Hey - my opp was the 10th and I’ve recovered really well - I’ve had my boob drained 3 times (last time today) and going back on Thursday for another check up - I get very little pain now - still a little sensitive in my arm and no feeling under my arm pit but that’s normal :)

Arm pain is worse than the breast but neither are half as bad as I thought they would be :)

when is your surgery? Keep us updated please xx

Hi - Yes, I had to sort out my drains myself - but its really easy. Basically the drain comes from the wound site and it is a long tube with a plastic bulb type thing at the end of it. The bulb is then attached to a bag. Any fluid that is being drained from the wound site collects into the bulb and every so often you squeeze the bulb and the fluid transfer's into the bag attached. It has a seal on it - so no fluid will ever leak out. The bag gets changed every few days. I had a breast care nurse or a district nurse visit every day for about a week or so and they changed the bag - but I could have done it myslef - but as they were there I let them change it - so I just did the sqeezing of the bulb. :-)

I hope I haven't made this sound complicated because it's not.

One tip I would give you is to ask about have a shoulder bag type thing that you can carry the drains in, I didn't get one and every now and then I'd forget about the drain and get up and start walking across the room only to have the bag fall on the floor and drag along the floor. behind me. I found a kind of gym bag with a draw string that I used in the end that I could carry over my shoulder. I think you can get them free - google 'free drain bag' and all sorts come up and you should find one either free or for postage. I know they have free on facebook, so if you're on facebook search 'drain bags' and the page should come up.

I was dignosed on 8th August and didn't have my surgery until 24th September - so I had quite a wait as I was having all sorts of MRI's and mammograms and scans etc and I also had a holiday booked that I wanted to go on - so don't worry too much about the wait - if it stays as May - it'll soon come round. 

You're bound to have good and bad days - this is normal - we're dealing with a 'big' thing here - but believe me you can do this and we're all here to support you and give you any advice if we can when it's needed.

Take care and keep in touch

Lots of love

Helen

xxx

Thanks for always being here to answer my questions  I really appreciate  

Having heard your time line I feel better now.

I really pray and hope my op and healing go very smoothly too. 

I will surely keep you updated.

Cheers

OK thanks so much for the explanation and your kind words , reading your surgery time line makes me feel better about my wait, and knowing its normal to do the drains myself.

Thanks for the tip about the drain bag, will start searching now.

Will keep you updated 

Cheers xxx

Ahh you are more than welcome - feel free to message any time with any questions after your opp etc - I’m sure you will be pleasantly surprised by the opp and your healing time :) just listen to your body and take each day as it comes ️ ️

Thank you. 

Forgot to ask, how is your implant fairing with the radiotherapy , any scarring on the skin? Or any issues with the implant 

I was told today the implant might get damaged or fail due to radiotherapy.. 

I haven’t got a start date for my radiotherapy yet- I have a meeting with my oncologist on Thursday as part of my results are getting sent to america for some kind of scoring trial regarding chemo - then I will find out my treatment dates 10 days after that.

my surgeon did tell me when I got my surgery though that my implant would take a hammering with radiotherapy but my implant is just a temporary measure till after treatment and he said he would rather that took the brunt of treatment than my healthy cells then we can do a permanent reconstruction after treatment 

are you keeping your implants long term? Xx 

OK, hope you get a favourable result from the scoring. 

Yes I intend to keep it long term, unless I decide later to use my tissues. My surgeon said i could keep it for as long as I wanted as far as it doesn't get destroyed by radiotherapy.

Hi dear, 

Just checking up on you, how are you getting on with recovery? How was your scoring? Have you started other treatments, my op is next week, I pray everything goes well.

Cheers xxx