Home From Thailand

I arrived home today from an amazing 2 week holiday in Thailand. I promise to bore you silly with my travel photos very soon, but right now I need a little sleep!

Tomorrow I finally get to pick up the keys to my newly built house and so I have a million and one things to do to get in move-in ready for my mum. Not to mention that I have 2 weeks of TV to catch up on and no clean underwear... Thank god for the up-coming Easter long weekend!

A few photos for now...

AJ, me, Connie & Ashton at our resort in Koh Samui

Sunset in Koh Samui

Me in the pool in our villa in Koh Tao

Drinking buckets with Connie in Koh Tao

Koh Tao

Drinking in Bangkok

Overwhelmed

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Oh boy, it has been a pretty full on couple of weeks! I swear my life seems to abide by the 'it never rains, but it pours' policy.

First there was my body lift surgery follow up appointment on Tuesday where I received the news that further surgery was recommended. Since then my mind has been full of surgery quotes, health insurance item numbers and bank loans. Should I? Shouldn't I? Yes, No, Maybe. I am so confused!

Work has been unusually manic with a massive event that has kept me busier than I have been in the past two years. I don't mind being busy at work, it is just a pain when it means having to work late. I have an extremely busy reality television schedule right now and I don't want to have to choose between My Kitchen Rules, Masterchef and The Block... This is a choice that no reality TV addict wants to make!

Then house stuff decides to explode as well. The lease on my apartment comes up for renewal this week and I have had to negotiate a new lease and do my best to talk my real estate down from a big rent increase. Luckily I talked her down to $10 per week and signed the new lease today. Phew, I just couldn't handle having to move yet again.

The big house news is that the house I am building is almost finished!!! Yesterday I had to go to Drysdale (90 minutes away) and do the final inspection with the builder. Then in two weeks we will get the keys and my mum can move in. There is still a lot of work for me to do now and this week I have been busily organising the driveway, fencing, lighting, curtains, garden etc. I really couldn't be happier with how the whole process has gone, there were some bumps along the road, but nothing in comparison to the horror building stories I have heard. Here is a little sneak peak on how it is looking...

On top of all this, AJ started a new job this year and has been busy working long hours while he settles in. Then, in the one week, he received two very good job offers out of the blue and he has been all in a tizz trying to work out what he should do. We both have so much on our minds that we have barely spoken two words to each other because we are busy staring off into space thinking and worrying!

Finally, we go on holidays to Thailand for two weeks on Tuesday, which is amazing, but requires a lot of organisation. My head is swarming with printing ticket confirmations, downloading kindle books, getting my eyebrows waxed, getting a pedicure, locating my passport, buying power adapters, getting money exchanged, buying immodium, thinking about what to pack, and the million other things on my list of things to do before we go away.

Obviously I can't complain about going on holidays at all, but with everything going on my anxiety has reared it's ugly head and I have been feeling more than a bit overwhelmed. Of course, because my lap band is a little bitch and can sense my anxiety, it decides to shut up shop and make it impossible for me to eat much more than ice cream. Oh well, lucky Melbourne is in the midst of a heat wave and the ice cream is going down a treat!

So, nothing bad is going on right now, in fact a lot of great things are happening, but anxiety doesn't recognise this and just casts a great big dark shadow of insomnia, nausea, negativity and panic over me. Hopefully this will all fade away when I am sipping cocktails by the pool in Thailand...

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4 Months Post Body Lift

Today is exactly 4 months since I had body lift surgery. I would say I feel 95% recovered, with just some minor swelling and tenderness lingering.

Having the body lift surgery was the best thing I have ever done for myself. I know my body is far from perfect, but I feel normal for the first time in my life. I didn't realise how much fear and anxiety I carried around with that extra skin. I just feel so much lighter in every way possible.

Warning: These before and after pictures are probably not something you want appearing on your screen at work... or in any public place!

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4 MONTHS POST BODY LIFT SURGERY

BEFORE BODY LIFT SURGERY

Upper Body Lift

Well I am just one day from celebrating 4 months since I had my body lift surgery and this morning I met with my surgeon for a follow up appointment. He was really happy with how flat my tummy is and how my scar has healed, but then he threw a bombshell at me.

He thinks I need to have an upper body lift to properly complete my surgery. Sigh.

My first thought was that he was crazy because having more surgery was the last thing on my mind. Then he went into more detail and showed me the skin he wants to remove and how it would change the shape of my body. After lots of pinching and prodding of my skin and squiggly drawings on his ipad, I have to admit that I agree with my surgeon.

There are two types of upper body lifts--the first lifts the breasts and removes excess tissue in the arms and the second also lifts the breasts but instead of removing excess tissue from the arms, it removes excess tissue from the upper back rolls.  

Of the two upper body lifts described above, my surgeon would perform the second one on me.

What he wants to do is an incision under each breast and insert mesh to my ribcage and then attach my upper torso to the mesh to hold it firm. Right now the skin on my upper torso is still quite saggy and there is no other way to pull it tight so it will stay in place. He would also lift the breasts using the same incision under the breast.

The surgeon would then continue the incision all the way around my upper back and remove the folds of skin hanging down on my back. So I would basically be sliced all the way around my body like the lower body lift I had, but this time they would do it on my upper body.

The scar would look like this (if only my body also looked like that!)...

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So all the complaining I have been doing about the extra weight on my upper back since my surgery isn't actually weight gain, it is excess skin. The skin has always been there, I just noticed it more now that my tummy is so much smalled and flatter.

My surgeon also examined my lower back, where I am still protruding after surgery and he advised it was not fluid or swelling, it was fat and would need to be lipoed out.

I left my appointment feeling overwhelmed and confused by everything. In one way I felt like a bit of a failure that I need additional surgery and the thought of having to tell my family and friends made me feel sick. I also felt a little excited by the results I could achieve with this surgery, but mostly worried by the idea of additional surgery and how much it would cost. I should receive the quote by the end of the week and then I can make some decisions.