Week 4 update

I forgot to do an update at 3 weeks. Tomorrow is 4 weeks post op. I feel like I really turned a corner between weeks 3 & 4. I'm feeling so much better. I'm not swelling as much. The stuff they put over my stitches is coming off more and more. I still have some of it there, but the places without it look really, REALLY good. I went shopping for some new clothes. Everything else is way too big for me. ;) Fun stuff! I have 2 more weeks that I have to wear a binder, but I will probably wear it even longer. It helps so much with swelling. I do swell more as the day goes on, but look pretty good when I first get up. I'm really happy with it!

Pre-op and post op tummy tuck pictures

The black clothes are post op at 2 weeks. The others are right before surgery. You can see that my stomach pre-op was not as bad looking with my clothes on. When I take my stomach out of my clothes, you can see how huge it is, and how far it hangs down. From the front, you couldn't even see my bottoms except under my stomach. The post op picture is with 2 binders on. My middle is still very swollen, but there is no more skin to pick up at all! Once the swelling goes down, I will look really normal!

Almost 2 weeks post op Tummy Tuck

I think this past week was my worst and my best. Technically, this coming Wednesday will be my 2 week mark. Since my last update, I had some pretty painful times. I tried to cut back on my pain medicine some. One reason was I wanted to spend time with my family. Another reason is, I didn't want to run out of my pain meds and still be in horrible pain, so I cut back to see how it was. I found out that it wasn't so great! I went back up on frequency. I was still trying to sleep in the living room, which was not comfortable. Add in the kids being noisy and waking me up while trying to sleep, I was getting fed up with everything!

I decided to go downstairs to my bedroom. OH, MY WONDERFUL BED! Oh, how I had missed my bed. I have a latex foam mattress and it's wonderful! I wasn't sure if I could lay in it, on my side. I did, and it wasn't too bad. It's still hard to sleep on my right side where I have 2 tubes coming out. It's more sore on that side. So, I started getting more restful sleep. I stayed up on my pain meds, which are really almost gone, and slept so many hours of good sleep.

I really started getting stir crazy and restless during this past week. I like to be up and doing something. The doc's instructions said to walk at least 5 times a day. Just getting up to go to the bathroom, and sitting up for a while after my shower, made my stomach swell until it was so uncomfortable (yes, I do keep my binders on, but still!) I was just at the end of my rope at one point and tears welling up in my eyes. That's when I decided I just had to keep taking that pain medicine around the clock. Anyway, I find it very confusing and aggravating that you need to walk, but the more you are "up", the more you swell.

So, the closer I've gotten to this second week, it's gotten a bit better each day. I'm not swelling AS bad, and not hurting AS bad. The swelling is still uncomfortable, but not like it was. Bruising is still minimal. All in all, I think things are improving (as they should be). I can tell this is going to be slower than what I'm use to. I still don't have any of the skin pulling apart like happens sometimes. My drains are still in, but getting close to coming out. I'm down to 35 mL of drainage in a 24 hr. period. I have to get down to 25 mL to get my drains out. None of my stitches have started coming out yet. Not sure when they are suppose to, but they are self dissolving. That's about it for now. I'll try to do a video to update here in the next couple of days.

I'm 1 week post tummy tuck

I'm on the other side of the surgery now. It's sometimes hard to get comfortable. I'm still sore, but doing really good. I've never felt like it was "pain". It just feels sore and bruised to me. I have had the brief sharp pains where the nerves try to regenerate. I have medicine for that, too, so it hasn't been bad. I had a lot of medicines for this surgery. Now, I said I wasn't in pain, but I bet if I didn't use my pain meds, I'd be in a LOT of pain!

I've got an anchor in my torso now. The cut is from just under my breast bone, down to my pubic bone, and past my hips on each side. My surgeon did a great job! I've seen people who have a wad of skin at the end of the incisions on their hips where the surgeon bunched it up when sewing them back together. I don't have that. My stomach is still really swollen. It has went down quite a bit, but has a lot more to go. I'm anxious to see what my belly button looks like. Right now, it doesn't look like a belly button at all. It's too swollen. I feel like I have a lot of bruising that I'm not seeing on the skin yet.

I'm walking around well. I can sit straight up in a chair, or couch, but I cannot stand straight up yet. Sleeping is still hard. I sleep a lot with my pain pills. They knock me out and I take them every 4 hrs., except when I skip them so I can actually be awake enough to talk to the family. Usually I sleep 2 or 3 hrs., and the last hr. before the next pain pill, I spend going to the bathroom, readjusting my sitting/laying place, draining my drain bulbs and stuff like that. I was sitting up in a chair, making 2 birthday cards for my daughter. That made me swell really bad! So then I was laying flat on my back with legs elevated, to get the fluids moving out again. This meant I was up and down every hour on the hour, all night long, going to the bathroom!

I have lost a little bit of the water weight. The Dr. took off 15 lbs. of skin/fat. I can't believe it was only that much. It looked like it would weigh at least 30-40 lbs. So, since I still have swelling, my measurements are just temporary. At this point, while measuring my lower stomach/hips, (keep in mind I've got 2 binders on as well, and padding from gauze) I've lost 6 inches. The waist and upper stomach under breasts are still swollen bigger than they were when I went into surgery. I'm so anxious to see the actual results. This gives me a pretty good idea, but the swelling makes it hard to imagine the final shape. To be continued....