Surgery

FAIR WARNING: Do not read this if you are squeamish about blood or needles or medical procedures!
Also, lots of words. Sorry, not sorry ;)
So in January just a couple weeks before we moved I had surgery to remove a non cancerous lump in one of my breasts.
A little back story here...
When I was nursing Ameilya I got mastitis several time. No big deal, right? Pretty normal. Well, I had a spot almost under my arm where my milk ducts would get all clogged up every day and it was really painful. Then Madi comes along. I get mastitis a lot, like 5 or more times. Always in that same spot under my arm. Not normal. I had my yearly check up with our family doctor after I stopped nursing and my dr noticed a lump right where I had been having problems so she sends me in to have an ultrasound done of that area. Before the ultrasound they prep you saying things like "most of the time we can just tell you it's not a big deal and send you on your way" and "you're so young that you shouldn't have to have any further testing" so I knew that when they said that the doctor wanted to come in and talk with me about it that something was up. The doctor came in and said that the lump was most likely a non cancerous growth called a fibroadenoma but that they wanted to biopsy it just to be sure.
So right after Thanksgiving (while Tyler was still at OCS) I had the biopsy done. It was terrifying. Of course they numbed me so I couldn't feel anything but I could still SEE everything (they don't put up a screen or anything so that you can't see what's going on). And it lasts a lot longer than you would think it does, like 15 min or more just for the needle part. They do an ultrasound to find the lump and then mark the spot with a permanent marker. Then they numb you and after you are good and numb they insert a large (I'm talking like 1/4 in diameter here people!) needle into the spot. The big needle has a hollow core into which they stick a slightly smaller needle that takes the tissue samples. They don't take just one sample, the number varies per person but with me I think they took 6 samples. So that big, scary needle was stuck in me for a good 15 min or so while they got all the tissue and stuff. After they are done and take out the really big needle they put pressure on the area and then as soon as the bleeding has mostly stopped then they put some sticky, tape like strips called steri strips over the (big!) needle hole, gave me an ice pack and lots of instructions not to lift anything over 15 pounds (like both of my children!) and when and when not to shower/bathe etc. (Remember, at this time I was still single momming it while Tyler was at OCS!) The numbing wore off on me really quickly, it's supposed to last three hours or more but only lasted about an hour and a half for me. The recovery for the biopsy was rougher than I would expect, it was over a week before I didn't need a prescription dose of ibuprofin to make it through the day/night. I couldn't keep my arm to my side as the spot was basically right under my arm. My best friend Rachael came and spent some time over with us so that she could help me not lift the kids and stuff.  By two weeks after the procedure I was back to feeling like my usual self and exercising and doing all my normal stuff again.
Anyway, after that was all over with they sent the samples they collected to the lab to be tested for cancer. The doctor said that there's a really good chance because of my age and risk factors that I didn't have cancer but that there wasn't a zero chance and that they just wanted to be sure. So they tested it and the tests came back showing that it was a benign fibroadenoma which did not necessarily HAVE to be removed. This led to a discussion between me and the doctor about the possibility of this lump causing my mastitis. She seemed to think that it was more than likely that this was the source of the problems during nursing and that if I planned on having any more babies then I should at least talk to a surgeon about having it removed.
So off to Dr. Jon Getz I went. He took one look at it and the pathology report and determined that it was most likely a lactating adenoma, which is a lump that grows actually during pregnancy, not lactation as the name would suggest, and told me that it would keep causing me problems for nursing in the future unless removed. So we scheduled surgery for just after Tyler returned home from OCS.
The surgery happened the Wednesday after Tyler got home, we arrived back home together on a Sunday. The surgery went really well, no complications. They didn't put me completely asleep, just heavy sedation and waking up was a breeze. The incision was about an inch and a half to two inches long and again they stitched the layers of tissue under the skin but on the skin surface they just used the steri strips again like they did for the initial biopsy. Again, they sent the entire lump that they excised into the lab to double check that there wasn't any cancer present. The tests again came back negative for any abnormalities and it was confirmed that it was in fact a lactating fibroadenoma.
The recovery wasn't too bad with having Tyler around to help with things. He did a lot of lifting of the kids for me and a lot of scubbing since it was really hard for me to use my right arm at all. And when I did use my arm more than I should have it really aggravated the incision. The narcotic pain medications that they gave me made me so dizzy and nauseous that I mainly just used ibuprofen and tylenol with the narcotics just at times when I had overdone it and needed a little more relief that I could get from the other medicines alone. It wouldn't have been so bad if I didn't need to be packing boxes to prepare for our move. There were times that I felt like my body was telling me I needed to take it easy but I had to keep packing anyway. This stretched my recovery out a little more that it otherwise would have but, all in all, my recovery wasn't too bad. By two weeks after the surgery I almost needed no pain medication. Two and half weeks after surgery was moving day and it surprisingly hurt very little.
Since moving it has hurt a bit but not too much. A few days ago I kinda forgot that I had just had surgery and did a bunch of pushups at the gym and boy did that make things hurt (still does). But other than that I'm great! No cancer, thank the Lord, and a fairly speedy recovery. Couldn't ask for much else!