During the nine months leading up to pregnancy and the time spent breastfeeding afterward, your body is on a hormonal roller coaster ride that brings about significant physical changes. While your baby bump may slowly fade away with time, your breasts are often less able to bounce back to their pre-pregnancy size and shape.
We’re sure that the new addition to your family is a source of joy, but the changes in your body may be less welcome, which is why we offer several procedures here at Cosmetic Surgery Center that will help you reclaim your body after pregnancy, including breast augmentation. Under the expert guidance of top cosmetic surgeons Drs. Trent Fogleman and Paul Benien Jr., we’ve helped many women in the Oklahoma City area head into motherhood with a body that belies the journey there.
If you’re feeling unhappy with the appearance of your breasts after pregnancy, here’s a look at what’s happened and how we can fix it.
From the moment of conception, your hormones, namely estrogen and progesterone, begin to take over operations in your body to prepare for the development and care of a new life. And one of the areas these hormones control is your breasts. At the beginning of your pregnancy, your breasts usually enlarge as they prepare for the all-important task of feeding the new life you’re bringing into the world. More directly, your estrogen and progesterone stimulate your milk glands and ducts.
After you give birth, your hormones continue to oversee operations during breastfeeding, ensuring that your baby has an adequate supply of milk.
As your breasts enlarge and then shrink back down during this time, some women are left with deflated breasts that sag and droop, while some women hold on to the larger pregnancy breasts and others bounce back to their original shapes.
If you fall into the category of smaller, hollowed breasts that don’t retain their shape, and nipples that appear larger and droop downward, rest assured, you’re not alone. And, more importantly, there’s something we can do about it.
Many of our female patients come to us after their final pregnancy to undo some of the pregnancy damage, and one of our top procedures is breast augmentation. To do this, we rely on two different types of implants — saline and silicone — to fill the hollow spaces inside your breasts.
While an implant alone will do wonders to restore more shape to your breasts, you may also want us to lift your breasts at the same time, which is something we can discuss during your consultation.
One of the first decisions you need to make is what type of implant you’d like. There are pros and cons to both, so let’s take a look at the features of each.
With a saline implant, we make a very small incision (sometimes under your arm) and thread the empty implant through, filling it to your desired size once we get it into place. The disadvantages of saline are that some women feel they aren’t as natural to the touch. As well, should the implant develop a leak, your breast will deflate.
Silicone implants are popular because they hold their shape better and feel more natural. And should your silicone implant develop a leak, the gel stays put, so you won’t have an obvious deflation. On the other hand, they also require us to make a larger incision to get them into place.
Ultimately, the choice is yours to make, and our job is to ensure that you have all of the information you need to make an informed decision. We may guide you toward one implant over another if we feel that your situation calls for a specific type of implant.
Whichever direction you go in, you’ll be rewarded with breasts that don’t look as if they’ve been put through the pregnancy ringer.
If you’d like to learn more about breast augmentation, please don’t hesitate to give us a call. Or you can use the online booking tool on this website to set up a consultation.
