When I get super excited about something, I fail to shut up about it. When I get really pissed about something, I similarly fail to shut up about it. When the moon continues its orbit around the earth, I continue blabbing on and on. However, when something upsets and me and leaves me sad and miserable, I just might close my trap. The most relavent example of this phenomenon occurred just a few months ago.

First, some background. Frankenboob was already inflated to nearly 500cc, the initial volume of the expander. The expander is made of magical stretchy stuff and can hold 1500cc, a disgustingly large size for someone of my stature. My untrained eye was perfectly happy with 500cc, which seemed to match my unmolested right boob. Dr. PlasticSurgeon, who is more versed in choosing boob sizes, pointed out that radiation causes the muscle and skin to shrink, making one or two more inflations necessary.

Anyway, there I was, innocently lying topless on the examination table while Dr. PlasticSurgeon and her minion examined Frankenboob. The horrible latitudinal scar is about 1/3 down from the top. Ergo, the best way for the skin to accomodate inflations is for the skin above the scar to stretch down. But Frankenboob would have none of that. It didn't even stretch the skin on both sides. Oh no, it had to be impudent and stretch only the bottom skin, widening the scar and making everything red and miserable.  As a result, there would be no further inflations.

To top it off, my stupid insurance company refused to authorize the radiation being scheduled by Dr. RadiationOncologist. Why? According to them, the type of radiation requested is "experimental" and not indicated after "breast conserving surgery." That's right, the same people who paid over $100,000 mere months ago for a mastectomy were claiming that I had two boobs.

The situation was by far not worst I'd experienced in recent memory, but it was enough to make me shut down. I stopped caring about writing. I stopped caring about my few remaining hobbies that didn't require me to leave the house. Oh sure, I still complained about doctor stuff when around other people, but I stopped inflicting the gory details upon unsuspecting masses. As one person at work pointed out, I was a lot more serious about my medical prospects.

I won't claim to have freed myself from the ups and downs of depression, especially since I'm currently lying facedown in the bottom of a trough. Despite this week being awful, the overall trend has been upward. Sadly, the contents of my stomach have also shown the same upward trend, but that's a physical problem, not a mental one.

A certain puppy decided to inconvenience us by outgrowing her collar while not growing enough to fit a medium Google collar. The nerve! To teach her a lesson, we took the Mutt Brigade to Petco to find a Reese-appropriate collar.

At first, Reese was nose to the floor, enjoying the myriad of smells. And then it dawned on her - FOOD!

Luckily for her, we had no idea where the collars happened to be, so she got to vacuum up the entire store. A morsel of something under a shelf three inches off the ground? That's no problem for the amazing collapsible puppy!

She managed to get in up to her shoulders before she reached her buried treasure. The amazing part? She got back out without any help.

Reese carefully inspected the merchandise before selecting a dainty black collar with pink skulls. Much to her embarrassment, Matt tried it on her for size right there in the aisle!

"Daddy! What if the other dogs see me?" But once it was on, she couldn't help but pose for the camera.

Where's Matt? I'll give you one hint: he's behind one of the 53" plush teddy bears. I wanted to bring a few home for the dogs, but Matt said no. He never likes my amazing ideas.

That's what Matt said when I refused to stop trying to yank open the stupid car door. He ended up opening the door for me, while I retaliated by kicking the door. It totally deserved it.

Meanwhile, Frankenboob has been inflated a total of three times, for a total of 370cc. It's now more ovular than ever, so I had to go buy a couple of new sports bras that would normally be way too big. For some reason, Victoria's Secret doesn't make anything for the irregularly shaped boob.

A weird bump of skin is poking out at the left end of the scar. It's gotten more pronounced with every inflation, even though I've tried to poke it flat. According to Dr. PlasticSurgeon, it's called a dog ear, and is caused by a pleat forming when the skin was stitched back together by Dr. Surgeon. She made sure to stress the part about Dr. Surgeon causing it. But not to worry, she can easily erase its existence when creating the nipple.

Reese, who finds it necessary to say hello to every dog in a five-mile radius, clearly heard about of Frankenboob's dog ear. Sadly, her version of first contact involved stepping directly on Frankenboob while in our bed this past Monday. Not understanding why I suddenly started screaming, she immediately froze. Matt, sensing something was amiss, came bursting out of the bathroom and removed the offending paw, along with the rest of the puppy.

Reese feins innocence, sleeping with what's left of her favorite toy.

Oddly enough, I woke the next morning to find a multicolored Frankenboob. And did I mention it hurt? As the day progressed, it changed from purple to a nice red. Time to call the doctor!

By that point, I had completely forgotten about Reese's attempt to compress Frankenboob into a singularity. All I could think of was that it hurt and it was an odd color, even by Frankenboob standards. Luckily, Dr. PlasticSurgeon's secretary happens to be my neighbor and knows that both Reese and Zero can be jumpy when excited. Perhaps one of them did it? How on earth I managed to forget that, I'll never know.

Since I already had an inflation appointment scheduled for the next day, I decided that I could wait a day for a thorough medical probing. In the meantime, I could continue taking prescription levels of ibuprofen out of an OTC Advil bottle.

At today's appointment, it took Dr. PlasticSurgeon about three femtoseconds to locate the point of impact. And then she jabbed it with a stick! Or she just lightly touched it to make sure nothing was horribly amiss.

Apparently it isn't the best of ideas to inflate a bruised boob, so that was delayed until next week. For today, her minion was dispatched to fetch the brown tape (as opposed to the white tape). I'm not entirely sure how it works, but a few pieces of tape are holding the bruised area in stasis such that it can heal in a more timely fashion.

In other news, this morning I inadvertently discovered that I can flex Frankenboob! It looks very similar to videos of Chippendale dancers flexing their pectoral muscles, except there's a boob on top. And no, I can't flex the right. Believe me, I've tried.

Shockingly, I was still taking Percoset the Monday after my first inflation. It was a mere week and a half since Frankenboob's excoriation, and just over two since Frankenboob's creation. Therefore, it was time for something disastrous to happen.

Matt drags me out of the house most days. While he claims it's for my benefit, I strongly suspect he just wants to get himself out the house. On that fateful Monday, it was definitely not me who benefited. The mistake was stopping at a 7-Eleven on the way home. A giant guy accidentally elbowed me in the Frankenboob! He immediately turned around and apologized, so it would have been a bit rude to kick him in the balls.

Somehow I made it make to the car without screaming, though my eyes did tear up. When we finally got home, a visual inspection didn't make me feel any better. A bruise was forming, and there was clearly a dent at the site of the impact.

The new disaster area continued to throb the next day. Time to call the doctor! Dr. PlasticSurgeon assured me that the expander requires much more than a giant elbow infraction to pop, so I needn't worry about that. As for the pain, the area had just experienced two traumatic surgeries and was therefore much more vulnerable. A small bump that I would otherwise barely notice could cause severe pain in these circumstances. I should just keep popping pills, and the extra pain would go away in three to four days. Woohoo.

The day after I received the all clear from Dr. Surgeon, I went to Dr. PlasticSurgeon so she could survey the damage. But before she could gasp in horror, her minion had some fun with a magnetic stud finder. The device is basically a magnet suspended in a little plastic holder, with which the minion was able to locate the metal marker indicating the injection site of the expander. Of course the site was under the tape Dr. Surgeon used to hold my boob together, which meant that after a week of dread, I finally got to see the extent of the horror.

Much to my dismay, the scar is about five inches long, and mostly horizontal. While the spot indicated by the stud finder was marked, I poked at the scar, trying to make it go away. I failed.

A piece of medical tape with a daub of topical analgesic was placed over the mark, limiting my poking range. After about five minutes, all poking was ceased as the numbing goo had taken effect. A white surgical drape was placed around the area, which was cleaned with an iodine drenched swab. Dr. PlasticSurgeon further sedated the area with an injection of some sort. Then came the scary needle.

While I watched with a fascinated horror, a two inch needle pierced the muscle and entered the expander. To confirm the needle was in the correct location, the doctor drew out some blue liquid. When she filled the expander during the first surgery, Dr. PlasticSurgeon mixed the initial saline with methylene blue. Bright blue liquid is generally not naturally produced anywhere near the boob, so the blue liquid gave her reasonable assurance that the needle was in the correct location.

Having verified the needle's insertion, it was time to start filling. A 200cc bag of sterile saline was hooked up to a bizarre pump. When released, the pump filled with saline from the bag. When compressed, the saline travelled down a tube, through the needle, and into the expander. Oh, and it made a loud and highly disconcerting noise after every compression.

After only 100cc, the pressure made it uncomfortable for me to breathe on my left side, so she stopped for the day. That more than doubled the size of the expander to 170cc. Though the expander has a maximum size of 500cc, Dr. PlasticSurgeon expects to reach the correct size around 450cc. This will be accomplished over four fillings, though it could be done in just one. By spreading it out over weekly fillings, the skin is less likely to develop stretch marks. Also, filling it at once would create even more pressure, preventing me from breathing easily or comfortably.

The expander is fairly football shaped, though it's not particularly obvious yet. With the latitudinal scar, Frankenboob will look particularly footballesque once fully expanded. While clearly not the ideal shape for a boob, it does the best job of readying the surrounding muscle tissue for the permanent implant. Sadly, I will be stuck with a malformed Frankenboob until approximately six months after radiation is complete. At that point, the expander will be replaced with the permanent implant and a 50cc implant will be inserted under the muscle on the right side. I'm a big fan symmetry, especially when it comes to personal pillow perkiness.

To relax the muscle holding the expander in place, as well as to immediately knock me out, more Valium was prescribed. In other words, I spent the rest of Thursday and most of Friday slipping in and out of consciousness. On the rare occasion that I woke up long enough to be cognizant of my surroundings, I spent most of it begging Matt for pain medicine. Just think, I'll get to repeat this process after each inflation!

Right before leaving the office, I was given an implant card. It has my name, the type and serial number of the expander, and the doctor's information. While I don't have to carry it with me, some people choose to keep their cards in their wallets. Since I had a few empty slots in my wallet, I figured I might as well put it there. Just in case they find my charred body in a ditch. With my wallet. And all the other cards are melted.

For whatever reason, the card made me think to ask about MRIs and other magnetic scanning devices. Shockingly, they are no longer a good idea, assuming I don't want further damage to Frankenboob. Also, the TSA's nude-o-scopes may be able to detect the implant, though the operators are supposed to know what they look like and to not cause a problem. Since I refuse to go through one of those machines as a matter of principle, I guess I'll never find out.