My Evil Tit: Fill 1

I had my final drain removed the same day I had my first expander fill. Those drains are not pleasant. That final one ruined my chi. I could feel it coiled inside my “breast.” Every time I moved, it moved. And the entry site of the tube became very itchy, not to mention the stitch holding the tube in place. Occasionally, I would feel a thin, icy pinch that would make my entire body run cold.

Ironically, it wasn’t the drains that gave me the most grief. I had six sentinel lymph nodes removed underneath my left armpit, and this area is the most tender, still. It feels swollen, sore and numb. I have to gingerly rub my deodorant on it. The inner muscle that runs the length of my left arm is tight. And those six lymph nodes are tiny—half of a diced worm at best. The bilateral mastectomy was nothing compared to the removal of those little annoying nodes.

However, I’m moving onward. Chemo down. Surgery down. Drains removed. Onto the freaky expanders!

Every week, I will visit my reconstructive surgeon and she will plunge a three-inch needle attached to a giant syringe filled with 50 cc’s of saline through the skin and muscle of my chest. I have a port attached to each expander bag. My reconstructive surgeon finds these ports with a magnet, dots the perimeter of the area with a purple marker (What is with these purple markers? Are there any other colors???) and then proceeds to stab me. I will continue to receive weekly fills until I say, “Stop!” Ultimately, I get to decide my breast size regardless of how difficult it is tell what size they will be.

The expanders are strange. It feels like I’m wearing a very tight sports bra. There’s metal in them and they push up against my ribs. They’re also big. The saline runs near my armpits and a few inches below my clavicle. I’m a blow-up doll. Or a partially deflated one:

Your poor eyes! At the moment, I have a scrotum hanging from my chest. It’s only the right breast, too. And if you think the above photo is bad, I texted some of my friends a picture of a dusky nipple that was having difficulty attaching to my skin with a cheerful, “Merry Nipmas!” The crisis only lasted a few days. My breast surgeon sent me to an acupuncturist who smeared a homemade poultice heavily scented with lavender over the top of my witchy nipple.

The bilateral mastectomy required my nipples to be moved upward. My areolas were punched out like Christmas sugar cookies and stitched back on at their new site. Poor Jase continues to dutifully apply digital stars on top of them for the sake of this blog. Upon seeing these latest pictures, he exclaimed, “Good god woman! There are some things a husband just shouldn’t see!” And yet, when given the option to resign from his duties, he begrudgingly trudges forward.

He and I both.