What is a preventative mastectomy?

There's only one difference between a preventative mastectomy and a regular mastectomy.....with a preventative mastectomy you don't have breast cancer. You're doing it to prevent an occurrance of breast cancer happening.

So what do they do? In a nutshell, they cut your boobs off. Ok, not that drastic. They make incisions across your breast and remove all of the breast tissue, mammary ducts, fatty tissue, etc that makes a breast. The way i see it in my mind, its like gutting a pumpkin. they get all of the parts that could contain cancer one day out. The best part is the doctors send every bit of what is removed to pathology to check, check, and double check for any signs of cancer, tumors, spots, etc that may not have shown up in previous scans and tests. They are VERY thorough which is great!

Now most people who have the mastectomy done, also has the first step of reconstructive  surgery done during the same surgery. This is what I did. After the breast specialist removed all the old boob(as I like to call it), the plastic surgeon comes in to start on the new boob. Now thisis the cool part...

She puts what is called a tissue expander BEHIND your chest muscle. The expander looks like a very thick implant with some kind of metal spot on it. The metal spot is important because through a series of expansions over the course of weeks/months, patients will go to the plastic surgeon and receive saline injections directly into the tissue expander until they have stretched your chest muscle out to the new size of breast you desire. Isn't modern medicine amazing?!?!? I mean in the same day they "cut off your tatas" they start creating new ones for you that will never sag or move or droop. I will be the only 95 year old woman at the nursing home with beautiful perky boobs in the same spot they were in high school. Bahahahaha!

But seriously, the best part is knowing that I got to choose when I would have a mastectomy...cancer didn't choose that for me. I got to choose to deal with this on MY terms. I was able to pray about it, think about it, talk about it with my family and friends, and really be at peace with the decision instead of having a doctor tell me I have to have it done immediately to save my life. Preventative mastectomies are great if you are at increased risk for breast cancer. Plus you get cute, perky boobs for life!