Monday, October 24, 2016

Breast Reduction Surgery Experience

Hi everyone! I’m done with my surgery and completely recovered at this point, so I thought I’d start posting about my experience. Here’s what my actual surgery was like. 

The day of surgery, I was super nervous. I’d never been under general anesthesia, and my only other surgery, on my hand, was a pretty traumatic experience. However, this whole experience couldn’t have been more different. 

The worst part was waiting for an hour for the surgeon to arrive. Everyone at the surgery center was ridiculously nice. The anesthesiologist, who called me the day before to ask me some questions, made jokes with me and was really reassuring. He gave me some sort of anxiety medication immediately after putting in the IV and the nurse stroked my arm while I fell asleep. 

When I woke up, the first thing I remember is that I was very, very cold, and kept shivering uncontrollably. I vaguely remember some fuss. When I woke up more fully, I was covered in blankets, even my head, with just my face sticking out. They had also given me some medication to warm me up, which made my mouth very very dry. I found out later that I most likely had a little bit of post-surgical hypothermia, which is not uncommon. Honestly, this was the worst part of the whole experience, and it wasn’t too bad, since they did everything right and got me warmed up fast, and I was still groggy enough that I wasn’t super aware of what was going on.

As soon as I was vaguely conscious, they brought my partner in, and gave him directions for taking care of me. The surgeon briefly stopped by to say it went well and how much they’d removed, and then had to run off to his next surgery.

The nurse who was in charge of me after waking me up was British, and she offered me a cup of tea. I turned it down, even though I normally love tea, at which point she said “Oh, you probably don’t want it. It’s that Lipton stuff. It’s made out of the dust they sweep up off the floor!” 

They gave me a pain medication (I was offered two, but turned the second one down because too much tends to make me dizzy and I wasn’t hurting much at all.)

After about half an hour, the nurses helped me use the restroom and get dressed (I had worn yoga pants and a shirt that buttoned in the front, which were good choices,) and then we were able to head home. It took a while to get home through the weekday San Francisco traffic, but eventually we did and I was able to rest. 


Next time I’ll talk about what my recovery was like!

13 comments:

  1. Congrats and thanks for posting! <3

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you for sharing this. I am considering surgery myself, but am deeply afraid of the recovery process.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Congratulations! I'm glad you had good staff at the surgical center, that makes such a difference.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Congratulations! I hope you had a speedy recovery- looking forward to more posts! :)
    I had never been under general anesthesia before I had knee surgery this past April. Apparently I am one of the 20% of the population that gets severe post-op nausea/vomiting... I couldn't eat for days! I am glad you did not experience that!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I'm getting a breast reduction in 6 weeks and I'm anxious to hear your thoughts on the recovery process! :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thank you so much for this update! I've been reading your blog for years, and I'm really happy for you. I'm sure the decision was tough.

    I've been considering breast reduction for what seems like a decade now. I'm a 28F/G, and have terrible neck, back, and shoulder problems. I have a pretty small frame (around 115 at 5'5'') so my back takes on a lot of stress.

    I also live in SF (Hayes Valley, right by Alla Prima lingerie) and would be curious to know which doctor or medical facility you went to.

    I wish you a calming recovery! xx

    ReplyDelete
  7. Congratulations! Thank you so much for sharing this process. I hope it can help women who have never thought of it or are afraid of it. I've been told to wait until I'm finished having children so I can't jump on the band wagon just yet. But I'm so glad someone is demystifying the experience and presenting a strong and responsible image of this kind of surgery for all the right reasons!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Congratulations!! I'm so glad all went well and am excited to hear about your recovery!! You're a truly inspiring women! I recently found this blog and I'm completely in love with it!! It's help me a lot so far!! Thank you so much!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thanks for sharing so much. I really do appreciate hearing about the reduction surgery process from someone body-positive like yourself. In my life, I've personally had a few friends who've had the surgery and been approached by numerous acquaintances who have as well. The acquaintances in particular have proselytized the surgery to me in a way that has made me uncomfortable. They've talked about how much better they look now, how they could wear cuter clothes, how they feel less "fat," and how I should really try it. I get wanting to be positive about their own bodies, choices, and experiences, but I've resented that they did it in a way that seemed to imply that there was something inherently wrong with my body--something that I need to fix. I don't mean to say that I don't support women's choices to do what they want with their bodies, even if it is solely cosmetic, but it's hard to hear about people making a cosmetic choice to specifically *not* look how I look and actually pressuring me to do the same! For some reason, I've been a constant target for this!

    In your case, though, obviously you have done the surgery for primarily medical reasons, and you're smart and sensitive enough to be equally body positive for those of us who haven't had the surgery along with those who have. I trust that you will love and appreciate the way that you look now (and enjoy the necessary shopping sprees) without denigrating the way that you looked before because you were and will always be absolutely lovely, inside and out.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Hi Brittany,

    I'm very happy to hear you're feeling better. Thanks so much for sharing your wisdom, your humor and your absolutely stellar natural figure with us for all these years. Best wishes!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Hi Brittany, I'm really looking forward to hearing about your recovery. Any news on when your post about it will be up? I'm starting the process of moving towards a breast reduction too, and I'd love to hear about your experience.

    Thanks so much for all you do.

    ReplyDelete
  12. I'm glad the surgery went ok! Can't wait to hear about your recovery. I hope you have gotten spaghetti strap/strapless everything!!!

    ReplyDelete

I always love to hear your thoughts! Please remember to be respectful. I may not publish comments that are rude, hateful, personal attacks, racist, sexist, or otherwise inappropriate. Dissenting opinions are fine, as long as they are respectful. Thanks!