Looking forward to a “much more symmetrical overall shape”

At my latest meeting with the consultant plastic surgeon, we more or less concluded that if the various ongoing issues relating to my reconstructed boob resolve as well as she hopes over the coming months, there may well be no need for further surgery.

That would indeed be a result. Don’t take it personally, I said, but I’d be perfectly happy for you not to operate on me again. In fact, in the run-up to the appointment, I’d pretty much come round to thinking that, regardless of how things “resolve”, I’d really rather not have any surgery that’s not entirely medically necessary. I might change my mind, but that’s how I feel at the moment.

With the procedure I had, a DIEP flap reconstruction, the surgeon(s) build a new breast from skin and fat taken from your abdomen and transferred to your chest using complex microsurgery. In my case it was done immediately following my mastectomy, last December. It’s not usually a case of “one and done” (nice phrase); there is nearly always a later surgery to make adjustments.

Here’s the state of play. There’s swelling caused by lymphoedema in the right breast and right “flank”. (Flank? It makes me sound like a horse.) There are dents caused by skin tethering in a couple of places and there’s scar tissue where the lymph nodes were removed. The plastic surgeon and I compared how things are now with how they looked in the photos she took at our previous appointment at the beginning of March (It’s not over ’til it’s over). There are definite improvements on the tethering and scarring front, but things aren’t exactly a great match, if you get my drift. In the words of the consultant who’s managing the lymphoedema treatment I’m about to start – and I’m aware this might be too much information for some of you, but hey ho – the right breast is “elevated and very swollen”. Things even up a bit if I hold my right shoulder down and my left shoulder up, but you can’t exactly walk around like that all day, can you? Seriously though, when I’m dressed, you don’t notice the lopsidedness (or perhaps you do and people are just too polite to say).

Re the swelling, some of my more fitted tops are so tight across the chest on the right side that they’re pretty much unwearable. Add to the mix the god-awful bras (The least sexy washing line ever) that I still have to wear. These are so huge and cover so much flesh that if I wear anything more than the most modest of tops, I risk flashing what has to be the ugliest lingerie ever. All in all, my above-the-waist clothing options are currently rather limited.

This probably sounds a lot worse than it is. Even with the various issues, the reconstruction is amazing.

On 5th May, I’m starting an intensive course of lymphoedema treatment – daily one-hour sessions for 15 consecutive working days of a specialised, gentle type of skin massage or manipulation that’s aimed at reducing the swelling. It’s hoped this manual lymphatic drainage will lead to the tethering releasing and the dents filling out, to whatever degree; it might also help with the tight scar tissue. The ongoing physiotherapy I’m having should also help. If this all happens, the plastic surgeon reckons “the overall shape will be much more symmetrical and it is likely you won’t need any further surgery”. Yay!

And if things don’t resolve as well as we hope? Well, if the swelling goes and I’m still lopsided and dented, I could have two procedures, a lift on the left (yes, really) to make it match the new one on the right and fat grafting on the right to get rid of the dents. This latter procedure would involve taking fat tissue from my thighs or buttocks (either way, ouch) by liposuction, processing the tissue into liquid and injecting it into the reconstruction. And women have this done voluntarily?

If the swelling and dents don’t go? Let’s just wait and see.

On the breast lift front, I have to say I still feel much as I did when I was considering whether to have reconstruction in the first place (“Are you happy with the size?”), ie that I really don’t feel comfortable messing with the good one. I think I could live with them being less than a perfect match. If my various scars needed tidying up or there were lumps (of dead fat tissue) in the reconstruction that needed removing, I’m sure I’d be keener to go ahead with a Phase II. The scars have healed really well and there are no lumps in the reconstruction. So as things stand, I’m hoping I end with Phase I. That has to be a good result for the surgeons too, to have done such a good job in one go – a “one and done”.

It’s not just about appearance, though. How you feel about it emotionally is also massively important, as is how it feels physically and how you recover from the operation. The latter two points obviously influence the first. I’m kind of surprised that I’ve given over so many column inches on this blog to how it looks. It think it’s partly because my mind boggles at the complexity of the medical procedure and the skill of the operating surgeons. I look at it and think what an amazing piece of human engineering. Importantly, it’s also a reminder of how well my cancer treatment went (A busy week with welcome news – “no mass identified” and “no further surgery necessary”). Also, I remember just how good it looked in the weeks immediately after the operation; whatever my expectations were, they were far exceeded.

I’m very happy with things and don’t regret my decision to go down the reconstruction route. It was a tough choice (Decisions you never dreamt you’d have to make). There’s no sensation at all in the breast or nipple. This was always going to be the case, but it takes a lot of getting used to, believe me*. As for recovery, well four months on and – removing the lymphoedema from the equation – things are good. There’s still a slight ache inside where the breast meets my chest when I wake in the mornings but it soon goes away. I feel a pulling inside when I make certain movements, and that feels strange (that could be the cording, though, rather than have to do with the reconstruction or mastectomy).  The area surrounding the reconstruction is still a strange mix of tender, numb, tingly and achy. That all causes more or less constant low-level pain and discomfort and while it’s annoying, it’s bearable. That’s not to say I wouldn’t love it all to go away. Hopefully it will. It’s much better than it was.

Yesterday, I met the therapists who’ll be doing the MLD and had a bit of a taster session – I can’t wait to write about that! They seem confident they’ll get results. I next see the plastic surgeon in early July. We’ll see how things look – and feel – then.

*This lack of sensation – most of the nerves are cut during mastectomy and reconstruction and the area becomes numb – is very bizarre. When you touch the reconstruction with your own hand, it feels much like your other boob (at least it did before all the swelling). If someone else touches it – no sniggering now, we’re all adults! 😉 – you feel absolutely nothing. Now the following info is new to me and I just have to share. The nerves have the potential to regrow as the nerves in the flap that was transferred from your tummy regenerate within the chest. If sensation is going to come back, though, it’s likely to take a year or two. Interestingly, it seems that if you have no sensation in your breast, you may get feeling back in the area next to your breast. Now check this, folks, “some women find that the armpit next to the reconstructed breast becomes tremendously sensitive to touch and is a new erogenous zone”. Come back in a couple of years and I’ll let you know how it’s been for me.

Side effects you really don’t want to think about (Radiotherapy Part 3)

I know it’s seven weeks since I finished my course of radiotherapy but I really feel I need to get this off my chest. The potential long-term side effects of breast cancer radiotherapy are something else. There, I’ve said it.

At my first appointment with her, the consultant oncologist in charge of my radiotherapy explained why this treatment was being recommended for me. She talked me through the proposed treatment plan, the practicalities involved in planning treatment and the treatment itself, and, of course, the potential short- and long-term side effects. She then offered me a consent form for signing… or not. I did ask if people refused treatment. Yes, the consultant replied, but not in cases such as yours where radiotherapy has such a clear benefit in terms of reducing the risk of recurrence and improving overall prognosis. There was never any doubt that I would sign.

As with other breast cancer treatments I’ve had – chemo, surgery – or am continuing to have – hormone therapy – radiotherapy has lots of potential nasty side effects. Some are immediate, and some are more long-term and can occur months or years after treatment. If you’re familiar with this blog, you’ll be aware of some of the short-term ones: skin redness, tiredness, swelling and tenderness of the reconstructed breast, swelling from fluid build-up in the treated area, etc. The potential longer-term side effects are much scarier. That said, they’re less likely – in some cases much less likely – to occur than the short-term ones. They include shrinkage and firmness of the reconstructed breast, increased risk of second malignancy, rib fracture, lung scarring and a 10-15% risk of lymphoedema. And, of course, damage to the heart, especially if you’re having radiotherapy on your left side.

Let’s go through them. Around one in ten women who have radiotherapy following reconstruction experience shrinkage and hardening months or years after treatment. What a nightmare that must be. I agonised over whether to have a reconstruction or not and in the end decided to go ahead with one that involved transplanting abdominal fat and required major surgery. It was a massive deal. Nearly four months on, there are some “issues”, but it looks like the result will be good in the end. You really don’t want to wake up one day in five years’ time to find it’s shrunk and feels like concrete. The plastic surgeons, too, must hate seeing what radiotherapy does to their lovely artwork. It’s no wonder then that “with a view to improving cosmetic outcomes“, clinical trials are under way to determine whether it’s safe to do things the other way round, ie to give radiotherapy before surgery.

As for the other potential long-term side effects, well everyone knows radiation can cause cancer as well as treat it, so the warning about a “minimal risk of second malignancy” was no surprise. But rib fracture? And lung scarring? Well it seems a rare potential late side effect of radiotherapy to the breast is “weakening of the underlying ribs on the treated side“, which may “increase the risk of a fracture in later years”. I’d better be extra careful when I go skiing.

An equally rare or even rarer side effect than rib fracture is lung scarring, aka pulmonary fibrosis, which can result in serious breathing problems (guess there wouldn’t be much skiing at all then). If you’re having radiotherapy to the breast and chest wall, it’s impossible to avoid the lung. The reason I had to hold my breath during treatment was to lift the treatment area away from the lung and so minimise exposure.

Finally, with regard to lymphoedema, well I was already at risk of that anyway as a result of having had the axillary lymph nodes removed during surgery. And yes, I have developed it, in and around the breast area, but I’m hoping it can be resolved, to some extent at least.

So what else do I need to look out for now that I’ve had radiotherapy? Well, swelling caused by treatment can persist for months or even years. Also, irradiated skin may burn more easily from sun exposure and be prone to infection and breakdown, so you need to be extra careful in the sun. And here’s a nice one to finish. Breasts that have been irradiated may not grow or shrink in size as much as untreated breasts, or indeed at all. Radiotherapy seemingly freezes own-tissue reconstructions at the size they were before radiation treatment. Again, this is pretty annoying as one of the benefits of this type of reconstruction over an implant is that the new boob changes with you as you gain or lose weight. One of the main causes of asymmetry between the “treated” and “untreated” breast is, apparently, weight gain. While that’s a clear incentive to keep to a steady weight, it’s not much consolation to those women who put on weight as a result of the hormone treatment they may end up taking for as long as ten years after they’ve had chemo, surgery and radiation (or combination thereof) in an effort to guard against the cancer coming back.

I’m aware I’m not doing a very good job here of “selling” radiotherapy. Radiation treatment reduces the risk of recurrence and that is, of course, the main concern. But it doesn’t half add to the baggage that comes with having or having had breast cancer.