Girl, calm down lol. Jesus! My surgery is this November 1st and I'm leaving to Bangkok Thailand this Monday night. I'm not worried on the surgery but mostly on being there on time and getting situated before surgery. I know my surgery will be fine and I heard my Dr and the nurses will be very caring through others experiences.

First thing I'm gonna do is rest, I am not gonna touch anything because I'm afraid I might mess up or screw up my wound down there. There is NOTHING to worry about. now if you start meddling with your fresh wound down there, you will mess it up and for sure it's gonna ruin any chances of keeping it open or looking nice. You may just rupture a stitch if you touch down there on the first day of packing being removed. It's very delicate so keep off limits unless the nurses or doctor instructs you to do things with it.

And like everyone said here, follow the instructions your doctor gave you. Dilation should not be done unless instructed by the doctor or nurses. Ask the nurses for permission to do any type of activity. You want to avoid strenuous activity. You'll be fine, as long as you get a lot of rest, relaxation, and peace of mind. You don't need your stress level or blood pressure to go any higher than normal because it may slow down the rejuvenation process.

Good Luck! Hope you have a swift recovery. So happy for you! Gives me a more reason to be excited  🙂

I got exactly the same right now. I am in my 8th day and I may dilate next week because of swelling. Besides, my surgeon advises every client to start dilating after one week, at the checkup. Why I don't know. But since he has operated on hundreds of woman, I guess he knows what he talks about and never heard a single bad story about him considering closing.

As many have said, relax and follow the doctor's instructions. My surgery was on the 1st of October, stuffing (stent in my case) was removed on the 6th, and I dilated for the first time on the 19th (the doctors had told me that I should start when I feel ready, but ideally by the 22nd at the latest, so I was a tad early).

Btw: Do not expect the same depth etc. as you had initially when you dilate for the first time. It is not lost, but merely needs nice and calm "training" over time; that's why you get that rather intimidating size assortment after all...  😛 You should not be feeling any real pain while dilating, a bit of discomfort can happen, but if you hit the pain threshold then that part should wait until things have loosened up a bit more. For first 5 days I used a 2 1/4" x 5/8" dilator (compared to the 4 3/4" x 1 1/2" stent that was in there originally 😮 ), and am gradually working my way up. Don't overstrain it, as otherwise your next session can end up being quite unpleasant.

Regimes can vary considerably as well. I've heard of people being told to dilate 3x a day for 30 minutes, and others 1x a day for 5 minutes (which happens to be what my doctors handed to me). The main importance seems to be dilating regularly (i.e. at least once a day). Basically listen to your body and enjoy the gradual return of feeling in the area. 🙂

I had to start dilating at the 11th day post op. After five days initial packing was removed and I received a new packing every day. I am four months post op and I am still stuffed between dilation (2 times a day). I am very happy with the result. So follow your docs instruction. We are all different and healing is different.

Lara

You might find this page helpful. There's a long diary and a series of pictures with scary looking swelling, and the result turned out completely normal.

http://www.annasplace.me.uk/grs.html 🔗

The link for the pictures is near the bottom, under Results and Reflections.

Late to the show as usual, but first, congratulations, and welcome to "the other side".  As the others have noted, each doctor has their own regimen on the dilation, and there is NO single hard and fast rule on it.  Even after a full year of toasty postie, I have a schedule for dilation that says "daily for the rest of my life" as old as I am that will be less than 365*30 dilations to do.  I miss an occasional day here and there but that is why I have lube.  I agree that doing too much dilation is at its best a waste of time that you can use for writing a horror novel about anything other than your surgery. Once your sutures dissolve, the worst I have experienced was when I had too little lube, or the skin absorbed the lube, and I got a "hot spot" that was tender for a couple more dilations. Early in the game it is more possible to do some damage, but while I can fill you with horror stories, you just really need a hug, so HUUGGGG!