was a specialist in post breast cancer care! In a hotel in Tenerife!! I blew a fortune on seasions cos she was SO good, bit back in UK it just feels like it goes back to how it was. Scar tissue feels stapled to the back of my stomach.
I wonder why they refuse to open us bulgies back up and correct it? I guess cos it is flesh not fat that needs ‘shaving down’? Is the problem big enough to justify the risk/cost of another operation?
Hi I’m due to have liposuction next week hopefully this will be the last surgery then I’ll just have to have nipple tattoos. Has anyone had these done and how do they look?
Wow… reading your post is as if I wrote it myself.
I also had a prophylactic mastectomy and DIEP flip reconstruction. I’ve had about every complication possible. I had it at 34 (just hit my 2 year mark) I’ve had 9 surgeries a million ER visits weekly dr appointments, home health, lymphomodema specialist, catscans, x rays, blood work, you name it.
I’ve had an abcess, seroma, necrosis, mess, septic, PE, everything… and it keeps going.
Currently I have an awful pain in my left side, they look at me like I’m crazy because nothing shows on my scans. However, it hurts to breathe in (my pain tolerance is very high and I don’t take pain meds) I’m swollen all the time, it’s awful. I can’t find a reason or a logical explanation. It’s so frustrating
Carly
I am grateful to have found this thread. I had my DIEP/BMX in November 2017. All did not go well, flap skin left for the breast mound ended up having issues–as well as fat necrosis :( my PS was able to fix things enough with three additional surgeries (debridement, second debridement, and skin grafting) that I am left scarred but with breast mounds that are okay enough to pass as “mine” in a bra. I still have a large fat necrotic area that is very slowly dissipating. I try so hard not to be disappointed with my surgery or surgeon–I have a semblance of breasts–they are “even”–scars are able to be covered–but, it is soooo not what I expected nor what I was led to believe my outcome would be. PS actually asked me to “cover up” when his residents came in the consult room on my last visit! Of course, I am really not planning to do any revisions with that PS, he is well known, he is considered good, but he was very discourtious at my last follow up visit in January…compared my result to the sketches Rembrandt did, said LITERALLY SAID, for every work of art Rembrandt created, at least 20 of his sketches likely landed in the trash basket. OMG.
Anyway, here I sit, not wanting to see my PS again, but with all the issues you ladies describe with my belly. Of course my GP says go back to the PS, my chiropractor wants me to have a CAT scan, but how do I get that unless my GP will evaluate the bulging tummy? I have zero fat left there–obviously I have some fluid build up there that causes me to look four or five months pregnant, and by the end of the day I am so tired and my belly is hard as a rock. I know expanders wouldn’t have worked for me, anything introduced into my body causes me issues–so, DIEP was my option–and most of the time I am happy enough, until my belly bloats and my foobs are achy and sore and I have no interest with all that to give much physical affection to my husband.
Probably need to find a new PS, know I will eventually be less traumatized and ready for revisions, and need a doc who understands this procedure so I can get advice and medical help for any out of the ordinary complications. Want to be, planned to be happy with all of this–cancer is GONE–no more scary times getting the Mammograms and all the biopsies I needed over the years–til the last one that was extensive and high grade triple negative DCIS…still, with all the time, money, recovery–you’d think at least the tummy tuck portion of this would be good, right?
Oh gosh…sadly we have had identical experiences.
I had my op Dec 2015, 2 years 6 mths ago.
Nothing has changed. If anything issues are getting more pronounced.
Boobs hurt if I don’t wear a bra (overhang now, he made them HUGE so now they are worse than before op.)
Boobs hurt when I DO wear a bra (because fat transfer goes into my armit where bras press!!)
I was so looking forward to C cup manageable boobs and a flat tummy.
Instead I got huge H cup lumpy badly scarred melons, a really temperamental painful bulge one side, a tummy scar that STILL feels like a chunk of rope was stapled inside me, and a swollen pubis that makes me look like a drag queen in my bathing suit!!!
I am a single mum, and frankly can’t imagine ever being naked with a man enjoying sex again ?
I look HIDEOUS naked.
I finally have my revision surgery review appt next month. I had tto wait 6 mths on NHS to see my original PS!(originally used health insurance, but they increased my premiums quadruple times so I had no choice but to cancel (insurance companies can be totally disgusting and amoral!!))
Not looking forward to it because despite his original massive oversell of what he could do, when I originally pressed him on sorting me out as promised he was reluctant and started waffling on about risks of correcting it all!! He PROMISED it was standard before my op… funny how he has changed his tune now!! (meant to be best in UK at the procedure. Probably is, but he does not like being bothered after the ‘main show’ is over!)
I would not recommend this surgery to anyone now.
Seriously think a simple bmx would have been easier to recover from!!!
Hi,
I’m sorry you had such a bad time of it. I had a tram flap nearly 3 months ago. Worst thing I ever did. Asked NHS and private for double mastectomy but refused to do it as only 1 breast had cancer. Said they wouldn’t remove 1 healthy breast, but happy to leave me in a one-boob body, which would have affected me mentally. So my option was implants (replaced 2 yearly due to radiotherapy rejecting foreign bodies) or major surgery using my stomach to rebuild boob. So I went for the tram flap knowing it would be awful and it was. Like being hit by a bus. My body is a train wreck and it’s not happy with me. Severe fatigue, stomach like a balloon. Severe pains on and off along stomach scar line where they took muscle. Stomach scar, drain scars and breast scars awful. I look like the bride of Frankenstein. The skin saving implant was painful and pointless. They had to bin my skin as too damaged from radiotherapy. Looks like someone has gone at my boob with a carving knife. I can’t look at myself. No clothing can press on my scar line, which is where all shorts and trousers sit. I have to wear leggings pulled under the scar line. Can’t wear jeans which I lived in before. I wanted to be flat chested, but since they lifted my boob and reduced my stomach, my breasts look huge, which I hate. It is lumpy, deformed and has no nipple. And next weds I go in to get the left breast symmetrised. Another carving knife job. The private health cover won’t pay for the 2k scar revision, so if I want that I need another op via the NHS. If it can’t be done in 2018, I will just get breast tattoos to hide the scars. I feel like you, I would recommend it to nobody. I have constant fatigue. If I sit, lie, stand or walk to long I get pain where they removed stomach tissue and muscle. I need constant painkillers and I’m just sad. A double mastectomy in Nov 16 would have been me done. Instead, they wouldn’t listen to what I wanted and here I am mid 2018 waiting for an end to be in sight. This cancer crap just never ends in how it screws with your life. Wishing you health and happiness, sad sparky dog.x
Generally and fluid (seromas) goes fown within 6-8 weeks.
Plus my serimas fid not hirt or ferl solid… if I jiggled my tummy it literally moved like a wayer ned! Was quite funny.
No, the ‘bulge’ I think we areall talking about feels more like a small rugby ball. They are sometimes more solid/swollen feeling than others (lots complain that ditti g for long periods exacerbates it)
I am convinced it is some kind ofs ar tissue flaring up.
Mine only bulges the dide of the DIEP flap, not the SIEA flap.
Hi,
Well I had the symmetry reconstruction last Wednesday. The surgeon tried to drain fluid from my stomach during surgery but said all he could draw was blood! He can’t explain the swollen stomach. Left breast is now half the size and with the nipple gone. He did an ultrasound of my stomach and said the seroma I had which he drained a month ago is now an encapsulated seroma that can be removed by surgery or left! Funnily enough, he said it didn’t look like a normal seroma but the ultrasound showed that’s what it was. Thank god, was scared it might be tumor until the scan. So anyway, feeling sore, sad and like I don’t want another surgery ever. Now all I want is to be left alone to heal until I have to return to work in September, which in dreading. Wishing everyone a speedy recovery and a healthy future. Xxxxx
hello all, I’m hoping for some advice. i had a skin-sparing mastectomy in 2016,with an implant fitted at the time. I was told that the implant wouldn’t last for ever so that making the decision to have the skin sparing mastectomy meant I would have to have reconstruction later. I’ve now had a consultation with the plastic surgeon, who has said that I don’t have enough belly fat for symmetry so I’m going to be lopsided after the operation. He suggests that he would then do a second operation to reduce the healthy breast. I’m worried that i would then look like a patchwork quilt, plus he would have to move the nipple and surely that would lead to a Loss of sensation there. Are there any alternatives? Oh and if I try and put on weight, it all goes on my hips and thighs so gaining enough fat in my tummy area would be difficult. very conflicted about this.
Hi Inteh2335
Technically you are on the wrong thread, as this is for post diep flap issues rather than symmetry surgery… may be a better thread on symmetry surgery on the forum… however for my two penneth worth, I’d go for the healthy boob reduction. The scars really do fade and 2 years on from surgery my scars are silver lines.
Depends how much the loo sidedness is affecting you really.
Don’t know if any of the ladies on here had a reduction on their healthy breast for symmetry? (I had double mx and diep so can’t really advise)