I am basically doing what some refer to as a two step PBM. Here is a timeline of what I was told to expect:
Part 1: July 17 - The general surgeon will go in and remove all of my breast tissue, including my nipple and areola and suture me up (about 2 hours). My plastic surgeon will come in behind her and insert expanders (see picture) (about 2 hours). They are basically empty balloon like pockets that will slowly be filled with saline until I reach my NEW desired boob size. He won't put much in them to begin with but in a few weeks I will go in once a week to get them slowly filled. He will also be inserting 2 drains, one on other side of my chest, so that any tissue or body fluid can drain out. I hear those are a real pain in the butt! I can expect them out around the 7-12 day mark though. After he closes me up, I will be in the recovery room for an hour and a 1/2 then moved to my hospital room where I will stay until Saturday AM, so less than 48 hours in the hospital!
Part 2: October/November - Between July and this time, I will have gone in weekly for my expansions. Once my desired size has been reached I can get ready for part 2. Part 2 is an outpatient procedure so I can go home that same day....no more hospital stays! This is when my plastic surgeon, Dr. Mosier, will go in, drain the expanders, take them out and replace them with my new silicone implants. I lovingly refer to them as "my teddy bear boobies." They are so soft and squishy!
Part 3 and 4: December/January - After I have completely healed from part 2, it will be time for me to decide how to go about my new nipples/areola. I have 3 choices:
1. Nipple reconstruction where Dr. Mosier will cut the skin on my breasts and wrap it around to form a nipple, and stitch me up. Then I will get the areola tattooed on. Click HERE if you want to read/see a diagram of it...really interesting stuff!
2. I can skip the NR as mentioned above and do a 3D nipple where he will tattoo on the nipple and areola so it LOOKS like a real nipple but would be flat just like any other skin on your body. Vinnie Myers is a tattoo artist up in Maryland that somehow fell into 3D nipple tattooing and there is a really interesting link about him HERE.
3. I can choose to do nothing and just have boobs or what I am referring to as ORBS, thanks to my bestie, Alecia!
Thankfully I have some time to make a decision about part 3 and 4 of my surgery as I honestly fluctuate back and forth weekly. Sometimes I think I want NR so I will look AND feel like myself again. But sometimes I wonder what it would be like to walk around with "headlights" on all of the time because I fully plan on retiring most bras after all this! So what would you do?