Looking great!! Hope that shower is everything you want it to be haha

Oh man, that first shower post-surgery is super nice. I hated going a week without a proper wash!
(Baby wipes helped a lot though, and I have this forum to thank for knowing to bring 'em!)

bathing cloths, a memory foam neck pillow, and circulation socks were my best friends for my recovery :p

Quote from: veniamviam on February 05, 2016, 11:52:00 AM
Looking great!! Hope that shower is everything you want it to be haha

Oh, it was...  Shower and shave did wonders. 

Did anyone else notice that pain meds in addition to slowing down digestion slowed down hair growth?  I swear my stubble was growing at about 1/3 the normal speed - three days in and I had one day's worth of shadow.  Hadn't heard anyone reporting that before but it was a significant difference.  I guess the pills slow *everything* down. 

Pic from day 11, yesterday, taken during my 30 minutes with the compression vest and bandages off. 


The other 23 hours and 30 minutes of the day, I have bacitracin covering the nipples, bandaids over that, and two puffy "abdominal pad" square bandages as padding over the incision and chest area, with a tight vest holding everything together, preventing scarring, encouraging reabsorption of fluid from any swelling (of which there is hardly any), and protecting the whole area. 

Some skin breakouts where the bandaids around the nipple grafts stick to my skin.  There's a line of blemishes that traces the exact outline of each bandaid - maybe I'm allergic to the bandaid material. 

In two days the tape over the incisions comes off.  Look forward to seeing what they look like, and to getting that tape off of my skin finally.  The doc gave a box of Mepiform (?) silicone strips to use starting at the two-week mark, after the tape comes off.

Drain holes on the far lateral (armpit) end of the incisions seems like they healed fine.  When I put bacitracin on the nipple grafts every day, whatever is left over I put on the drain holes.  (Still using the few mini packets of bacitracin from the doc until I can buy a larger tube.) 

Nipple sutures are sticking out a little - surgeon told me I could trim them if they were bothering me, but they are absorbable and will go away on their own eventually.  Since they are covered with a bandaid 23 1/2 hours of the day they aren't bothering me but if they were exposed I wouldn't want them brushing up against things. 

There's a white bubble-looking spot on the edge of one nipple. Looks similar to what others have posted in this thread, so I am not worried about it. 

All is well so far, just a bit tired of having limited range of motion and having to sleep on my back.  I have a pillow under my knees and other pillows arranged so I can fall asleep OK, but by the morning all I want to do is roll over, and I can't, so I end up not sleeping as much as I should because I can't get back to sleep comfortably. 

Pain is intermittent, not terribly intense.  In 12 days since surgery I have cut down from 4 pills per day to 1/2 or 1.  Sometimes I feel the incision, sometimes I feel the nerves where the nipples were attached, sometimes my whole chest spasms or twitches a little bit.  Honestly the worst pain is the back pain from not being able to turn on my side while I sleep.

My skin does feel really tight, but that's better than having it loose, right?  Feels like I'm going to stretch something to the breaking point when I push my shoulder blades together or lift my arms too high. 



Surgeon: Robert Anooshian (through Kaiser San Francisco). 

Where: San Francisco, California, U.S.A.

What: Double incision w/ free nipple grafts

Time: 11 days post-op

Cost: covered by insurance, $5 USD copay.  Yes, 5 bucks for surgery thanks to the excellent insurance plan my wife's union secured.  Plus $67 including shipping for the optional but strongly suggested compression vest.

• Surgeon: Robert Anooshian (through Kaiser San Francisco). 
• Where: San Francisco, California, U.S.A.
• What: Double incision w/ free nipple grafts
• Time: 14 days post-op

Two weeks post-op. Butterfly dressings (steri-strips, micropore tape, whatever you want to call it) came off the incision today.  Here's what it looked like freshly unwrapped, before I showered or put ointment on it or anything. 

I'm pleased with the size of the incision.  It's slightly raised but looks OK to me as a starting point. 

Nipple grafts are still in progress, lots of change from day to day, and lots of discomfort now.  The bandaids were soaked through when I changed them today.  Everything looks normal as far as I can tell but something's definitely going on in there, and it involves twinges of intense sensation in the nipple and incision area. 

Left:

Notes
Around the graft area, skin breaking out everywhere the bandaid adhesive covers - and it's latex-free.  Also some suture ends poking out. I trim them with nail clippers if they're unreasonably long, but they're covered with bandaid 23.5 hours of the day, so nothing is going to brush up against them. 

Some of what looks like peeling along the incision is just leftover adhesive from the tape, but the skin is peeling a little lower, below the incision line, right where my skin seems to be taut or stretched.   

Nipples in the last day or so got much more raw, soaked through the bandaid for the first time, and the area is very sensitive.  This is the most discomfort I've felt since surgery, though granted I am taking minimal pain medication, at most 1/2 pill a day. 
 
Right:


Note
At the drain end of the incision on this side, there's a hard raised nub of skin that's very uncomfortable.  Not sure if this is a suture being rejected by the body or a skin tag that happened to be along the incision or what, but it's an irritated lump. 





Put the silicone strips (Mepiform brand) on for the first time.  I put bacitracin ointment on under it but am not overjoyed about putting petroleum all over my skin so might try something else, like silicone lubricant or some organic jojoba oil with arnica.   Cut the strip horizontally in half, and then had to cut pieces to fit the rectangular strip along the round incision.  On one end, as you can see in the picture, the strip wasn't sticking well, even 2 minutes after I put it on, when this pic was taken.  I did my best not to spread bacitracin so wide that it interfered with the adhesive, but something was keeping it from sticking well. 


Current recovery routine is like this

• 
  compression vest with abdominal pad bandages (medline brand abdominal pads, 9" x 12") for cushioning on all day except for 30 minutes to shower and change dressings.  I re-use the abdominal pads - no need to replace them every day unlike the bandaids.
• don't reach overhead or too far forward
• sleep on back with pillow under knees and extra pillows to ease the back/neck strain
• don't lift anything heavier than 5 lbs.
• don't raise heart rate
• take some pain medicine but I don't have much left and don't use tylenol or ibuprofen for other reasons so I'm trying to research alternative pain relief in a hurry
• eat healthy and take zinc, quercetin + bromelain, coenzyme Q-10, B vitamins, spirulina (for vitamin A and K and other vitamins), selenium, and probiotics

during 30 minutes with vest and abdominal pads off, I

• peel off bandaids
• shower
• take pictures as needed
• spread a pea-sized drop of bacitracin on each nipple graft
• put new bandaids back on
• put a thin line of topical treatment - bacitracin, or organic jojoba with arnica - on incision, thin enough so silicone strips will stick over it
• put silicone strips on incision
• put vest back on, and before fastening it, slide abdominal pads in for cushioning, one on each side covering nipple graft and incision

Quote from: unclesean on February 13, 2016, 02:45:56 AM

Note
At the drain end of the incision on this side, there's a hard raised nub of skin that's very uncomfortable.  Not sure if this is a suture being rejected by the body or a skin tag that happened to be along the incision or what, but it's an irritated lump. 

Sutures are starting to poke out.  There might also be a skin tag or other things going on there, but a spitting suture is part of it.  VERY uncomfortable.  Wish I'd been warned that this phase of recovery would be more painful than the first two weeks. I would have been more frugal with my pain meds so I'd have some left over.  Ouch. 

Posting by request. I had DI w/ grafts done by Dr. Fischer in Baltimore, MD on April 21st, 2015. Top picture is from ~1 month post-op. Bottom picture is today, at basically 10 months post-op. Please ignore the belly button bruise and general bloating in the bottom picture, I had a hysto last week.

I have not and am not planning to use any kind of scar treatment.

Hi guys, I was wondering if any of you here use cocoa butter for your scars?  If so, what kind?  I recently bought Palmer's that also has Vitamin E and I read mixture of reviews on what it does to scars.  Can anyone say from their experience?

Quote from: trumi on February 18, 2016, 03:46:05 PM
Hi guys, I was wondering if any of you here use cocoa butter for your scars?  If so, what kind?  I recently bought Palmer's that also has Vitamin E and I read mixture of reviews on what it does to scars.  Can anyone say from their experience?

No personal experience here yet as I am just starting my scar care regimen.  All reliable sources I've read say Vitamin E makes scars look worse.  http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/13/health/13real.html 

OTOH, if there's just a tiny amount diluted in the cocoa butter, I doubt it would be a problem - the problematic effects seem to be from rubbing Vit E directly on scars.  Does it say how much vitamin E is in there? 

I was told to use Cocoa Butter by the surgeon but the one I found was the Palmer's, which is this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Cocoa-Butter-Skin-Cream-3-5-Ounces/dp/B000P8FQ5Q

Unfortunately, it doesn't mention the amount of Vitamin E. 

Quote from: trumi on February 21, 2016, 05:27:30 PM
I was told to use Cocoa Butter by the surgeon but the one I found was the Palmer's, which is this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Cocoa-Butter-Skin-Cream-3-5-Ounces/dp/B000P8FQ5Q

Unfortunately, it doesn't mention the amount of Vitamin E.

It's the eighth ingredient listed, so it has less Vitamin E than fragrance or alcohol.  I'd guess not very much.  Wouldn't worry about it. 

I used Palmer's Cocoa butter for a little bit after my surgery. I didn't really notice much from it but I was using other things like scar strips and that. I know the strips definitely helped my drain holes flatten and smooth out.

Okay. I have a slight concern. So far, my healing has vee. Exceptional. I got my surgery on February 11th and thingS have been going great except...

It looks like my nipples are pulling. Could be worse I know. But the idea of it concerns me. I noticed it first yesterday and today it's a bit worse. Anyone else have any kind of experience with it? The areola is mostly healed with stretched red marks around the ring where the graft was originally placed. Help...?

Quote from: AlexanderMiles on February 28, 2016, 12:47:06 PM
Okay. I have a slight concern. So far, my healing has vee. Exceptional. I got my surgery on February 11th and thingS have been going great except...

It looks like my nipples are pulling. Could be worse I know. But the idea of it concerns me. I noticed it first yesterday and today it's a bit worse. Anyone else have any kind of experience with it? The areola is mostly healed with stretched red marks around the ring where the graft was originally placed. Help...?

Could you take a picture so we can see what you are talking about?

This is what I'm talking about. Not sure if it's just how it's healing or what :\

Can't see the picture. Try uploading to http://imgur.com/

Whoops. I'm sorry. Try this one. http://imgur.com/taGawA1
My bad.

The picture is kind of blurry so I can't see the nipple clearly but it just looks like a nipple to me. Incision line is nice and fine.

got nothin for ya, 'cuz those nipples look fine to me, alexander, but i have joined the wonderful world of post-op as of like an hour ago (dr medalie, in cleveland). he was absolutely fantastic, standing shirtless in front of someone other than my partner actually didn't feel weird. the anaesthesiology staff were wonderful, my nurses were great, just all around a great experience. currently i'm parched and a little sleepy, with just a little soreness along where i'm thinking the internal bits of the drains are sitting (based on where he drew the prelim incision lines). currently waiting to get my script for pain meds filled, but i don't think i'll have to use them for a little while yet.

honestly i feel so great. never have to wear a binder again, weird tubes in my armpits, really chalky dry mouth. 10/10 would wholeheartedly recommend (but we'll see how i feel tomorrow after trying to sleep ^__^)