Healing

Monday will mark three weeks since my 15+ hour surgery. My surgical team completed the following procedures: a prophylactic mastectomy on the left side, a sentinel lymph node biopsy on same side, a removal of my chemo port, a removal of the tissue expander, and bilateral reconstruction of both breasts using the fat from my stomach. I spent 5 days in the hospital following the surgery, and was able to go home on the following Saturday afternoon. This meant I was home on Sunday for my first wedding anniversary :)

Following the surgery, I had 4 drainage tubes. Turns out having 4 drainage tube is as bad as having only 1. They just suck. Luckily my tubes were removed less than a week after my release from the hospital. During the days following my release, one of the abdominal tubes became loose, but my local doctor stitched for me. The next day, my surgeon removed it.

For those of you unaware of the tubes (see also Wikipedia entry for photo), the tubes are placed in patients in order to collect the overflow of fluids the body produces. The body can only absorb about 30cc of fluid, so doctors typically will not remove the tubes until the tubes collect 30 cc or less during a 24-hour period.

Once the tubes were removed, I became a new person. I could walk better. My appetite returned (I did not have much of an appetite for a couple of weeks). My energy levels began to increase. I could climb stairs which meant that I could sleep in my bed rather than on the couch (which was beginning to hurt my back).

My energy levels are not great. I take nice long naps. I can take short walks around the neighborhood or large box stores, but need to walk slowly and take short breaks. The pain is also decreasing, but is not gone. I am definitely healing, and am looking forward to the day when I feel comfortable walking by myself around the neighborhood and don't hurt so much.