Tummy Tuck Progression in Reverse- Graphic Photos

You will not want to see the photos near the end if you are at all squeamish. The journey isn't glamorous!  


When I did the DIEP Flap breast reconstruction, they did a modified tummy tuck to use the tissue and fat as my new breast.  Then, after a couple months of recovery, they did liposuction and fat transfer from my waist and thighs to add to my new breast.  I have spent the past three months healing.

This surgery, the subsequent surgery, and recovery have been beyond difficult and painful.  But the results are increasingly wonderful.  Each week, I am able to do more, and the pictures reflect not only the surgery, but the effort I've put into getting healthy with diet and exercise.

Looking back at the photos, I cringe at the thought I was dealing with so much pain.  But now, three months after that initial shock to my body, I'm stronger and leaner.  I'm getting better daily.  There is still quite a bit of swelling from the liposuction three weeks ago, but that will take six months to go down.   The massive scars will fade in time, and I will be sporting my new, hopefully toned, body by next summer.

Anyway, here are the photos of the tummy tuck progression in reverse.  The newest, most recent photo is first.  I've come a long way in three months.

After Liposuction Surgery

Growing Garden Pics

Cucumbers are growing so fast!

Cantaloupe and Watermelon plants are escaping

This zucchini plant is kicking butt and taking names!
It's taller than my wheelchair ramp and four feet wide

I love coming out here every morning to see the magic that's happened overnight

The Fifth and Final Surgery!

I am now on the schedule for my last surgery!  I will be heading back to Spartanburg on July 25th for my final surgery.  This one should be fairly easy in comparison to the previous one, and I should be heading home by that afternoon.

This surgery will be a touch up surgery to the breast reconstruction, and will include, scar revision, liposuction of my hips and stomach, and then liposuction of my upper thighs, then transferring that fat to the new breast to make it match the other.  I am choosing not to do nipple reconstruction.  After that, I'll be on my own to tattoo a design on my new breast.

I'm so excited!!

Race for the Cure TV Promo

A Year of Breast Cancer- VIDEO

More Garden Pics & Surgical Update....

First things first.... When I did the DIEP Flap breast reconstruction, they did something called a rib resection. I only saw one diagram that showed them going through one of the ribs in the chest to get to blood vessels. And I thought, "Okay, they will cut the rib to get to the blood vessel and then it will heal like any other broken rib". And for six weeks I've been waiting for my rib to heal, but it still hurts like hell, especially when I sneeze, do side to side motions, or strenuous activity like vacuuming or mowing the lawn.

The other night, as I was laying down, I felt a bone kind of sticking up about two inches to the right of my sternum. After feeling around and pressing on it for a couple minutes, I realized that there's no bone that connects to my sternum. Then I looked up the meaning of "resect", and it means removal. I don't know why I didn't realize it, but the procedure removed part of my rib....and the end of it is so sore! Yuck!  Hopefully that will stop hurting soon.

Anyway, so here's the latest on the gardening adventure, hoping it will lead to a healthier me... 

First "mini" harvest of green beans

All these are Bell Peppers!

Bush Early Tomatoes

The Sunflowers are sprouting, and I'm still waiting on the Pumpkins to sprout too

Next to happen is planting some Naval Orange seeds, Cherry Tree seeds, and Pomegranate seeds.  Soon my yard will be full of food! 

The Garden

When they put the top soil in the garden boxes, I didn't realize it was mostly clay. My garden did well for a while, but the plants weren't really growing and they started to turn yellow. Part of it was over-watering, because the clay held so much water. And part of it was that there were no real nutrients in the soil. 

So...I've been busy. I got 80lbs of manure and organic plant food, planted lots of new plants in the garden, and re-tilled the whole garden by hand for the second time. The first time was with compost and this time with the manure and food. Whew! But hopefully now it's not going to kill the plants. It was driving me crazy to see my neighbor's plants that are HUGE and beautiful, and mine were all tiny and yellow.

I also planted a cherry tree and I still need to plant my fig tree. But everything already looks better!  On top of that, the Oncologist said that all the labor will help my veins!  I head back the hospital infusion lab today for my monthly dose of Herceptin.  Hopefully they only have to stick me once this time!  (Update:  I got stuck twice again)

Here are pics of the garden.... 

Rows of bell peppers in green, red, orange and yellow

Green beans and corn.  Still a little yellow but getting bettter

My herbs are growing really well!

I still need to plant my fig tree with the other fruit trees

Cherry tree (although better for flowering)

The Peach Tree, Two Apple Trees, Plum and
Pear Trees are all doing well.

Natalie's angel catching sun for the garden

Watermelon has sprouted along with the Canteloupe

Overall looking MUCH better

Zucchini!!

I also planted a Dwarf Lemon Tree, Lime Tree and Grapefruit Tree

And Potatoes!

I'm Gonna Dye!!

They say you have to wait six months after chemotherapy to dye your hair.  (Who are "they" anyway??)   From the research I've done, this is what I've found about what they have said.  Chemotherapy changes your body chemistry.  This includes skin, nails, hair and everything in between.  The way your body reacted to chemicals prior to chemo, is not necessarily how they will react afterwards.  And chemo stays in your body for a long time.

But, this grey hair, no matter how sophisticated people tell me it looks, had to go.  It's only been five months though, so I didn't know what would happen.  Some women experienced rashes or allergic reactions.  Some women got green hair.  Who knew how my hair would end up?  And because my skin had such a bad reaction to the steri-strips, I didn't know what to expect.

I bought the box of hair dye a month ago in anticipation.  I nervously decided today was the day, and I put that stuff on there!!  I only left it for 17 of the 25 minutes, just in case I had a reaction, so it's not as dark as what the box shows.  And yes, I left the birthmark, although it looks ridiculous right now with my hair so short.  But in time, my hair will grow, and I will go a little longer next time with the dye.

The one thing I did notice that was different, I guess because of chemo, is that my hair didn't have any shine after dying it.  But that's easily solved with some hair gloss.  Anyway, here's how it looks!!

Pic taken for Greenville News at Natalie's swim meet.  Look how grey!!

6/10/14  "Before"

In progress....

6/11/14  "After" 

And here's the progress five weeks after surgery....

Belly button is going in and elongating. The incision is healing and changing to a lighter color.
And I'm looking forward to lipo for the buldgy areas. 

Finally, a flat stomach!!!

Surgical Update

I met with the surgeon this morning to see my progress after my surgery four weeks ago.  He found and removed a few stitches that had broken through my incision lines, and took a look at the place on my hip where my incision opened up.  The good news is, there's no infection anywhere, and it will heal up in just a couple weeks with just a bandaid (as opposed to "wound care").  

Also, he said that I'm healing so well and so quickly that he's moving the follow up surgery closer.  I won't have to wait the three months.  I'll meet with him in just a month to schedule the next surgery.  This one will be to resolve any small issues like the roundness over each hip and add more fat to the new breast.  It should be a very easy surgery.  Nothing compared to the last one.

On top of all that, I won't have to wait the full six weeks before lifting my 60lb son, Eliah.  Because I've healed so well, he gave me the go ahead to get back to life.  Although I still need to be a little careful with activity, because my rib is still healing, I can do most everything now.  Whew!

The next step is to start wearing silicone sheets on the scars, because apparently something in silicone makes scars go away.  So I will head to the drug store this afternoon for those.  Other than that, I'm on the mend! 

Four Weeks Post-Breast Reconstruction Surgery

Well, I had my breast reconstruction four weeks ago today. I've had lots of energy, so I've been walking downtown or on the treadmill, doing some floor exercises, and some light stretching.  Then I decided to do spring cleaning (again).  I've steam cleaned the carpets, moved furniture to clean behind, and even cleaned out all the closets.   However, I kind of got ahead of myself with doing stuff, and was quickly reminded to take it easy.

On Saturday, I reached down to scratch my incision line, and it split open on my left hip.  It's not too bad, but does require some wound care... and rest.  Apparently, my body is refusing to dissolve the stitches.  Not only are the stitches rising to the surface, but they are, at four weeks, still fishing line material.  I pulled a three inch long piece of fishing line out of the middle of my stomach a couple days ago.  Since then, the middle part of the incision is finally starting to heal.  But my body isn't even trying with these stitches!  So frustrating.

Anyway, I meet with the plastic surgeon in a couple days to take a look, but there's not much they can do except address the stitches as they break through.  In the meantime, I'm eating pineapple to speed healing, taking enzymes to dissolve the stitches, Chlorella to help build new cells, and trying to take it easy, although sitting still is quickly driving me insane.

Three steps forward, one step back with healing.  Overall, I'm still very pleased with how it's going, despite the hiccup.  A lot of the swelling has gone down around my hips.  The doctor will still plan on fixing any remaining bulges with liposuction in just a couple months.   And I'm starting to think about a tattoo that will cover most of my body now. Hahaha (I'm only half kidding).

Post Surgery Body- Three Weeks

Yesterday morning, I stood naked, looking at my reflection in the bathroom mirror.  I saw my short, growing hair, no longer brown, but grey, with my bright white birthmark sitting on top like whipped cream.  I wondered if I should dye my hair as before or embrace the natural look.  Then I tried to will it to grow longer by focusing my thoughts on the roots.  No luck.

As my gaze went down, I saw my face, with deep new wrinkles and eyes that stared back, hoping for approval from the woman looking at her.  I kept my opinion hidden as I looked further down and saw the scar from where the chemo port was.  I told myself it was getting better and less noticeable.  Maybe nobody would notice it if I put a little makeup on it.

Again, my gaze went lower.  I saw two breasts, one natural breast and one new, smaller, scarred breast.  The bright red scar goes completely around my right breast, and extends from my cleavage to under my armpit.  There are stretch marks that were once on my stomach and easy to ignore by not looking down below my breasts.  But I told myself that this was okay.  Just three weeks ago, I didn't have any breast there, just a long scar.  And now, there is the beautifully shaped breast in front of me.  I squinted at myself in the mirror.... "Sure, if I squint, it looks like a real breast now".

Still looking in the mirror, I turned to the side, and underneath the new breast is a collection of scars.  Drain holes from the mastectomy.  Drain holes from the new surgery.  And old scars from my gallbladder surgery and chickenpox.  I told myself just to ignore those.  They shouldn't even be noticeable in time, right?

I looked at my new belly button.  "Eh, it will do", I told myself, and focused on the enormous scar beneath.  I remember the disappointment five years ago, when I had a hysterectomy and was supposed to do a tummy tuck at the same time.  Days before surgery, I was told that we couldn't afford the tuck procedure.  I've looked in the mirror so many times since then and held my stomach flat, wishing it could change.  And as I looked at myself yesterday, I saw that my stomach was indeed flat.  But who knew the price I would have to pay for this result?

The scar... oh my goodness, that scar.  Still red, still huge, still bruised.  I looked closer, and I could see the line from my C-section and Hysterectomy underneath this new, massive, in your face, scar.  I could see more scars from the gallbladder surgery, and small scars from surgeries done to my uterus 15years ago, and stretch marks from pregnancies. Below that, more drain hole scars from this past surgery.

I stared at the whole image in the mirror.  I tried to remember what I looked like before.  I'm not sure if I couldn't remember, or if I didn't want to, but I immediately brought myself to what was presently looking back at me.  Before I gave myself my own opinion, I thought to myself, "How will someone look at this and think it's beautiful?"  My eyes started to well up with tears, and I broke down.  Just writing that made me tear up again.

Then I picked my head back up, and I looked at her again.  And as I stood there, casting the potential judgment of others aside, I formed my opinion of myself.  I saw a whole person.  Each piece of this patchwork quilt I've become, tells a story of strength I've never known I had. This body is a perfect representation of my inner victories.  Each battle was won with faith, endurance and sheer willpower.  I've been broken down, torn apart, stripped to the core, and pieced back together to form this new person.

I can't hide the view on the outside the way I've hidden the other battles in my life.  But apparently, this is the way to remind myself, and the world, that I'm not weak.  I'm not going to give up, no matter what happens.  I will continue to fight for myself until the day I die.

It's funny, I started yesterday with a look in the mirror, gawking at a woman that looked like she had gone through a shredder.  I ended that moment, seeing a whole person with a unique story.  I can't make others see what I see.  But when it comes to my own opinion, I think I'm beautiful, and my strength shows through.

I admit that recovering from this surgery is extremely hard.  As good as I am at healing, I'm fighting like hell every day.  I force myself to walk on the treadmill, stretch, and do exercises that build my body.  It hurts, and it's hard, and I'm fighting with a body that will not listen.

The new breast is even starting to get sensation.  The downside is that, as the nerves regenerate, it's excruciating.  I look like a mental patient, as I twitch and flinch at each lightening strike of pain to my breast.  The muscles pull tight, and raising my arm above my head is difficult.  I can feel it pulling from my chest all the way to my wrist.  I can see it inside my arm, twisting and painful.  But regardless of the pain, I still try several times a day to stretch it out and do exercises.  I don't give up.

This battle is not over.  I don't know if it will ever end.  But I won't be defined by what's on the surface.  And I will fight as long as I have to, with everything I have.

I won't ever give up.

Two Weeks After Surgery

These photos are two weeks after the DIEP Flap procedure.  The stomach incision goes more than half-way around each hip.  There's a little little bulge over each hip that will be liposuctioned during the touch-up surgery. The belly button will retract and get smaller over time.  The breast swelling has gone down, and the incision line is healing almost as well as the belly incision, although I won't show pictures of that.

My stomach muscles are still intact, however they have been operated on, so they are still healing.  It feels like I've done about a 100 crunches, but I'm still able to use them.   Standing up straight is easy, but does take a little time if I've been sitting for a while.  The biggest issue I've had is the rib pain so far, but the doctor says that will fade in a couple weeks.  It really doesn't hurt unless I'm trying to reach something in front of me.  But other than that, I'm on the mend!!

Here are the belly incisions at two weeks.  Most of the redness is from the steri-strips causing the blistering and scarring.  And it's all so itchy!

Some bruising and swelling over the hip, but not painful

That red line on my stomach is a scar from the tape

The hip bulges will be fixed

And here's what I look like at two weeks with clothes on!!