Prophylactic Bilateral Mastectomy with Reconstruction Healing - Week 5 after Surgery

5 days ago I went to see my physician who truly had very little to say about the pain and encouraged me to continue to massage and no heavy lifting but fly-free and push things slowly! 

So I figured I'm on my own here and determined that like a baby I will have to start anew! I quit all daytime pain meds and am using Tylenol at night as needed (sparingly) and am trying to find a way to phase out sleeping sitting upright.

I went back to a place I've loved since I was a child.  I went back to ballet. The long lean posture, and arms for stretching... the beauty of form and peace it brings to my mind. It does for me what yoga does for my friends.

Day 3 of driving a little more every day... I'm sleeping sitting up less often and just on my sides. 

I am at week 5 post-surgery... I hope things continue to get better. I Google things, in the car while parked, when the pain gets overwhelming and I still have a half day ahead of me and the stories online of the women who still feel these things in them and still feel the tightness years later and have formed internal scar tissue they can't break up - well I am working on that not being me and finding a way to help more women in the favorite of my charities I work with.

This surgery is a lot like having a dog so far, or a BMW, or hair extensions... it requires constant attention in the beginning and then lots of tweaking.  The feeling of it being there never leaves one's consciousness. It's very distracting.

I can't wait to post that this feels better but I am only at week five... the 6 week no lifting embargo is almost over. The 3 months go-back-to-the-gym-and-bench-press is yet to begin. The 6 month refining surgery is not soon. The 1 year mark of the light pink possible nipple tattoo I probably won't get isn't here. The 4% hydroquinone to bleach down scars hasn't begun. 

It's all too soon but I'm done blogging I think for now dear reader and I thank you for reading it.

I hope I helped some women who will go through this know what to expect. :)

BILATERAL PROPHYLACTIC MASTECTOMY: It's week 4. I can't drive. I can't heal. I can't stop feeling like a burden on my family. I can't accomplish anything.

Is this going to be my "after" in a few months? OK 
I've always felt we had a lot in common anyway. :)

It's week 4 after surgery. I can't drive. I can't heal. I can't stop feeling like a burden on my family (and they've been really kind and amazing). I can't accomplish anything. I am extremely frustrated. 

A few days ago I healed to the point where I felt like I had good pain control w just Arthritis Tylenol (the extra strong 1400 stuff) and so I tried to drive to pick up the children from school.  Huge mistake!  

BMW steering wheels are HEAVY... and when I was a gym going "athlete", oh just 4 weeks ago, this was a welcome little extra calorie burn in my day. So, since my little adventure a few days ago, it's been all about the extra swelling and extra pain killers I don't like taking or even talking about. Ugh. I feel like such a loser. They don't tell you that pre-op. Can you imagine the brochure? "It is normal to feel like a loser for 4-6 weeks after surgery... and that's OK. You're doing the best you can!" They should have Jerry Seinfeld write it. THAT I could understand. 

SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO beyond frustrated. So I Googled "prophylactic mastectomy blog" and these honest, awesome women w their amazing blogs popped up with details. 

Here are some of my details: I have 2 vertical scars that are getting easier to look at. The Lifecell (ie; cadaver - ew but thank you people for donating your bodies to science) paper towel feeling stuff holding up the silicon under the muscle still looks lumpy (normal ... or maybe I have a small seroma under one. idk) I am not getting the nipple reconstruction... are you kidding me? To not have to worry about nipples poking through shirts sounds like a plus not a minus. I may get a light pink 3D areola tattoo in a year to just feel a bit more normal and distract more from the scar once it has faded and the tiny thing (skin folds) that may have to be fixed gets fixed... but I'm not a tattoo person so this is unlikely. We will see how it all looks under a shirt. 

I don't regret it at all.  To have some control over the circumstances life has given me seems like a smart thing.

OK, some of these awesome blogger women wrote about how they feel regarding their surgery in relation to their husband. I honestly still feel like a victim (or a patient or a better word than that) when he is around and I have to look at the scars... I didn't prepare for what it would feel like to LOOK different. It's a small part of the overall equation and I'm sure we will both get used to it.  

I get told I'm beautiful a lot by women and men and I don't know if that's just part of the female experience or if it's true in my case (and I don't dress in tight clothes or obvious decolletage) but one of the things that attracted me to my husband when I first met him was he didn't focus on how pretty he thought I was. He really focused on my words and was so appropriate and smart and since I know I'm the kind of person who turns into who they hang out with I knew it would work... because I am always trying to be more appropriate and smarter. There's just too much artsy stuff in my head that I try to push aside.

I just can't believe how slowly this healing is going. It's MAJOR surgery. 

Anyone have any ideas on which cars have a nice, light, loose steering wheel? 
Maybe I can rent a car and that would stop me needing to rely on people so much.  Thank you! 

Gotta' go find some organic magic to make for the kids... they're due home and they super-rock so they deserve some body good healthy fuel. :)  
(That last sentence (no, actually this entire A.D.D. sounding blog entry) happened 1. because I haven't been able to get my pain under a 4-6 (on a scale of 1-10) today and 2. after light housework when the pain overcame me and did a Cher smack in the face "Snap out of it!" to me, I watched Parks and Rec and Rob Lowe's character hit me the hardest - I live too close to LA for it not to. Soooo...)

Someone has agreed to take the children...

Someone has agreed to take the children... to pick them up from school, feed them organic magic, look over and clarify their homework, entertain them, and take them to their sports before bringing them  home. SO I was able to take the Advil/Tylenol combo (which didn't even take the edge off) and then (because I don't have to drive now - thank you world) take 2 Valium for the pain.

I don't know what this is but I'll have what she's having...
where's my husband and my Four Season's reservation.
We're due honey. - Kevin Spacey Richard III

I don't normally watch television but if you're healing from surgery, this is the time to do it.

My feelings on medicine in general: I dislike it. I like feeling like a good person and I don't care if that makes me a simpleton in your eyes because apparently I am getting 30 Google hits a day and they're probably all robots so no one is reading this anyway.

SO, with my 2 Valium I am watching Kevin Spacey's "House of Cards" instead of Bill Burr's show on Netflix which I love (he reminds me of the teenage me) because Kevin seemed nice on The Daily Show.  I don't like "The House of Cards" - it is far too much like real life. Not because I'm a sneaky, life-as-chess playing no-good-doer (first of all I would be Robin's Wright's character - I'm a woman married to a powerful man but mine has good character, scruples, and integrity, AND he's a genius), but because life seems to increasingly be about posturing - which I used to absolutely despise when my mother was alive.
Now I have to find my own path and have my own opinions and I find that one can never in a million years say anything close to what they are thinking. (Oh, she's growing up. It's about time.)  My children are learning this lesson too now - because I teach them everything I know because being naive like me sucks. "Life's a game people... so stop your crying, work hard, smile and play it." - aren't you glad I'm not your mom?

I want my life to be more Jon Stewart and less Frank Underwood... Frank can say things and trick people and have his stupid theories and Jon Stewart does something even more difficult... he is like-able while reporting the most gruesome news stories... he does accents (which incidentally I also do very well thank you very much), he has that wisdom that comes from experience on how to be in charge of all his guests and steer them into a successful interview despite what they're actually feeling (giddiness, etc) while making it seem effortless... and he is happy and smart - but not like a Jimmy Fallon Muppet.

God I need to get out of my house. LOVE YOU - the shut-in in recovery. 

The One Where Nothing Happened....

Yesterday's one load of laundry, and one load of dishes, one quick ride to pick up the kids from school, one fortnight after prophylactic bilateral mastectomy w silicon implants of the same size... while being cognizant of the 5lb weight limit of exertion... was a mistake.

The pain is defeating me... so much so that I ate ice cream at 3am (I don't do that.) and am starting my day, dear benevolent reader, with a diet coke with Splenda and a cereal I hate (I don't normally eat breakfast) in the hopes my body will tolerate the 1 Advil and 2 Tylenol and Multi-Vitamin I have just put in it.

My child's teacher said to me yesterday that she was so proud of how brave and how pro-active and strong I am and how another woman would have just waited rather than acted on this. She said something similar in 3 more sentences in a row and more eloquently than I am typing it.  

She is the only person in my life to have expressed what I myself feel about this whole debacle. 

I said a very graceful remark about her kindness and how appreciative I was for her words and then did the self-deprecating "I really didn't feel like I had a choice given my life's circumstances and goals." (She wasn't biting that - thank you - YAY!)  in return in the most sincerity I could muster w my seat belt pushing into my very painful breasts from driving the stupid, heavy steering wheel BMW I drive (I hate that new, SUV, stupid, uncomfortable, gas guzzling, piece of garbage car and will never get another - it's like a pet and always needs something while providing none of the soft features or love of a pet.). I smiled and tried to make a joke about the power of red lipstick (the joke was either not funny or lost on her or both)...but it shocks me that she knew exactly what to say. 

Since this blog is fairly anonymous, whatever that means, she won't know I thought the impact of what she said was as great as it is... but like it says in the header I'm nice in real life when I'm not in pain... so she will know. :)

That's it... I'm done blogging for a few weeks until I feel like Superwoman again and have found my life's purpose... deadline, 4 months. No, no, I hear how that sounds...

ANGELINA JOLIE SURGERY: UPDATE ON BILATERAL PROPHYLACTIC MASTECTOMY W SILICON IMPLANTS NOT NIPPLE SPARING. ONE FORTNIGHT LATER

First I want you know to know I can't proof read my own stuff... I can't bear to look at myself on film (unless it's CGI'd so I look like Charlize Theron - hasn't happened yet), and I can't bear to listen to anything I've recorded on my CD's - no matter how freaking genius it is and how much disbelief I am in that I improved that right there that well from the heart. That's just not who I am. Mike Meyer's understands this about me. Go ask him. 

RECOVERY: It's been great. (Hahahahaha!) I'm still in pain. I still look like the Bride of Frankenstein that popped out of Tim Burton's head. Again, I love your wife Tim.

Here's the important part. I still think I'm funny like Lewis Black or Kathleen Madigan or "Find the Funny" Tammy Pescatelli (normally I'm more Kelly Osbourne when she grows up and realizes life is not what she thought life was... y'know... like Tori Spelling - entirely like-able people in real life I'm sure).

Not unlike Alec Baldwin and Elizabeth Banks (or as I like to call them Jack Donaghy and Avery Jessup), my husband has been gently, too gently for his usual personality which I pick up as pity - I HATE pity.... wait...

Side bar: My husband and I grew up in different parts of the country so we almost never read each other correctly and have to double check everything to make sure we understood each other correctly. That's not a vote for inbreeding people. I'm a sarcastic, creative, artsy type with prior success whose mind moves to parallel thoughts quickly and gets annoyed when you don't get my joke (like Robin Williams)... and my husband is nice and appropriate, solid and perfect - it's annoying sometimes... I have to hold all my inappropriate/funny/over-the-top-totally-normal-in-NY-but-gauche-here in my head when we are around people and it drives me crazy. 

See, I still think I'm funny. This has to stop or I'm going to have to drive out to LA and find an outlet for it... where do they keep my people the Indian Jews and other people here? NBC? Why do they keep cutting my scenes then? "Oh, we couldn't fit it in the time allotted." Wah-wah-whine-whine-wish I drank wine...

So Mr. BigAndPerfectMultiMillionaire has been suggesting for a few days that I've had a few weeks to recover and aside from Tylenol and not lifting over 5lbs I could probably get back to life.  Bye-bye night-time Valium, hello to my normal insomniac life is what he didn't know he was suggesting.

I FIND THIS INFURIATING - which is a good thing because it's the only emotion that fuels me into any action anymore.  So today, I am not taking anything for pain. I cancelled the housekeeper so I could try to do laundry (Oh yes I am.), then I'm going to pick up the kids with a mountain of red lipstick and a smile and Ralph Lauren on, and have a perfect meal with organic magic prepared for the children when they get home. Then, I'm going to ask them about their day and their homework.  

I will then spend two months donating 60% of our home contents for more "dead space" in it to fill with thoughts (and I have nice things). All this for planning a way to out-earn my Mr. Big. This is going to be fun. He thinks he is so perfect. Watch this...

PS: I'm going to try to watch "House of Cards" for the first time tonight as I fall asleep in the fetal position with liver damaging Tylenol as my only weapon. Let's see how that changes the writing tomorrow. 

Post Post Script: Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show needs more females and female comedienne's on his show or I honestly probably won't watch... and he has to fake flirt w them... and some of them have to be WOMEN (jaded and in a suit and NOT 6 inch heels) not just females... but I'm very happy for him and the first day was ahmazing (I developed a crush on Will Smith and Bono and that's saying something because I like to think I don't like anyone) ... I still would rather watch Kathleen Madigan host it... or Conan. Oh look, another white male on TV owning it. That's nice. :) Tee-hee, so happy for him. He seems so humble. :) Bless his heart.  

http://pinkaliciousintentions.blogspot.com - out (drops microphone loudly on the floor, smiles seductively, and exits stage left) #TurnDownForWhat

Prophylactic Bilateral Mastectomy with Reconstruction Recovery Not Nipple Sparing : The First Two Weeks Recovery : RIGHT AFTER I SAT ALMOST FRONT ROW AT THE GRAMMY'S!

Here we are! Happy BLUE JASMINE 2014! 

AND MAY I JUST SAY I LOVE YOU DEAR READER! 

YOU ARE THE BEST PERSON IN THE WORLD!

THANK YOU FOR ALLOWING ME TO FEEL LIKE AN AUTHOR 

FOR THE DURATION YOU READ THIS.

Eat. Sleep. Rave. Repeat. 

Tina Fey, Amy Poehler LOVE

I have conquered the dieting problem. 

1. I don't eat until noon (except black organic coffee) so my blood sugar is not spiked so I am not hungry. 

2. Then organic veggies/protein twice then fruit or whole grain bread cheat before bed. 

3. If I view fruit and whole grain bread as a cheat and food as not pleasure but fuel - this works. 

4. The final element is to drive to a gym far away where the classes make you feel like you are on drugs. The women say things like "KILLER" as they slow squat you (after 35,000 pre squats) with a barbell on your back. (I'm looking at you Les Mills with lust in my eyes for inventing that class.)  The music is so loud you feel you are a young virgin in Studio 54's hey-day at 3am and the danger of an orgasmic orgy with he's and she's and no negative consequences lurks in every corner. 

The "Cardio Party" class girl is so happy and sexy and gorgeous and moves her derriere in ways I don't think I've ever seen or imagined before... and I know I can accomplish any form of dance within a few weeks so I know I am going to dance like a WHORE alone in my kitchen by the end of 2014! 

It's going to be brilliant and the shades will be drawn and none of my Republican friends in their tennies and martini blah-blah, HIGH WASP khaki's will be the wiser. It's my dirty little secret that I am uber healthy AND I feel sexy and I'm doing nothing wrong and can attend all their uber-boat parties and pretend to be boring too and pretend that I adore spreading my legs while upside down in fancy group yoga class (ewwwwwwwwww) in my LuLuLemon (which I DO truly adore) while sipping a water with olives and pretending it's a shaken-not-stirred something! Insert evil laugh here. 

It's OK, I've been accused of being a "HEALTH FREAK" before (and not just by my children)... it gets easier the more I make my peace with it. Stop, you know you love me. Where is Tina Fey to write this better? The phones won't stop ringing in my Gold Scroll Room (that's what I call this room) and it's killing my writing buzz.

RIGHT AFTER I SAT ALMOST FRONT ROW AT THE GRAMMY'S this happened!

Now that you all love me or have clicked on... I have a confession. 

I AM WRITING THIS WHILE ON DRUGS.

Yes, that is correct. This writing is going to get serious now so move on non-serious readers. I said good day sir! There will be no pictures of my breasts because internet security and obscurity is a farce and this is all going to catch up to me someday and I'm a private person who can't shut the hell up for some reason... some days I feel like Lewis Black.  Oh, the drugs are pain meds people, calm down.

It is 2 weeks after my PROPHYLACTIC BREAST REMOVAL w SILICON RECONSTRUCTION.  I am very, very, very high risk and one of my aunt's died from just the chemo.  The most important thing to know about me is I take great pride in my mommy skills. I may have embellished in a few of my past posts for drama or maybe that I was pursuing a reality show (yes, I know how stupid that sounds) but I put my entire main purpose of being, my number one goal on my top ten list is to turn out good, accomplished, citizens with good taste, good manners, and that ace their studies so that they can be the best at what they do. I rewrite my top ten goal list annually in January and those sweet babies are always #1 and it's always the most detailed goal w sub headings and outline form tabs etc etc...  POINT BEING: I am not dying on my children the way my mother died for no reason on me. No one messes w my children's lives unless it's something they can learn from to kick even more a*s at their jobs. That's right cancer I am looking you in the eyes and talking to you. If the 30 Rock I have watched on Netflix while recovering has taught me anything it's that the angry, mean mom's live the longest - so I'm pointing all my anger at cancer.

I'm tired now and I'm freaked out by what I have to type to tell you how it's going to go if you decide to do this. I've been flipping into grande dame mode to cope with this recovery and not being a superhero. I feel like I'm 80 and I'm in pain and I can't move my arms until today. I'm taking pain killers to type this. I'm compensating by wearing pearls and red lipstick 24/7 to cope... like that says to the world "Bit*h, I got this!"

They recommend you buy a front zip sports bra for after (which I did) but I've found more success with this bra. It's a "nylon ruched bra" and costs nothing at Forever 21 or Amazon.com and the greatest gift is I don't have to look at my Bride of Frankenstein breasts until they heal if I just have one on 24/7.

Best Bra For Prophylactic Removal Recovery

WEEK 1: pain (yuck and my stomach does not tolerate NSAIDS so I'm not taking them) drains are in (no biggie, just pin it to the bra and empty twice a day) and record in your book that you record your meds in.

WEEK 1.5: more mobility in arms (up to shoulder level) - I'm still sleeping on the chaise and I THANK GOD for the Evolution station on IHeart.com that earbuds in a heart beat like sound that drowns out the pain all day and all night. My husband writes the meds and times on a plastic cup right next the bed for the 2am crazy pain. We record it all in the book.  It  reminds me of such a book we made when the children were born and we recorded when they diaper changed/ate/nursed/etc - there's something so reassuring about having a plan and doing something well and in an organized fashion.

WEEK 1.7: Took myself off all pain meds and said to self, "HA! 6 weeks to heal from this? I'm doing it in 3! I'm invincible! I also may have to drive my kids to school in a few days because the friends have been leaned on too hard in my opinion (I sent Thank You baskets/texts/handwritten cards but still.) so I need to know what that feels like."

WEEK 2: Pain meds before bed only, the pain SUCKS and it's been 3 days of being a tough girl. That's enough now. Heal like a person. Mini-goal, am able to tolerate Netflix instead of just deafening dance music 24/7.

WEEK 2.1: Pain meds at night, Tylenol only in day, still exhausted, starting to not to only want to eat pizza and chocolate and comfort foods. The veggies are back. Apples taste good again. I'm getting a grip. It still sucks. I still probably can't drive for more than one ten minute session as needed with two hands.

The lift no more than 5 lbs for 6 weeks post surgery rule is in effect still. My children and husband are the most perfect people in the entire world and I am so so so so so grateful for them.  


THEN THERE'S THE IDEA OF BECOMING ACCUSTOMED TO HAVING SILICON IN ME!

I am vain, I'm not that vain, and I NEVER would EVER want to be one of those girls w fake breasts. My idea of perfect breasts are 
1. The ones I had (except for the decolletage area changes from nursing)
2. A skinny ballerina disco girls 
3. Grace Adler's
4. One of the Olson Twin's - y'know a skeletal figure woman who grows older and only wears Chanel. 
A Blue Jasmine Cate Blanchett type. 

Blue Jasmine

OMG Alec Baldwin is in 30 Rock AND Blue Jasmine (which I saw on a flight to Paris a few months ago). I wonder if I have Alec issues. What does this say about my suit wearing dad and my suit wearing husband and my polo and khaki wearing son. No, we are not doing that now... or ev.er.

SO, once these stupid balloon bags "fall" under my built up strong pectorialis muscles... what will they look like? Does Angelina Jolie look "done"? (I'm not Googling that, I don't want to suffer the insane search results.) I asked for the same size silicon as previous me fyi.

Do I regret it, no - it was the smart thing to do with the current science available to us I think. I thought about it and researched it for years before I reallllly pressured my husband to make it happen. That sounds worse than it is.  

Am I happy with it now? No, I feel like a vacant Barbie bride of Frankenstein. Like a Tim Burton creation. No offense Tim. I love your wife. 

Getting fat and muscle put in place of silicon would have been a much larger operation to heal from so I opted against it.  I hate that I had to do this surgery. Once I heal and feel capable again I am CERTAIN I shall feel more positive about the entire thing. 

This was smart. This was the right thing to do. I used to be a scientist and I still play one in my head. 

Written with love and Jon Lovitz and Liz lemon and Alec Baldwin, Aziz Ansari, my hero Lucille Bluth, Mike Meyer's and someone holding a glass of Dewar's and a sexy Greta Garbo type playing in the back of my head, sarcasm, and all the Jewish boys (and girls) I kissed at Bat Mitzvah's... but most of all written with Megan Mullally and Anna Wintour and Judy Gold, Valentino, Karl Lagerfeld, and mostly Ralph Lauren in my head. 

Not with Jay-Z - who made eye contact with me at a recent award show for over 30 seconds while sitting next to his gorgeous and drunken wife and like a deer in headlights I did not know what to do so I just smiled and stared... but then it happened two more times and then I had to look away.  Honey, unless you want to sign this singer, my life is complicated enough. It's hard being Stepford Mary Poppins. 

And NOT with Louboutin: who needs to sell his shoes with the manual on the Band-aid frictionless stick and pads you have to get to survive wearing his ridiculous, overpriced genius marketing red dragon Khaleesi torture demons! Love you CL! That's just how we play! Kiss-Kiss!

I love you all. I want YOU to know, when I get better in 3 weeks and my ridiculous silicon mountains have fallen to their appropriate location in 4 months.

 I WILL find this dress, purchase it, and OWN it at the next charity ball we go to. I know just the one. Insert evil laugh here! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand she's back. 

Ralph Lauren Grey Beaded Dress Fall 2014

photo by Marcus Tondo

Post Script: Madame Buttons you need more gigs. I want to hear more of that airy voice. #JustCloseYourEyes

http://pinkaliciousintentions.blogspot.com - out (drops microphone loudly on the floor, smiles seductively, and exits stage left) #TurnDownForWhat