I had planned for my next entry to recount my trip to Hong Kong for you. It would have been filled with pithy observations such as, "After spending a day traversing Hong Kong, my dislike of San Jose finally crystallized: It is not a real city. Like the crown rhinestone in a tin tiara, it is only glamorous until you've seen the real thing." But then, Life Got in the Way (TM), and here we are in April. Let me assure you that Hong Kong is fantastic, and should you ever have the opportunity, you should definitely experience it for yourself.
In the meantime, I've been consumed with Work and Life. Several things at work have finally gelled and things are moving forward at a good clip. Not as fast as I want them to, but Progress Will Be Made (eventually). As for life, I have moved from the soulless hotel-like condo near the San Jose airport into a spacious house with a good friend in Alviso.1 It has a Damn Big Garage and this alone makes me deliriously happy. Devilman spent a month helping me paint and arrange my bedroom and spare room in such a way that I am quite simply the happiest I've been in years.
Most importantly, though, I've finally done something that I've been wanting to do for a very, very long time: I've had a breast reduction.2
Now, laying yourself out upon a table and letting someone chop you to pieces and stitch you back together is not something you do on a whim. I started researching ten years ago by talking to lots of women who had had it done; every woman with whom I've spoken has said it was the best thing they'd ever done for themselves. What amazed me was the lack of negative feedback; what little negative feedback I found online primarily came from what seemed to be negative people.
Of course, thinking about it and doing it are two different things. I had to find the right plastic surgeon. Let me just state now that I have no faith in any medical "professional" who cannot look me in the eye while they are describing a procedure they are expected to perform on me, nor am I interested in someone who doodles the cuts they plan on making on me on the white paper covering the examination table, nor do I want to hear the words, "Well, I've never lost an entire nipple" leave a surgeon's mouth when I ask about the risks associated with my possible surgery.3
When I first moved to California three years ago, I thought that if I was going to find a good plastic surgeon anywhere, it would be here. I voiced this to a former coworker over lunch one day; it turns out she had had three friends who had all had reductions, all used the same surgeon, and all were deliriously happy with the results. That surgeon said things like, "I never cut off a woman's nipple! One, it takes longer to heal, but mostly, it's just too psychologically damaging." That surgeon is the surgeon I chose.
Prior to my surgery, I asked a photographer friend of mine in San Francisco to take tasteful nude portraits of me. In reviewing the pictures last week, I was stunned by the loveliness of my Venus de Willendorf figure, but excited that those heavy, pendulous breasts would finally be gone. While beautiful, they were clearly too big for the frame I inherited from my short, stocky half-Filipina mother. My paternal grandmother, from whom I inherited these breasts, was of good Dutch or German stock, taller and heftier by far. I knew that in looking at those pictures that I would not regret this decision.
Amazingly, having your breasts reduced is an outpatient procedure these days. A friend dropped me off at Sequoia hospital Thursday morning; I was so excited I practically skipped to the second floor Short Stay Unit where I would be prepped for surgery. I joked with nurse weighing me in that I expected to leave a few pounds lighter. It turns out I was correct - the doctor managed to remove almost two pounds of tissue from each breast.
So here I am, three days post-op. I hurt like hell. My breasts are bruised and boxy4 and oozy5 and mostly look like something stitched together by Doctor Frankenstein. But, they are as much mine as they ever were. Despite the swelling, oozing, bruising and squareness, they are beautiful and will only become more so as they heal.
1 Technically, Alviso was annexed by San Jose forty-some-odd years ago. It is, however, in denial about this and maintains its own quirky identity. I love it for that reason, alone!
2 To the men in the audience that are morally opposed to this, I can only say, "SHUSH!"
3 These were actual things done and said by surgeons I had interviewed.
4 Because you tend to be mostly flat on your back for the first 24-48 hours after surgery, the blood and plasma pool and your boobs take on this kind of rounded-box shape. This is normal.
5 Oozy is also normal. It's just the excess blood and plasma finding its way out between the stitches.
