Finally an update - VERY long
Just wanted to give an update and say that I am back in the swing of things. It has been a REALLY long haul, and I'm glad to be counted amoung the "living" again so to speak.
I had a hysterectomy in May, that went well. I am glad that I had it done, and so very glad that I didn't have to deal with periods during the body lift procedure.
I had a belt lipectomy/lower body lift June 7th, and was doing quite well until early July when I developed my first seroma. That was needle aspirated in the office 3 times, and then I went away for a weekend quilting retreat with my mom and several friends. By Saturday afternoon, I wasn't feeling well, my thighs were swelling up to HUGE proportions, my belly was really fluid filled and I was feeling like I had the flu. By late that night, by belly and tops of my thighs were bright red and hot. Sunday morning July 13th, I knew I was in trouble and told my mom that we needed to head back to LA NOW. We packed up our sewing supplies and headed to LA. I called ahead and spoke with an advice nurse who suggested going to urgent care first to see if they could help me. Once we dropped off our friend and went back to the Kaiser West LA medical center and stopped at urgent care, they took one look at my belly and sent me to the ER. The triage nurse couldn't understand that my belly is numb from the surgery and I couldn't feel the pain or the heat on my belly, but I was afraid that something was wrong. She decided to bring an ER doc into the triage area - he looked at my belly and said they would have a room for me right away. I ended up being admitted into the hosptal with severe cellulitis and infection of the seroma area. After 24 hours on cipro and vancomycian, I had surgery again to remove the infected seroma, scrape the pocket that had formed - which was HUGE, and talc was applied to the insidie of the wound to hopefully cause it to stick together. I woke up with 4 new JP drains - which started the marathon of drains, and hoped to heal again. I was reopened from hip to hip in the front. The seroma pocket was below my belly button, from right hip to left, and extending around to the back. I was so depressed to come home the day before our 26th anniversary and not be able to even get a card for my husband. A friend of mine went to the store and called me and read anniversary cards to me so that I could have a card for John. Little things like that began to mean so much to me as I was confined to my home. I contacted a friend who began cleaning my home weekly and called the church to see if we could have meals brought in.
About 10 days later, I began to develop another seroma on my left hip - I still had 2 large bore jp drains in place coming out of my groin. I emailed my surgeon, and was scheduled for surgery again on August 1 - 2 days before the baby shower I was hosting for my son and daughter in law. I saw my surgeon the morning of Aug. 1 and he felt that the seroma wouldn't heal on it's own, and my left thigh was beginning to redden again, as well as my belly on that left hip side. I went into surgery again, placed on my right side, and the left side from pubic hair line to midway from hip to "crack" in the back was reopened. Again, another massive pocket was found, and scraped of the pseudobursa lining that was producing excessive fluid (more than 400 cc's per day at this point). This surgery left my left thigh completely numb from hip to knee. As of today, it is still numb on the lateral (outside) aspect of the thigh. Hopefully I will regain feeling. My belly had adhered together, but my back and left side were still having problems. I had 3 jp drains placed on that left side.
Following the August 1 surgery, I was to remain in bed on my back or in a recliner as much as possible, not move around except a small amount to prevent blood clots. I had to remain in that position for 2 weeks at home. That was VERY difficult. I was so thankful to those who brought meals, text messaged me, and called. I really missed my computer but it was almost impossible to check email, or log onto websites. That's when I really fell away from my OH boards which had given me tremendous support. I missed you guys!
I was given the OK to move around on August the 15th - just in time to attend my dad's 70th birthday party the next day. I was OK'd to be up for a few hours per day - no lifting, pushing cards, prolonged sitting or standing. (Movement in excess can cause seromas). I had told my doctor that I was booked for a 3 day weekend cruise with my daughters, my mom and my oldest daughters future mother in law and grandmother in law the following weekend. He was OK with that and we took an electric cart for me to use on the ship and in Mexico for the day. The morning we were to get on the ship, I woke up with a HUGE SEROMA on my RIGHT hip/side. This was the side that was doing fine. I had also been battling that my thighs/legs had been horribly swelling requiring compression hose. I went back to the plastic surgeons office. My doctor was not in the office that day, and the dr. on call didn't want to aspirate the seroma because I might get an infection while on the cruise. He scheduled me to see my surgeon Tuesday morning. The cruise was great, but there was little that I could do because of my legs, and limited mobility.
Tues, Aug 26th, I again saw my surgeon who aspirated 150 ccs of fluid from my right hip and saw the amount of output from my left side and felt that we now had no choice but to open up my back and do a "quilting" procedure across my backs, extending to my hips/thighs and sides to stop the seroma formation and once again remove the lining that had formed. That surgery date was set for Sept. 4. I was still having drainage from that left side in excess of 300 ccs per day after almost 5 weeks and we knew there was still a big problem, and my thighs were HUGE.
The surgery on Sept. 4th was the hardest to recover from. I was in great pain following this surgery and spent 3 days in the hospital. I was placed on my belly, and the incision was opened from hip to hip again and it was found that I had a hardened tunnel type of seroma. The pocket was scraped clean of the lining again, and the tunnel was cut out, and removed. This caused my butt to be lifted by 3 inches - and I'm very glad for that. There was LOTS of fluid removed from this pocket and into my thighs. The skin was then sewn down to the facia/muscle layer and reclosed in a quilting procedure and I again had 4 jp drains placed. My first night home, I slept well in my own bed, and didn't wake up for my next dose of pain meds. When I woke up after 8 hours, I was in so much pain, and had to use the restroom. It took me 23 minutes to get up, go to the bathroom and walk back to where I could see the clock again. I have a tiny house - this should have been a 4 minute trip at the most to the bathroom. Again, I was asked to severely limit my movements for the next 2 weeks. My good friend who had been taking me to the doctor (a 1 hr trip for me) had gone out of town. My best friend moved following my Aug. 1 surgery, and I began to feel so alone. Once again, we needed meals brought in, and people to help with driving me to and from appointments. I slipped into a very depressed state. I so badly wanted to be free from the drains - I had drains put back in on July 14th and it was now late September. I almost pulled them out myself a couple of times. It was a hard emotional/mental battle. I emailed my doctor a time or two in depression and he really helped me get through that.
I had the last 2 drains removed on Oct. 3rd - which was something like 87 continous days of drains. Each time a drain was removed, I developed a small seroma that needed to be aspirated, and my last aspiration was Oct. 10th. On the 17th, I was released from weekly visits, and I don't go bac****il the 5th of December. I have had to email my plastic surgeon 2 times about swelling issues and enlarged lymph nodes, but I am doing really well. I am pretty weak compared to how I was before the hysterectomy and plastic surgery. Each day, I feel stronger and I am able to push a bit further in what I can do. I tire easly, and cannot lift nearly as much as before. With time, I know that my muscle mass will rebuild.
With all these complicaitons, do I regret the plastic surgery??? NO! I feel so free of the excess skin - no more rashes, no more hot, sticky rolls of tissue. I still want to do my thighs - my PS just shakes his head and laughs at me. I went from a 12 pant to a 6 - 8 depending on the cut. My thighs are still big, so I wear the trouser style jeans that have fuller legs. I was able to fit into a size 4 dress, but the lower body was too tight on my legs, so I bought the 6 - that is the black dress in the photo of John and I. I'm in a 34/36 c bra - down from a 54DDD at one point, and a 38DDD extra long before the breast lift in June. I finally feel female and feminine. I like my body shape - I just cannot believe that it is me!
Thanks for reading this long update. Please know that this board is VERY important to me, and that I really missed you guys following this ordeal. I wish that it hadn't been so hard to get online, and then when I became so depressed I just couldn't do it. Thanks to those who send me messages even though I didn't return them - they really helped me.
Also, understand that most people who have plastic surgery don't go through what I did. My complications were rare and most people don't have them reoccur like I did. My body just didn't want to cooperate. This is a possiblity, but it is rare. Don't give up on plastics because of my story!
I hope to get my before and some of the after pics up soon. I need to take ones now that I'm really healed. The last full pics I took were the morning of the Sept. 4th surgery.
Hugs,
I had a hysterectomy in May, that went well. I am glad that I had it done, and so very glad that I didn't have to deal with periods during the body lift procedure.
I had a belt lipectomy/lower body lift June 7th, and was doing quite well until early July when I developed my first seroma. That was needle aspirated in the office 3 times, and then I went away for a weekend quilting retreat with my mom and several friends. By Saturday afternoon, I wasn't feeling well, my thighs were swelling up to HUGE proportions, my belly was really fluid filled and I was feeling like I had the flu. By late that night, by belly and tops of my thighs were bright red and hot. Sunday morning July 13th, I knew I was in trouble and told my mom that we needed to head back to LA NOW. We packed up our sewing supplies and headed to LA. I called ahead and spoke with an advice nurse who suggested going to urgent care first to see if they could help me. Once we dropped off our friend and went back to the Kaiser West LA medical center and stopped at urgent care, they took one look at my belly and sent me to the ER. The triage nurse couldn't understand that my belly is numb from the surgery and I couldn't feel the pain or the heat on my belly, but I was afraid that something was wrong. She decided to bring an ER doc into the triage area - he looked at my belly and said they would have a room for me right away. I ended up being admitted into the hosptal with severe cellulitis and infection of the seroma area. After 24 hours on cipro and vancomycian, I had surgery again to remove the infected seroma, scrape the pocket that had formed - which was HUGE, and talc was applied to the insidie of the wound to hopefully cause it to stick together. I woke up with 4 new JP drains - which started the marathon of drains, and hoped to heal again. I was reopened from hip to hip in the front. The seroma pocket was below my belly button, from right hip to left, and extending around to the back. I was so depressed to come home the day before our 26th anniversary and not be able to even get a card for my husband. A friend of mine went to the store and called me and read anniversary cards to me so that I could have a card for John. Little things like that began to mean so much to me as I was confined to my home. I contacted a friend who began cleaning my home weekly and called the church to see if we could have meals brought in.
About 10 days later, I began to develop another seroma on my left hip - I still had 2 large bore jp drains in place coming out of my groin. I emailed my surgeon, and was scheduled for surgery again on August 1 - 2 days before the baby shower I was hosting for my son and daughter in law. I saw my surgeon the morning of Aug. 1 and he felt that the seroma wouldn't heal on it's own, and my left thigh was beginning to redden again, as well as my belly on that left hip side. I went into surgery again, placed on my right side, and the left side from pubic hair line to midway from hip to "crack" in the back was reopened. Again, another massive pocket was found, and scraped of the pseudobursa lining that was producing excessive fluid (more than 400 cc's per day at this point). This surgery left my left thigh completely numb from hip to knee. As of today, it is still numb on the lateral (outside) aspect of the thigh. Hopefully I will regain feeling. My belly had adhered together, but my back and left side were still having problems. I had 3 jp drains placed on that left side.
Following the August 1 surgery, I was to remain in bed on my back or in a recliner as much as possible, not move around except a small amount to prevent blood clots. I had to remain in that position for 2 weeks at home. That was VERY difficult. I was so thankful to those who brought meals, text messaged me, and called. I really missed my computer but it was almost impossible to check email, or log onto websites. That's when I really fell away from my OH boards which had given me tremendous support. I missed you guys!
I was given the OK to move around on August the 15th - just in time to attend my dad's 70th birthday party the next day. I was OK'd to be up for a few hours per day - no lifting, pushing cards, prolonged sitting or standing. (Movement in excess can cause seromas). I had told my doctor that I was booked for a 3 day weekend cruise with my daughters, my mom and my oldest daughters future mother in law and grandmother in law the following weekend. He was OK with that and we took an electric cart for me to use on the ship and in Mexico for the day. The morning we were to get on the ship, I woke up with a HUGE SEROMA on my RIGHT hip/side. This was the side that was doing fine. I had also been battling that my thighs/legs had been horribly swelling requiring compression hose. I went back to the plastic surgeons office. My doctor was not in the office that day, and the dr. on call didn't want to aspirate the seroma because I might get an infection while on the cruise. He scheduled me to see my surgeon Tuesday morning. The cruise was great, but there was little that I could do because of my legs, and limited mobility.
Tues, Aug 26th, I again saw my surgeon who aspirated 150 ccs of fluid from my right hip and saw the amount of output from my left side and felt that we now had no choice but to open up my back and do a "quilting" procedure across my backs, extending to my hips/thighs and sides to stop the seroma formation and once again remove the lining that had formed. That surgery date was set for Sept. 4. I was still having drainage from that left side in excess of 300 ccs per day after almost 5 weeks and we knew there was still a big problem, and my thighs were HUGE.
The surgery on Sept. 4th was the hardest to recover from. I was in great pain following this surgery and spent 3 days in the hospital. I was placed on my belly, and the incision was opened from hip to hip again and it was found that I had a hardened tunnel type of seroma. The pocket was scraped clean of the lining again, and the tunnel was cut out, and removed. This caused my butt to be lifted by 3 inches - and I'm very glad for that. There was LOTS of fluid removed from this pocket and into my thighs. The skin was then sewn down to the facia/muscle layer and reclosed in a quilting procedure and I again had 4 jp drains placed. My first night home, I slept well in my own bed, and didn't wake up for my next dose of pain meds. When I woke up after 8 hours, I was in so much pain, and had to use the restroom. It took me 23 minutes to get up, go to the bathroom and walk back to where I could see the clock again. I have a tiny house - this should have been a 4 minute trip at the most to the bathroom. Again, I was asked to severely limit my movements for the next 2 weeks. My good friend who had been taking me to the doctor (a 1 hr trip for me) had gone out of town. My best friend moved following my Aug. 1 surgery, and I began to feel so alone. Once again, we needed meals brought in, and people to help with driving me to and from appointments. I slipped into a very depressed state. I so badly wanted to be free from the drains - I had drains put back in on July 14th and it was now late September. I almost pulled them out myself a couple of times. It was a hard emotional/mental battle. I emailed my doctor a time or two in depression and he really helped me get through that.
I had the last 2 drains removed on Oct. 3rd - which was something like 87 continous days of drains. Each time a drain was removed, I developed a small seroma that needed to be aspirated, and my last aspiration was Oct. 10th. On the 17th, I was released from weekly visits, and I don't go bac****il the 5th of December. I have had to email my plastic surgeon 2 times about swelling issues and enlarged lymph nodes, but I am doing really well. I am pretty weak compared to how I was before the hysterectomy and plastic surgery. Each day, I feel stronger and I am able to push a bit further in what I can do. I tire easly, and cannot lift nearly as much as before. With time, I know that my muscle mass will rebuild.
With all these complicaitons, do I regret the plastic surgery??? NO! I feel so free of the excess skin - no more rashes, no more hot, sticky rolls of tissue. I still want to do my thighs - my PS just shakes his head and laughs at me. I went from a 12 pant to a 6 - 8 depending on the cut. My thighs are still big, so I wear the trouser style jeans that have fuller legs. I was able to fit into a size 4 dress, but the lower body was too tight on my legs, so I bought the 6 - that is the black dress in the photo of John and I. I'm in a 34/36 c bra - down from a 54DDD at one point, and a 38DDD extra long before the breast lift in June. I finally feel female and feminine. I like my body shape - I just cannot believe that it is me!
Thanks for reading this long update. Please know that this board is VERY important to me, and that I really missed you guys following this ordeal. I wish that it hadn't been so hard to get online, and then when I became so depressed I just couldn't do it. Thanks to those who send me messages even though I didn't return them - they really helped me.
Also, understand that most people who have plastic surgery don't go through what I did. My complications were rare and most people don't have them reoccur like I did. My body just didn't want to cooperate. This is a possiblity, but it is rare. Don't give up on plastics because of my story!
I hope to get my before and some of the after pics up soon. I need to take ones now that I'm really healed. The last full pics I took were the morning of the Sept. 4th surgery.
Hugs,
Jennie
31 lbs lost before surgery
31 lbs lost before surgery
The amazing thing about this type of plastic surgery is that the results are very dramatic and incredible right after surgery. Due to the swelling right after surgery, my waist was 36" - now it is 28.5. I bought some size 8 pants about 2.5 weeks after the last surgery, and now they are too big. I bought the same pants just last week, and the size 6 are a big loose in the waist, but just right in the thighs. I'm still having swelling issues in my thighs at times, and sometimes my upper stomach will swell if I go several days without a compression garment.
It still amazes me that none of my measurements are over 40" -- I cannot imagine that my hips are 38! I started with 72" hips! My big towels that I take to the pool couldn't wrap all the way around me - and those are 70" towels. Now, those towel seem huge when I try and wrap them around me. They almost go around me twice! My one size fits all bathroom from Royal Carribbean cruise lines is VERY big on me now, and once I couldn't wear it cause it didn't come close to closing!
I am very glad to be rid of all that skin!
It still amazes me that none of my measurements are over 40" -- I cannot imagine that my hips are 38! I started with 72" hips! My big towels that I take to the pool couldn't wrap all the way around me - and those are 70" towels. Now, those towel seem huge when I try and wrap them around me. They almost go around me twice! My one size fits all bathroom from Royal Carribbean cruise lines is VERY big on me now, and once I couldn't wear it cause it didn't come close to closing!
I am very glad to be rid of all that skin!
Jennie
31 lbs lost before surgery
31 lbs lost before surgery
Are you the one that steals my big towels? LOL! Mine is almost closed these days, but not quite. That's another goal for me to add to my list.
I've read all about swell h--ll. That must be amazing to 1st have the skin gone and then as the swelling decreases, you get new gifts from your surgery like tiny time pills. WOW.
I've read all about swell h--ll. That must be amazing to 1st have the skin gone and then as the swelling decreases, you get new gifts from your surgery like tiny time pills. WOW.
You have been held to the fire! I know that your faith is what got you through this ordeal. There are many of our regular posters that haven't posted for a while and now they are all coming back.
I hated hearing all the issues that you had with your plastic surgery, but your attitude speaks for the entire ordeal! You'd do it all over again. I am amazed at your strength and resolve.
Keep working on getting that strength back. You look great!
I hated hearing all the issues that you had with your plastic surgery, but your attitude speaks for the entire ordeal! You'd do it all over again. I am amazed at your strength and resolve.
Keep working on getting that strength back. You look great!
kathsum
I know that the only thing that got me through was PRAYER and scripture! The Lord was so good to me, and we've seen so much fruit coming from this -- hard to even list it all, but it has been good.
I love the results, but the process was quite hard. More than I would have thought, but many of us are not over our plastics in 6 weeks which most plastic surgery shows will lead you to believe.
I love the results, but the process was quite hard. More than I would have thought, but many of us are not over our plastics in 6 weeks which most plastic surgery shows will lead you to believe.
Jennie
31 lbs lost before surgery
31 lbs lost before surgery
Thanks Jennifer - glad to be back and more normal. Today is a day that I'm more tired - I have days when I have energy, and then I have days when I'm worn out. I'm learning to take things one day at a time and realize that I am still healing and that I've been through quite a bit and it will still take time for me to be "normal" - whatever that is at this point!
I added you as my friend
I added you as my friend
Jennie
31 lbs lost before surgery
31 lbs lost before surgery
Jennie... Wow.. you have been through a lot to say the least... I am so thrilled you are recovering and back up and about. I know your faith took you through the toughest days. You are truly an inspiration....
Lisa... HW/ 314.7 SW/ 280 CW/ 180ish
RNY ~ 01/25/2008 Terrence Clarke (Ellis Hosptial Bariatric Center).... Lower Body Lift with butt lift and upper thigh lift ~ 07/14/2009 Sanjiv Kayastha (K Plastic Surgery) -- LOVE IT !!!!
Most Active
Recent Topics
