Before my double mastectomy, I had built the operation up in my head. I expected pain, a long hospital stay and a difficult first few days.
The reality surprised me.
It didn’t hurt.
Obviously everyone’s experience is different, but for me the surgery itself was nowhere near as painful as I had imagined. I went into hospital at 7:30 in the morning and, incredibly, I was home again by around 7pm that evening.
The most uncomfortable part wasn’t actually the wound. It was the drains.
I came home with four of them. They went everywhere with me, carried around rather unceremoniously in a tote bag. They were awkward and uncomfortable, but temporary — and once they were gone, life became considerably easier.
One thing I would absolutely recommend is starting the exercises you are given as soon as you physically can. Don’t force your body to do something it isn’t ready for, but keeping things moving really helped me.
And then there was something I definitely wasn’t prepared for.
My stomach.
After a double mastectomy, suddenly there are no breasts obscuring the view when you look down. Your tummy can appear enormous.
Mine hadn’t suddenly grown overnight. It had always been there — I just hadn’t had such an uninterrupted view of it before!
Recovery isn’t a competition. Some days your body will want to move. Other days it will tell you very clearly that it wants to rest.
Listen to it.
Rest when you need to rest. Do your exercises when you’re able. Move a little when you can. And don’t panic if your recovery doesn’t look exactly like somebody else’s.
I had imagined the operation itself would be one of the hardest parts of treatment.
For me, it wasn’t.
And if you’re waiting for your own mastectomy and frightening yourself with what it might be like, I hope knowing that helps just a little.
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