My surgery took place this past Wednesday afternoon. Everything went according to plan. I woke up soon after the surgery took place, and was wheeled away to my recovery room. On the way there I ran into familiar faces. Liam and the kids came by to wish me a good night. Gray was in his pajamas, and they had all eaten dinner already and bathed. We went to my private (oooh!) room, and chatted about the day for a few minutes. Then they left for home, and I was left to watch movies and nap on occasion.

I slept on and off for the next few hours, and had a nice chat on the phone with an old friend. It was lovely, actually.

Thursday morning Liam came by after dropping off the kids at daycare, and we headed home together. He took three days off this week to keep me company while I take random naps and demand snacks. Recovery is like being a baby, come to think of it.

So now I have to maintain my drain lines three times a day, and rest a lot. On Tuesday I will see my surgeon, and he'll decide whether he can take the drain lines out. Once they are out, I'll be much more comfortable. I can't wait for that next step.

As for my foobs - they look larger than I expected them to be. Maybe there's some swelling, we'll see. But they are nice.

It's been a while since I updated the blog about my health. I had nothing to report while pregnant, it was a very healthy pregnancy. Lena was born three days late, but other than that everything was extremely boring. The only excitement I had was during delivery - she was ready before the doctor was! I pushed for 20 minutes, most of which was waiting (aka not pushing) for the doctor to finish getting dressed. It was literally the easiest delivery imaginable.

Well, Lena is now 4 months old, and is a very easy baby. She sleeps through the night without a feeding, and has been doing that since about week 5. She's also very happy during the day, which allows me to think about myself for a bit. I got pregnant right after the expansions were completed for my foobs. But I halted the rest of the reconstruction to have Lena.

After thinking about it for a bit, I decided to schedule my final foob (fake + boob) surgery for June. I quit my job, so that I can concentrate on myself for a bit, and my surgery has been scheduled for June 16th.

This last foob surgery will involve removing my temporary expanders from my chest, and replacing them with silicone implants. Unlike a regular boob job, I have no breast tissue left. That meant that I had to expand my skin to accommodate an implant.

I met with my plastic surgeon a few days ago, and we discussed size and shape. It wasn't a terribly complicated decision, but we still want it to be as realistic and flattering as possible.

For the past year and 4 months I have had these very hard implants in me, that are not that cuddly. There were days when I felt badly for Gray who was trying to snuggle with me and was hitting metal (literally). I am excited that this phase will soon be behind me, and I will feel more confident about wearing fewer layers.

After this surgery - nipple tatoos! Fun fun.

We took pictures this time of the surgery day. Here is a sample of images we thought we could share:

And at the end of today, my sister will be the one with the "large" chest between us.

I bet this is something she never thought would happen. :)

Update - 2:15pm
Iris is now out of surgery, and in recovery. The doctors said that everything went extremely well. They had originally anticipated the surgery lasting until 4, so this is a great sign. Iris was concerned about being under for so long.

They'll move her up to her own room in about an hour. Depending on how she's doing, they'll either let her come home tomorrow, or keep her there for a couple of days.

Two things:

1. My surgery has been scheduled for February 4th, at 11 am. If you want to know more details, drop us an email.

2. The Narcissus are growing beautifully, and are stinking up our bedroom nicely.

I met with my Oncologist on Monday and talked to her about the next steps now that we know I am BRCA2 positive. We also talked about how this may affect my attempts of trying to get pregnant again. I essentially asked her if I have time to wait to have the other mastectomy. A double mastectomy is the recommended course of action when one is BRCA positive. Her answer was, "you have to do it now."

This took me by surprise.

I thought that I could keep my right breast, get pregnant, breastfeed, and then have the mastectomy and reconstruction. But no, she is too worried about cancer sprouting and getting aggressive during pregnancy. She has seen this happen a few times, and it's enough to tell her that it's not a cautious path to take.

So here we are today, planning another surgery. I've met with my surgeon and plastic surgeon this week, and they are trying to coordinate their schedules to come up with a surgery date.

You may be asking yourselves "why such an aggressive course of action?"... "is this really necessary?"... "she didn't really have cancer, just the first indicators of future cancer, why is she removing healthy tissue?"..."can she get pregnant after a double mastectomy?"....

These are my answers to those types of questions:

• Having a BRCA gene mutation means that my chances of having breast cancer are around 84% by the time I will be 70 years of age. Compare that to someone who doesn't have the gene mutation at around 14%. Those are very high odds, and not in my favor.


• Removing as much breast tissue as possible reduces my risk to nearly 1% chance that I will have breast cancer. So I'm going from 84% to 1%.


• Having a BRCA gene mutation also means that I'm at high risk for lots of other cancers, and because of that reason I expect to have to remove my ovaries in a few years. We're not doing that now because ovarian cancer generally happens around menopause, and I'm not there yet. And since we want to have another baby, I need to keep my ovaries for now.


• Pregnancy doesn't require breasts, so a healthy pregnancy is still possible after this surgery.

I don't have a surgery date yet, but I do know what's in store. Here is the run down:

First, I'll have surgery for the mastectomy and the start of the reconstruction process. They will place inflatable pouches on both sides, which will be only slightly inflated during surgery. How much or how little they can inflate the pouches is up to my skin, and that cannot be predicted until the surgery is happening. Then I will recover for a week and they'll monitor my drainage and make sure I'm not infected. After a few weeks of recovery, I will start going into the plastic surgeon's office regularly to get inflated slowly. Depending on how well my body handles it, the schedule may move quickly or slowly. I expect a visit every week or two, and the whole thing to take a couple of months. They'll have to inflate the skin to a size that's slightly larger than the size I intend to end up with. Once that's done, I'll have another surgery to replace the temporary pouches with permanent ones. Then I will be offered a tattooing service to replace the nipples. Every bit of flesh that is left behind raises the risk for cancer, so I'm choosing to remove the nipple as well.

How am I doing?

I'm not getting enough sleep, and my left eye has been twitching for a week since the DNA test results came back. Other than that, I'm taking it one minute at a time, just doing what I think is rational.

If you have questions, just like the last time - post them here. No question is a stupid question.

Me, I'm recovering nicely. My left arm is mostly the problem right now, but I'm slowly working on getting back mobility. The surgeon will see me again this Friday, and I'm supposed to be doing some physical therapy between now and then.

My mom is here, and Gray is already speaking some Hebrew. Yophi! I think he's quite in love with Safta, and will have a hard time when she's not here when he comes back from daycare tonight.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to work from home as much as possible. My energy level changes throughout the day a lot, but I'm keeping active.

Thanks for checking up on us!

The surgeon just called, and there was nothing in the tissue other than DCIS. My lymph nodes were clear.

His exact words were: "you're cured."

Best news yet!

Oh, and my drain line was taken out. Ouchie. Hopefully my body will handle the remaining gunk on its own. Otherwise, the surgeon will use a needle to draw out the liquid. I can finally sleep on my side, and there's nothing pulling on me all day. Such a relief.

All in all, a good day.

I'll be going to see the doctor later today, and I expect to have the results for the removed tissue then.

Meanwhile, here's a fun link from a few weeks ago:
http://mikeeandjo.smugmug.com/gallery/5981694_tV8i2#P-1-12

A sample of what you'll see if you follow that link: