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Anyone experience pain on one side wth placement of Tissue Expander?

Breast Cancer | Last Active: Feb 6 12:26am | Replies (15)
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@stars7

Hi all! I have a question about tissue expander pain and size. I had a double mastectomy, skin sparing nipple sparing, with a latissimus dorsi flap muscle graft from my back on the left side, and tissue expanders placed on both sides. My surgery was Jan 7, 2025.
My surgeon filled my expanders at my 1 week post op visit and again yesterday at my 2 week post op visit. He also removed all my sutures and dressings yesterday. I had 3 drains and I’m down to just one drain.
The right side seems to be huge after being filled, and it hurts so much that I was in tears most of the night even with my muscle relaxer. He didn’t fill my left side as much since it has the muscle flap, plus that side has been radiated so I have no feeling really on that side.
Is it normal for the tissue expanders to hurt like that?? It hurts worse now on the right side than it did when I woke up from surgery plus it seems like it’s so big, way bigger than the size I was wanting.
I was originally a DD naturally prior to mastectomy and I asked to be a smaller size B cup after reconstruction. I’ll have the expanders swapped out for implants after 3 months but I’m concerned it’s overfilled on that side.

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Replies to "Hi all! I have a question about tissue expander pain and size. I had a double..."
susan7656 | @susan7656 | Jan 25 8:25am

Hi. I had a nipple sparing mastectomy in October 2024 and did get tissue expanders.

In my own experience, the tissue expanders do hurt and are uncomfortable. Especially as you are healing from the initial trauma is mastectomy and lymph node removal.

Have you tried the post mastectomy chest pillow from Amazon? You can wear it around the house. It cushions your tissue expanders. I also sleep with mine on top of my chest.

I’m sorry you’re having so much pain. One thing I found out very soon was that I was doing too much and walking around too much. It would tire me out greatly and increase my pain. My surgeon told me I was the most active patient she ever had and to stop it. Resting is a proactive thing to do for your healing.

So I did what she said and 3 months later I’m in a much better place.

The muscle graft portion of your surgery sounds very painful. I’m not a medical person, but I would think that your level of pain is probably normal given what you’ve gone through.

Getting the tissue expanders filled can be painful, especially in the first month or so.

For size, I was a D before and I am a full C now, and that’s where I’ve decided to stop. I’ve talked with 5 other patients about size with tissue expanders and implants and learned about the risks of going “too small” and the discomfort of going “too big.” My doctor and I paid attention to my body type and together agreed on what looked and felt appropriate as the tissue expanders would get filled.

My doctor recommended I go get commercially sized as I was getting closer to the volume amount that seemed appropriate for my body type. So after my last 3 fills, I went to get commercially sized.

For pain in the beginning, I rotated Valium, tramadol, ibuprofen and Tylenol. My husband kept detailed logs of when I took medicine.

I have used the Waking Up meditation app since 2019. And using it multiple times a day during my healing has helped tremendously.

Ask your surgeon about your concern of one being overfilled. My guess is that they have a plan to even them out over months.

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