Congratulations.
So, the instructions my surgeon gave me in case of clotting inside the tubes were to pinch the tube near the incision with the thumb and index finger of one hand (so as to secure it), and with the other hand, pull/pinch along the length of the tube from the base to the bulb, so as to force any clots through the tube and into the bulb. The bulb itself should be squeezed pretty tightly when it's reconnected to the tube, creating a sort of gentle vacuum to pull the fluid out and into the tube. Your surgeon probably told you the same thing or something similar, and it most likely isn't anything you did wrong. I had something similar happen. After my operation, on my right-hand side, I had a lot of swelling and bruising, but hardly any fluid draining; while the left was draining well and hardly swollen at all. This tripped me out and I worried if the drain was congested or if somehow the tubes had disconnected themselves from somewhere critical, and that the swelling on my right might have been fluid trapped and building up. But before the operation, my surgeon had assured me that each side would absolutely
not drain equally; that it was actually unusual to have the same amount of fluid in each bulb. He asked me to keep a record of the times I emptied them and the amounts inside each bulb, and the amounts I had were totally random; sometimes one bulb wouldn't even need emptying while the other would be at almost full capacity, which was alright... even though the right side seemed to have missing, vanishing fluid. At some point my right side started draining more, even more than I thought should have been normal. My guess is that it just moves slowly and likes being unpredictable.
