I had been thinking about having breast augmentation for some time, having had a child and lost breast tissue as a result of nursing. I felt out of proportion and missed having the breast fullness I had prior to childbirth. My biggest concern was looking natural with breast augmentation. I had several friends that had undergone the breast augmentation procedure and many looked like they had glued water balloons to their chest or had funny, cone-shaped appendages that apparently cost them thousands of dollars.

I started researching on the web a bit to find out what the public had to say about local doctors and was even more discouraged when I saw some of the “after” shots on some of the sponsored web sites. Finally my sister’s roommate, who works for a local surgeon, recommended Dr. Michael J. Brown to me, saying that was who her surgeon referred to regularly since it was not their office’s specialty and that they had seen his work and it was the best consistently.

I decided to check him out via the web and was impressed with both the photos and the quick response I got to my email submission for information. I met Dr. Brown the following week and walked away completely convinced that he was the one who was going to do them. He is good at combining a professional, experienced feel with excitement, while not being too serious or seeming disinterested. I made my appointment for breast augmentation surgery a couple of months out due to timing issues and gave myself something to look forward to. By the time my breast augmentation surgery rolled around, I had plenty of information and felt well prepared. I had a few friends making me think that the pain would be awful and that I would be bed ridden for days. I was willing to live with that, having seen the outcome of Dr. Brown’s breast implant surgeries though. The hospital that he chose to perform surgery at (Fair Oaks Inova) was extremely nice and the staff was like a “checks and balances” system for the surgeon, rather than in some cases where breast implant surgeries are performed in surgeons’ offices.

I felt very relaxed and couldn’t wait to have my breast augmentation surgery done. I was put under anesthesia and woke up with NO pain! My nurse was cute and wanted to see…she said she wanted hers done too and heard Dr. Brown was good! So of course, I showed her! At any rate, I went home and kept waiting for the pain to get really bad. It never did! I was stiff and very sore the first three days (but really, not bad!!!), needing periodic naps, but keeping up on my pain meds and applying ice packs kept it at bay. By the fourth day, I was still very swollen, but needed nothing stronger than motrin and felt just a bit sore. I was also expecting to be swathed in some sort of mummy-like bandages at this point, but Dr. Brown told me that he doesn’t believe that leads to a natural look and can actually make the pain last longer. It was nice to be able to see them immediately and the end result was amazing, so I will buy this theory completely! I was back at the gym in 2 and a half weeks (not doing any heavy upper body lifting…) and saw a marked improvement in the shape of my new boobs as the days went by. (At first they were a little torpedo-like since they were still high and the muscles needed to relax…) By the time I went in for my second check up, my breast shape was great and I just needed to let gravity do its thing a little bit longer in order for the incisions to be completely obscured. By my 3rd month, they were PERFECT! You had to actually be looking for the incision and they were exactly as I wanted them to be. I had asked that the breast mounds be proportional size-wise to my body frame and the breasts look like they came with my body (or should have) and belong to someone who never had children! i could not possibly be more pleased! The only downside: having to buy new bras and not fitting in to shirts from before…or is that a plus???? I would do breast augmentation again tomorrow if need be and cannot believe how easy it all was!

A.R.