Liposuction is painful

July 4, 2004

If I knew then what I know now, I’m not sure I would have gone thru with the liposuction surgery. I had it on Friday, and for the first day they gave me these absorbent pads that I taped to my abdomen, to soak up all the leakage.

Yes, leakage–basically the surgery involes poking holes in your abdomen in several places, filling you with saline solution laced with lidocaine, and then vacuuming out the fat. But it’s not a gentl vacuum–the doctor has to poke the little suction tip vigorously because your fat isn’t just going to come out gently.

It was kinda like he was trying to pump up a bicycle tire–that kind of pumping back and forth with the tip, thru all the different incisions they had made in my belly. Along with the fat they vacuum out most, but not all, of the saline solution. So for about a day after surgery, you basically leak the remaining saline plus a little blood thru the puncture wounds. Yes it’s about as gross as it sounds. I had to change the dressings three times that first day. Luckily by Saturday morning the leakage had stopped.

Now I’m only wearing the compression garment, kindof a girdle to help support the abdomen. Which looks and feels like Mike Tyson was using me for sparring practice. That to me is the biggest problem–while it is clear that the surgery had some positive effect on my fat belly, we won’t know the final result for a month or more because all the swelling and bruising has to heal.

Oh well, I figure it’s a better use of my tax refund than gambling at the Ceasar’s Indiana casino.