OPTIONAL IS BULLSHIT

“I don’t think it is fair that the word, ‘optional ‘ or ‘elective’ is used when referring to the second half of the mastectomy portion of your surgery,” my dear friend Sara stated so matter of factly and her voice of reason as usual brought me back to reality. I was reviewing the trials and tribulations of my most recent second surgery five days post with her and using this language to describe my ‘how did I get here?’ feelings. “Come on,” she said with her pragmatism I have grown accustomed to in our almost twenty year sisterhood bond. “How dare they use that language with women when it comes to the plastic surgery portion of this, what do they expect, every woman to walk around with no boobs? It’s our inherent female body part.” She was so right. I was starting to have a bit of panic from this last surgery, oddly not at all because of the breast part of this, that part was a serious breeze- take the hard baseball tissue expanders out, put the soft squishy real feeling silicone in. Done. Awesome. Easy. It is the liposuction part of this surgery to replace the spaces and dents like epoxy on an old 57 chevy (52 in my case) that has thrown me for a loop. I am bruised and battered. All of this the good doctor warned me about and told me truthfully that this was the part that was going to suck, but that it would only last a couple of weeks max. If I added a photo to this writing, no one in their right mind would think this would be going away within two weeks from now.

Black, blue, yellow orange and not the pretty color selection from the rainbow. Besides I feel like I have the worst period cramps coupled with that five hundred crunch workout and the southern part of my body (and not my legs) is now part of the party too. The irony does not go unnoticed of super hot tits, but the southern part of my body (was planning on using the V word here, but my partner sounded kind of horrified when I read it aloud so I decided to censor, forgive me) that looks like it was tackled by a team of drunken hockey players. Not pretty. My friend, Melissa asked me matter of factly as I was lamenting over my soreness feeling mighty sorry for myself struggling to get up from the couch, “What are you doing looking anyway?” I can’t stop looking at it frankly, I had no idea this was a repercussion from the Twilight Zone desire of my Doc for me to have perfectly sculpted boobs. OMG. Pray for me. My other friend, Kris assured me that she watches some bizarre reality TV show that shows lots of liposuction and this is temporary. I don’t know what I would have done differently. I wasn’t going to not have the reconstruction. I wasn’t going to tell the GOOD DOCTOR not to do his job, I don’t think he would have listened anyway because the fact is bruise now “perfect” boobs later or no bruise and distorted misaligned boobs forever.

Bruises and pain go away, this is not permanent. It is just fucking freaking me out and I don’t think I was really prepared for the pain of this as much as it is. I can hear my inner circle of friends saying, “It is only five days, Alayne, what did you expect?” I know. Do I dare say that this is worse than the mastectomy? I am not sure. Maybe because at the mastectomy I was totally prepared for pain. I wasn’t for this so it has kind of caught me off guard and it is pissing me off. All because of the vanity portion of this surgery. I wish I was one of those super cool chicks who said, “Fuck tits. Take ’em off, sew ’em up and bam done, I’ll start running laps with no shirt on now that I am boobless. Tell the boob dictators to go to hell.” I just couldn’t do it. Does this make me less of a warrior? The language of elective and optional surely doesn’t help me feel like a warrior anymore as I sit on the couch taking oxy for the soreness in pain because my plastic surgeon was aiming for perfection in his surgery and I let him because I trust him. Still do. I am struggling with the vanity portion of this in my pain here. I am dehydrated, constipated and tired. I wasn’t prepared for this and I am annoyed that it is all because I chose to have “elective” surgery causing one more woman angst for yet another decision she makes. It reminds me of the guilt thrown on women for natural childbirth vs. epidural or formula vs. breastfeeding. What the fuck. Maybe the oxy is getting to me or the mounds of dessert I have been indulging in this last five days trying to minimize the pain. I know you superchicks out there reading this are ready to kill me with my laments. I can hear you screaming at the computer, ALAYNE, CAN YOU GIVE YOURSELF A FUCKING BREAK, A PASS?!!!!!! Thank you I can hear you and I will definitely. Starting right now, I will mindlessly lie in front of the tv, clicker in hand and turn this computer and my over thinking brain off and let myself heal. Thank you.

It is now the morning after I wrote this and I am glad I slept on this because I I feel way better today as promised by Dr. M. He said 7–10 days and today is the beginning of the Sixth Day. I didn’t sleep very well last night at all and I was sure today was going to suck, but I think the evening was the worst, now I feel better. YAY. Don’t worry out there, my friends, I am not going to run to the gym and overdo it. I am going to have lunch with my son and nap, read and write today. I love the turning point of healing, you just know when it is happening. The bruising is starting to soften a bit and things are looking up. What a difference a day makes. Fuck Optional.