-A woman’s thoughts after undergoing a tummy tuck, muscle repair, thigh lift and liposuction at 39 years old after losing 130 lbs.
When you read stories about or see posts on socials about people having plastic surgeries they’ve dreamed about for years, you really do see the highlight reel. Some people on YouTube with long form content with go into the nitty gritty details of how difficult different parts of the journey are. But what I’ve found with my own recovery from plastics is that it’s way more of a head game than I ever realized.
To clarify, I knew that dealing with pain and the difficulties of everyday life post op with swelling, pain and limited mobility WOULD be difficult and therefore would be a head game. But what nobody warns you about is how much time you have to sit around with your feet propped up for 7-14+ days…just THINKING. During this time, whether your thoughts are negative or positive greatly have to do with each person’s individual personality.
I consider myself a very positive person but even yet, I had moments of deep self reflection that slanted towards a more negative vibe. I had and still have (20 days post op as I write this) major frustrations with my lack of independence. I would have to say that is probably the biggest mental hurdle for me. In the early days post op I knew I’d need to lean on my husband and even my teenage sons to help me with…almost everything. But now 20 days out, the fact that I still can’t dress myself or reach my feet is SEVERELY frustrating. Because I’m someone who did yoga daily prior to my surgery and have really great flexibility and even as a “plus size” or midsize woman, I could do the splits. So to have had 7 lbs of skin removed from my stomach and yet here I am still unable to even reach out my own fat feet to put shoes or chonies on…I hate it.
Photo of author: my “yogi” body before, with my skin tucked into super tight leggings.
My husband is incredibly helpful and truly a caretaker and giver at heart so he has been nothing but wonderful. But because of the things I still need assistance with, I can’t shower alone for fear I’ll fall in the shower (my fear AND his fear) and I can’t reach everything to dry off and again, I can’t reach my feet to put chonies or pants on! So this has become a nightly routine for us that takes up to an hour that we squeeze in before or after dinner, before our evening chill time and it’s like an exercise session, just trying to get all the things done at the end of the day when I’m the MOST swollen and mentally and physically exhausted from trying to be normal all day!
I wanted to share these thoughts today not only to vent but to warn you, that if you’re considering plastics and you’re a fairly or very independent person, it WILL test you! There will be so many things you just can’t do and you have to throw your hands in the air, say okay, choose acceptance, remind yourself 100x that you chose this for yourself and just TRY to find an inner peace with your lack of abilities. For me personally I am a very productive minded person, I mentally reward myself daily with how many things I can get done in a day and I LOVE being busy, busy and productive working on my 100 goals everyday.
Photos of author 1 day post op with 2 drains.
Recovery has forced me to STOP, to just stop everything. I had paired down my google calendar of my own responsibilities for the first 7 days post op. When week 2 rolled around and my normal full calendar was in front of my face but my body and mind were like “Wait a minute, I still feel like a wounded critter with zero energy and stamina, I can’t do all that!”…I had to re-evaluate. And again, being someone who loves productivity, it kinda broke my heart to realize I had to take another week off from doing the things I enjoy doing.
And in that moment, about day 8, it sunk in and I had all these thoughts:
What if I need more than 2 weeks?
Is that okay, can all these projects wait, can I still meet my March and Q1 goals if I take even more time off? (I am after all a brand new indie author who released her first book 3 weeks ago and I’m solely responsible for promoting it, link here on “How to Start a Successful Freelance Career” if you’re interested! On sale now for just $2.99!!!)
When can I handle returning to my normal life?
How long will this recovery REALLY take?
Why is it taking SO LONG?
And then I have to stop and remind myself why I’m here. I’m here because I had weight loss surgery in 2010 and had a device put in my body (the lap band) to prevent me from over eating to try to take back control of my miserable life in my mid 20s. My weight loss journey was slow and I’d progress for a year then plateau for a year but over the course of 13 years I lost 130 lbs, gained back 30 and maintained the 100 lbs weight loss and was left with a very saggy apron stomach and ripply inner thighs that were a constant reminder of how much fuller my body used to be.
Me in 2010 at 315 lbs at 25 years old and next pic is me pre-op plastics/skin removal surgery, 230 lbs at 39 years old.
So after losing my first 50 lbs I knew I’d want a tummy tuck someday because I personally carried a lot of weight in my stomach, while my butt and thighs were large but also a lot of muscle. It took me many years to realize and accept (and a good scale) that I carry a large muscle mass and not only will I never be 115 lbs, but I’ll also not even ever be 160 lbs because my body isn’t built that way. All my essential stuff in my body (everything excluding fat) comes in around 170 lbs. So my goal weight to maintain has almost always been 190-200 and for some people that is their max weight or before weight. At 230 lbs I wore a size 14 in jeans.
As time went on I knew I’d love to have a thigh lift as well. Finally in 2023, I set out to do everything I possibly could to make this dream a reality and I’d do BOTH at the same time. I had my first plastic surgery consult actually in October 2022 and found out they thought I was a good candidate even though I was a “mid-sized” and wore a size 14, I didn’t have a desire to be a ton smaller. I knew if I lost another 20ish pounds that I’d be happy with that forever. And I wasn’t sure how much my extra skin weighed so I was ready to take those steps.
My plastics journey involved initial excitement in the fall of 2022 and getting really motivated and then the loan I was hoping to get for it didn’t pan out. I worked on my credit and in mid 2023 reapplied and it was approved but they said they couldn’t actually “issue” the loan until 30 days before the surgery and I hadn’t booked it yet so when I went to do that the soonest they had available was November 2023 (that didn’t interfere with my gardening season, something I do as a hobby but also a Youtuber and you can find my gardening Youtube channel here if you’re curious, I also share my plastics journey there!)
So I went ahead and booked that appointment but when it was 30 days until my surgery we checked back with the loan company and suddenly they could no longer do the loan. To say I was devastated was an understatement. I mean this is something I’d wanted done for 10+ years and it felt like the wheels were finally in motion but then I kept hitting road block after road block. Finally, by the grace of God and many tiny miracles, we had the funds without a loan to pay for my $12,000 surgery in March 2024. When we couldn’t make that Nov surgery date we rescheduled back then and rescheduled for 3/6/24 so the fact that the funds needed hit our bank account on 3/4/24…yeah, miracles!
The doctor pushed my surgery to 3/8/24 due to his own schedule which was fine by me but nonetheless, here we are and that was my bumpy journey to get here. So when I have those moments of sitting around feeling frustrated and damn near pissed off that I can’t put on my own shoes…I remind myself (and my husband reminds me) of everything I went through to get here, how bad I wanted this, how much I love my results already, etc.
Day 17 post-op, after having the final drain removed this was day 2 of being able to wear a compression garment around my waist which helped greatly to reduce the swelling in my stomach. As I began to see the results, this eases a lot of the negative thoughts.
I didn’t just have a tummy tuck, I had a tummy tuck/skin removal (they removed 7 lbs of skin & fat AND mine was more invasive because my incisions wrap around my hips and go TO my back before it stops), it isn’t just hip to hip or like a c-section scar. I also had major muscle repair because my abdominal wall had split, I had my thigh lift where he removed 2 lbs of skin and fat and then he removed 6 liters of fat from my legs and hips to smooth out my legs to get the best results possible for my thigh lift. So, when you do the math, 6 liters of liquid fat equates to 12 pounds!!!! This guy….removed 12 lbs of fat from my body…via liposuction, that I didn’t even PAY FOR. You hear me? I paid for a tummy tuck and thigh lift and got a discount for doing both together and he said he’d do “some” liposuction for good results and dude takes out 12 pounds! Color me shocked.
But my point is, from having TWO major surgeries AND liposuction, swell hell for me is just going to be a part of my life for 4-6+ weeks. Had I merely had a regular tummy tuck, I’d likely be feeling pretty normal now at day 20. But that isn’t me and I have to remember to not compare myself to others on socials who had plastics, because just because they had skin removal too, if they didn’t have all 3 procedures like me, we are not the same.
Me in my truck on day 19 driving for only the 2nd time feeling super impressed by my much slimmer waist, or “snatched” as the kiddos are calling it these days! I don’t think at any point in my life I remember seeing the seat belt so clearly or visibly…so this is a major none scale victory for this former chubby girl. You can see I’ve still got thick but also swollen thighs and that is to be expected but as much as I love my results, I know I’ll always be a mid-size, thick woman and I have come to finally LOVE my body type and feel like removing the excess skin is getting me to where I wanted to be post weight loss.
I want to point the importance of not comparing yourself to others online because there is a weight loss patient influencer I follow on IG who had the sleeve done 2 years ago and lost 270 pounds (yeah, holy wildness, right!) and on the exact same day as me she went in for surgery also but she had a tummy tuck REVISION, thigh lift REVISION and arm lift. So this was her 2nd or 3rd surgery and the main goal was her arms but she had small revisions done to the other areas. And I’d follow her stories everyday relating to her pain, moods, progress, etc until about day 10 when she got much more mobility and her swelling was down and she was on the road to feeling normal again. I beat myself up mentally for a good few days before venting to my husband. And he was quick to remind me not to compare my journey to anyone else’s and so I just want to share the same advice here.
If you’re in my shoes and you’re having major surgery, even if you’re only having one procedure done…it’s encouraging to find like minded community on socials but remember to NOT compare your recovery to others. Listen to your doctor, listen to body, be gentle with yourself and show yourself grace always. Our bodies are wonderful machines, meant to heal, meant to thrive and if we just follow the post op instructions of staying hydrated and getting ENOUGH movement, our bodies will do the rest!
If you like this article and would like to follow along when I post new ones, please join my reader community below where you’ll only be notified when new articles or books are published!
Shameless plug again; if you’re interested in swapping the 9-5 grind and want to launch a whole new chapter in your life by starting a career in freelance, my book is on sale on Amazon right now for just $2.99 for a limited time, you can find it here!
xoxo,
Elizabeth Richey
About the Author: Elizabeth Richey, living and thriving in rural Arkansas, Aquarian and iced coffee enthusiast. When she’s not writing, gardening, playing with her chocolate lab Maple or sharing videos on YouTube (Elizabeth’s Many Adventures) you can find her enjoying time with her family or traveling somewhere new! Most of the time she’s dreaming of being kicked back in her hammock in her cottage garden listening to the birds sing.
The author pre-surgery when she felt normal and what she can’t wait to get back to! <3