A decision to have a boob job never comes lightly. It took me years to decide if I wanted to be “that woman” one with fake breasts, maybe weird looking, mismatched breasts. With all the technology and medical advances I still see women who have surgery that results in breasts that look worse than what they had originally and that was probably my biggest fear.
I have never been flat chested, I was a 34D before surgery and have always been around this size, but having 2 children and breast feeding had left my breasts empty on the top and quite sad looking (in my opinion). After having my first child when I was 21 I saw a surgeon who advised me to wait, he reassured me that my breasts weren’t as bad as I imagined and to wait until I had at least had another. During the year I breast fed my second I was quite resolved that I would be having implants in the near future.
My biggest decision was finding the right surgeon. We’ve all seen this images of celebrities with weirdly shaped boob jobs that I would not like to be the owner of, and these people are celebrities! You would imagine they could afford the best. Also so many TV show showing these awfully botched bodies that needed remodelling that I wanted to be sure I found a surgeon who could deliver excellence. However I had a couple of challenging requirements, first I was suffering a droop and absolutely did not want a lift as the scars associated; I think are worse than my original breasts. Secondly cost, although I want an expert the cost had to be within reason.
Regarding cost I have a few friends who have gone over seas for surgery and this was definitely a tempting choice. With costs almost half that of UK surgery and promises of quick travel time to Belgium and state of the art hospitals, it seemed a no brainer to jump on Eurostar for the weekend and return with a full pair. However I do think all the advertising, with terms like “lunchtime boob job” (which is now banned in the UK) and so many celebrities endorsing the op, has given the impression that this is a minor operation. When I really try to visualise finally taking this major step and adding the stress of traveling to a new country, finding this strange hospital and then after it all having to come all the way back either by train or plane or both, and should something go wrong having to go all the way back to have it fixed, the saving doesn’t seem so great. Considering people travel world wide to have medical care in the UK I had to ask myself is saving a few pounds when literally putting my life and breasts in a strangers hands worth taking a chance on?
So deciding the UK would probably be safer and more convenient I started to look for an ideal surgeon. I took to the internet to do some research and came across a book called The Good Boob Bible, its a complete guide to breast augmentation surgery written by surgeons Miles Berry and Dai Davies. I looked these guys up and found cosmeticsurgery-partners which is a London based partnership of specialist surgeons. Miles Berry particularly specialises in breast augmentation he introduced and developed the ABBA Breast Augmentation technique in the UK, he is a master of Surgery as well as being a fully trained and accredited plastic surgeon on the GMC Specialist register. These credentials all sounded perfect to me so I booked a consultation at the Welbeck Hospital.
Of course after wanting this procedure for so long I had seen many consultation on TV and thought I knew how it would be, but I was pleasantly surprised. Miles Berry obviously has a real passion for surgery and an understanding of what it is each patient is hoping to achieve as an individual, not just another number coming through the door. I absolutely did not want a fake look or to be able to see the round top of the implant, I wanted natural and full, and basically exactly as they had been pre-babies, a little bigger wouldn’t hurt. We tried on lots of different sizes and looked at the different styles of implant, each of which he explained the different way they would look if used. Berry was extremely patient, he suggested I could come back if I wanted to discuss it further or try the sizes again, I think I was in the consultation for one hour and a half, and even though when I went in I still wasn’t 100% sure if I was going to go through with it, when I left I felt completely comfortable.
Things that swayed my decision to go ahead:
The Scars – I didn’t need a lift, my surgeon would use a technique called Dual Plane which places the implant partially under the muscle and partially over which creates a subtle lift without any more scars than a normal implant.
The Pain – The surgeon explained that it was not necessary to jab away at the breast to get the implant in, which creates extra bruising, swelling and pain. It can be done slowly and genitally and also reduced the chances of capsular contracture.
The Look: The size recommended by the surgeon to fill up my breasts was exactly the size I was hoping to have, not a pair of giant, melon style breasts.
The Stats: This is what I had finally decided to go with as implants
Type – Silicone Gel
CC amount – 360
Profile – High
Placement – Dual Plane
Incision – Inframammary (under the breast)
I decided to keep a video blog of the journey which is posted within this post. I hope any women contemplating a breast augmentation finds it helpful in making their own personal decision. At the point of writing this I am 4 days post op, back to work, not needing to use any pain relief and extremely happy with both my decision to have the surgery and to stay in the UK and have the operation with Cosmetic Surgery Partners and particularly Miles Berry. I am having the support bandages off tomorrow so will update in a video just how they are looking.
You can find a link to the surgery below and follow both Miles Davis FRCS and the partners on twitter.
www.cosmeticsurgery-partners.
Twitter @MrMilesBerry @cosmeticsp
SEE PART 2 of the video blog here
