Point of View #11: Katherine (Updated)

*The original post on Katherine's expander photos is below. Just wanted to let you know that today 7 new photos have been added to her gallery showing what her expanders look like after an additional 50 ml expansion, for a total of 350 ml per expander.*

Katherine first wrote me in late July asking for the password to see my 11 galleries of reconstruction photos. She was one month away from her bilateral prophylactic skin- and nipple-sparing mastectomies followed by 2-stage reconstructions (expanders with exchange surgery).

She lives in Australia, where the one-stage (One Step) reconstruction is available, but Alloderm is not. She opted for the expander method instead. She surprised me when she explained that her mother had had a one-stage bilateral reconstruction in Australia as far back as eight years ago, and that her grandmother had had a two-stage reconstruction in South Africa about fifteen years ago after a double mastectomy. Perhaps her grandmother's reconstruction isn't surprising, but it was news to me to learn that a one-stage method was available eight years ago in Australia, even if it is not the same exact one-stage technique that is performed in the U.S. today. I just did not know that one-stage procedures had been around for eight years already anywhere.

Katherine has photos for you to see of her expanders still in place, with very informative captions, and it is amazing how nice and natural her expanders look (and they're not even implants)! Her exchange surgery will be in the next month or so.

To view Katherine's and others' photo galleries, you'll need the password and URL. If you don't have them, please email me at: rebecca (at) onestepscoop (dot) com.

To see a list of the other 11 women's photo galleries, scroll down to the Points of View section of this blog's righthand sidebar. Each clickable pseudonym there will pull up a post about each woman with information on how to view their reconstruction photos.