ALND recovery experience
For those of you who had an ALND after your initial surgery, how was it? What would you recommend for recovery?
I had a single mastectomy with SNLB a couple of weeks ago, with 4 nodes removed. Imaging had showed all the nodes were in normal range and all the pathology during surgery came back with no live cells, so I thought I was in the clear. Unfortunately, the longer-duration staining showed that there's still cancer in two nodes. I had neoadjuvant chemo, so my surgeon says the protocol is to go back in and take another layer of lymph nodes and not leave it up to radiation.
The mastectomy and SNLB recovery have been easier than expected, but I'm not sure what to expect with the full lymph node dissection. My surgeon is saying I can be back to my wfh job in two weeks but isn't giving me a lot of information about what to expect in those first two weeks other than that I'll have a drain again and need to be more careful with my arm.