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Visitors' Stories -- Gina's Story . . .(a happy ending!)Nicole has asked me to write my recovery story to help inform ladies considering a BA of two things: first, the symptoms of infections and second, that things don't always turn out perfect. Neither Nicole nor I want to scare anyone but we want you to have all the facts. So here goes. My name is Gina and I am 32 years old, I am 5'3 and weighed 118# when I went in for my BA. I have three children, twin girls, aged 11 and another girl age 8. I have been married for almost 13 years and my husband was and continues to be very supportive of my choice. I started out as a 32-34 A cup and hoped to become a full C. I researched and considered every aspect of a BA for well over nine years before actually doing it. I even had surgery scheduled once and chickened out. I had my BA on 11/25/98 and everything went very well. I woke up in recovery very surprised to see that I had not freaked out and jumped off the table at the last minute. There was a lot of pain and breathing seemed difficult. Actually everything seemed difficult for those first few days. You don't know how much you use all those chest muscles until now. You use them for everything, breathing, sitting up, rolling over, going to the bathroom, everything! On day two post-op I went in to have my bandages and ace wrap removed and to see the new additions for the first time. They were beautiful! I loved them. They did not appear swollen or bruised at all. Things continued to go well and at one week post-op everything was fine. On day 11 post-op (which was a Sunday), my right breast incision started to ooze a honey-colored substance. After much urging from women and doctors from this forum, I called my surgeon's office and, of course, he was out of town and the doctor on call did not call me back for three hours. By the time he did call, I was soaking a 4x4 gauze pad every 30-45 minutes. He advised me to come into the office the next day. When I went in he started me on an antibiotic (which I forgot to tell you my surgeon had me start one the day before my BA and was on it for one week), and he contacted my surgeon to keep him informed of my situation. I had no symptoms of an infection other then the oozing. Symptoms of infection can include fever, swelling, redness or red streaks running up the breast, discharge and swollen lymph nodes in your armpits. They had me come back to the office daily for the next two days and then my surgeon returned on Wednesday. After seeing him he informed me that the implant needed to be removed and we would need to do it the next day. So on Thursday, day 15 post-op, I had my right implant removed and a drain put in. Everything went fine. I saw him again on Saturday to remove the drain and at that time, he noticed that my left incision was now having a discharge, although not nearly as bad as the right. He refilled my antibiotic and saw me in his office again the next day. There wasn't much change and it was only soaking 4-5, 4x4 gauze pads every 24 hours. He continued to see me daily until day 26 post-op when he advised me that we needed to remove the left implant as well. So, on day 27 post-op, I had my left implant removed and yet another drain put in. He did many cultures throughout this whole thing and they were all negative for infection but a slide of the discharge under a microscope did show evidence of bacteria. On Christmas Eve, I had the drain removed and have continued to improve ever since. I now have to massage my scars to prevent scar tissue build up. You should know that the chances of this happening to you are very slim, but we just want you all to know it can happen and if it does that we are here to support you, that you are not alone. The people from this site along with my doctor and husband have been wonderful to me. The ladies even got together and sent me flowers and balloons, which lifted my spirits greatly. I also have to tell you that my surgeon is a saint. He refunded every dime of my money, not even charging me anything for the three surgeries, lab fees, implants or his time. Right now, I am waiting to see if replacing the implants is an option. If it is, I have to wait at least six months. Hopefully I will be ready around June. I haven't actually decided if I want to replace them. It was a lot to go through but the chances of it happening again are slim and all the reasons I did it in the first place are still there. I would truly love to have those beautiful breasts back! I wish you the best of luck in whatever choice you make regarding having a BA. Gina Click Next to Read the July 2000 Update and Happy Ending!
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