Nightmare before Christmas or the day that I decided to finally fire my plastic surgeon

In my last post I described my reconstruction surgery.  While I love my flat stomach and I'm grateful to have two boobs again, as I start to examine the work, I had some questions for my favorite plastic surgeon (PS).  For one, I am covered in scars.  I have a long horizontal one for the tummy tuck.  The boobs, well, let's just say I sort of feel like Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas:

What I currently feel like.  Perhaps I should get a Sally tattoo?

I had a check-up with my PS yesterday.  Here's a summary of our conversation:

Me: What are the next steps were as I continue to heal?  

PS (with a puzzled look on his face): What do you mean, "next steps"? 

Me: Well, the scars.  I look like a character out of Nightmare Before Christmas (yes, I actually said this to him.  I'm sure few of you are surprised).  

PS (condescendingly of course): There are no next steps.  I don't think you look like a creature but there's nothing we can do to hide the scars.  Don't worry, when we do the tattooing, you won't notice them anymore.

I hate him.  I've never liked this guy, but today I had my limit.  It wasn't so much his answer, it was the way he answered.  I take some responsibility for not asking more questions, but it never occurred to me that there would be so many scars.  And it's always been difficult to pull information out of this guy.  Some scars?  Sure.  Looking like a patchwork quilt?  No.  I was told time and time again that his work as amazing.  If this is amazing work, I cringe to see what non-amazing work looks like.

I wanted to say several things to him:  that he was a condescending asshole, that if the tables were turned and we were talking about penis surgery, I'm sure the scarring issue would have been resolved a long time ago.  Instead, I held it together until he and the rest of the team left the room and I lost it. I didn't want to give this guy the satisfaction of seeing me cry.

Thankfully, I ended up having lunch with a friend yesterday, which got me out of the house and was a good distraction.  As far as I'm concerned I'm done with him.  Time to find a surgeon that's willing to listen to me and help me out here.

I also had a conversation with a friend this morning who was recently diagnosed and is making her own decisions around treatment, double mastectomies and the type of reconstruction to get.  She had been leaning towards the exact same surgery and called me to talk about the pictures she had seen yesterday.  She had been horried by (wait for it)...the scars.  Her timing was uncanny.  She's working with another PS in the same office as mine.  I know somebody else that's working with this doc too and I've heard nothing but good things about his bedside manner.

At this point I feel like an idiot.  That being said, it's hard to ask questions of somebody that isn't that interested in interacting with his patients.  If I knew a few months ago what I know now, I would have asked a lot more questions.  Shame on me for trusting the opinions of other healthcare professionals.  Other than firing my PS, I'm not sure what else to do.  I just feel stuck and helpless.  The attitude seems to be, "this is what the surgery is."  Which makes me feel like I should just be happy to be alive and my breasts and the way they look now is just something I have to live with.  Which is bullshit to me.

This is a bit of a ramble and a rant and I apologize for that--I try to write more concise posts but my emotions are far too raw right now.  The good news is physically I feel great.  I get tired and I'm not ready to start exercising yet (nor am I even cleared for that).  I guess my future of outfits with deep cleavage and side boob and just going to have to wait until I get over my self-consciousness of the scars.  At least I can focus on wearing midriff tops now.  Sorry, my knee jerk reaction is to make jokes in times like these.