Update on LBL - "Or time to give back after all the help I got from community"
I now 8 days out from my lower body lift that included some unexpected lower ab muscle tightening and some butt Kardashianizing!
My biggest fear going into surgery was pain and how it would affect my ability to get back to work as an orthodontist with only one week off. I heard various examples from the forum from people taking one to two weeks to others taking a month. My personal yardstick was to ask people how long they took off for RNY or leave and then compared to my experience.
So, I had surgery thursday the 24th, Christmas eve. In my prep visits we had planned to ply it by ear as weather to spend the night in jail (I mean hospital) or go home depending on how I felt in recovery. On the day my goal was to go home if at all possible but being open to staying as I had ended up needing two nights in hospital after RNY. I arrived at hospital at 5:30 am for prep. The surgeon spent what seemed forever drawing lines on me, including where my swim racing jammers ended, and spending much more time around my bits and pieces than I would really like another man to :). He showed my wife and I what was being pulled up and what was going down and most importantly where the scar would be.
Jump forward 7 hours. I woke up in the surgical recovery room and while sore was not in horrific pain as I had been after RNY. MY memory from RNY was being doubled over in pain and the nurse asking on a scale of 1 to ten how my pain was me apparently repeating over and over medicine, have you given me medicine. This time I was able to have what I at least thought was a chat with the nurse (she probably remembers it differently). She did have to keep reminding me to breath deeply as my O2 stats would drop and I would try till the next time I started to fall asleep! My doctor visited with me and let me know the surgery had gone well having taken a little over 7 hours (plan was 5.5 to 6 hrs), that he had done some lower muscle tightening so that it would look as good as the upper abdomen would after healing. He also, told me that when he had worked on my back and initially positioned everything he was not happy with my lack of a butt so had preserved tissue to build it up.
After I was stabilized I was moved out to another room to recover further and I told the nursing staff I would definitely be going home. I was told that the y wanted me to pee prior to being released so they ran an IV and I drank as much water as I could but the urge was not coming. I got out of bed and walked around, ran water and drank water but nothing would make me pee after being NPO since 10pm the night before. I wanted to leave and felt bad that the nurses where still there waiting for me so the next time she checked on me said I had managed a drop. So it was time to get dressed and get home before Santa! Medicinally I was on oxycodone 1-2 tabs every 4-6 hrs and valium every 6hrs along with an antibiotic and a daily injection to prevent clotting. The pain meds were great for preventing pain and putting me to sleep. I used them religiously on a timer the first two days and then cut back on the third day. The fourth day was my last day of pain meds and since then it has just been achy with occasional deep stinging pain where the muscle was stitched, especially after sleeping in one position all night.
As for my recommendations. First and foremost become a gym rat. I take two to three high intensity body shred, insanity type of classes a week. Setup at the front of class where you get called out by the instructor and work your ass off. Between that running and swimming I have developed powerful legs that can do squats and lunges by the hundreds and that I truly believe has made my recovery easy so far. when I need to get up or sit down I can hold my torso steady and just use my leg muscle to raise or lower me not bending at the waist or using my abdominal muscles. Even being physically prepared I still need the help of a loving spouse because there are some positions I could not maneuver out of. This was especially true in the morning when everything stiffened up and I needed help getting into an upright seated position in bed to be able stand. I have found from day one that moving around makes me feel better so I have tried to do that when ever I could between being knocked out by the meds. On day 6, being off meds for a day a felt safe going outside so I resumed walking and over the course of the day walked three short errands that took me much longer that usual but was great physiologically. The next day I was also very active and felt very tired by evening and some pain returned so I resorted to an oxy again. Yesterday was great day! Energy back, went to the mall and walked around with my wife before picking the kids up and going out for dinner together. Biggest highlight yet was waking up with insomnia and being able to get out of bed without pain and by myself! Other words of advise from me would be get your water intake up before surgery along with protein. A lot of people seem to have no problem getting lots of water every day but it has always been a struggle for me with work. Fear of constipation post surgery got me back to it. I also started taking Miralax two days before and continued two days after until passing gas became a coin flip ;( .
I will post some photos soon of the amazing work done on me by Dr Michaels who operates in the DC area.
I had the same experience with Dr Michaels and so did BreathesMusic a few weeks ago - his work is incredible and my recovery really wasn't difficult. I also love my augmented bum ? I'm so glad you're feeling well and recovering quickly. Keep up the good work! I'm 8 months post-op from his LBL and still have a flat and tight stomach!
Suddenly so many people on here are in the DC area and seeing Dr. Michaels! Awesome! Glad you had such a fantastic experience. My surgery was on Thurs the 17th (Dec) and I did a little telework in both the following weeks and started back full time yesterday teleworking. I'm waiting to go back into the office full time until next week, but between metro/walking to work and having 2 additional procedures in addition to the LBL I think it has just lengthened my recovery.
Sadly I did have 1 little spot in my side where the surface of the incision separated (not all the way through so it didn't need packing or anything). But he was able to easily clean that up and it's back to healing. I feel like with as much cutting as he did I was bound to have 1 little spot somewhere that didn't go exactly perfect.
But wow, being back in an office setting that fast is great. Glad your recovery is going so well and would love to see pics once you're able to post them. More walking definitely seems to be good for getting you back into the fully upright position, so kudos for keeping up with that!
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