Hello! I haven't been on here for years. I was wondering if anyone has a brachial plexus injury and then decided to have breast augmentation.

Elective cosmetic surgery is never recommended for those with RSD/CRPS, and if it is disclosed any knowledgable surgeon would decline the patient due to malpractice reasons.

If I'm missing an urgent physical need for the surgery, than please forgive my lack of knowledge.

No medical reason for it. I just want to have my body back. I live in pain any way. You only live once is my attitude now. I'm in pain whether I'm home, out or whatever. I want to look good even though I don't feel good. With stimulator and pain pump and injections and ketamine treatments, I thought I might be able to handle it. I go through the nerve block and ketmine treatments and getting morphine pump. Just wanted to know if anyone has had the operation after the brachial injury.

Your symptoms can absolutely get worse. The only docs that would agree to performing this surgery would be incompetent one's.

Imagine never being able to stand fabric or wind touching your chest area again. You wouldn't be able to put clothes on the upper half of your body to go outside.

You're symptoms may spread from head to toe. And yes, spread really can make you more miserable. If it's in your jaw, it makes eating, talking, and even breathing a misery. If you get it in your legs, you can end up in a wheelchair or needing a walker.

I think I understand your motivation to do this, but I would still recommend against it. Just my 2 cents, take it for what it is worth.

Maybe somebody with personal experience will chime in, but know that every case is unique. Some people have successful surgery and no spread of CRPS, but the next one does not have such good luck. I'm not a big fan of rolling the dice.

Things can get worse. The only surgery that is advised if you have CRPS is that which is absolutely, positively necessary. I am struggling with this decision right now as I need a knee replacement and am putting it off as long as possible. Every surgeon I've talked to has agreed with me. It is very, very dicy business.

I'm going to start off by saying that it's YOUR life and you should make decisions that will make you happy. That said...any time you make a decision involving surgery you should be aware of all the possible risks and make sure that you are prepared to accept them IF they happen.

This may be TMI...but I will share my experiences. I have RSD in my upper body including my chest (caused by spread after a lumbar sympathetic block which is MUCH less invasive than what you are thinking about). In fact...when the RSD spread to my upper body I went from a 32A to now being a 32DDD...and it's a misery. My whole chest is very sensitive to touch and it took many months and aggressive desensitization to get myself to the point of wearing normal clothes again...including a bra. And I think for most of us wearing a bra can be pretty crucial to making the "girls" look their best. This was a painful process and even though I can now tolerate those things MOST days...it is a constant balancing act. Some days I get home and I cannot rip shirt and bra off fast enough because the pain gets so intense. I feel lucky...very lucky...that desensitization worked for me in this area otherwise I don't know how that would affect my life. I wouldn't be able to wear normal clothes, I would be incredibly self conscious about the fact that I wasn't wearing a bra, and I would be miserable all the time. And you can only imagine what an affect this has had on any type of intimacy...every single touch causes pain.

Now...in considering such an invasive procedure I would implore you to think about how IF (and it's a definite possibility) RSD spreads to your chest and you experience what I do...would this surgery be worth it to you? IF the worst happens...will you still be happy? I cannot answer those questions for you...but I wouldn't wish my experience on anyone else. There is of course a possibility that none of this would happen...but even the chance of it would scare me away. Good bras, nice clothes, etc are other options that would likely cost less and be much less of a risk to your health.

When i was trying to find out what might have been wrong with me i stumbled across a forum for plastic surgery/ breast surgery. The tread that came up was on nerve pain after surgery. I will say i was mortified by the casual approach to the fact that some of these women were casually saying they still had nerve pain months after breast surgery and that it was common. They also felt it was worth the pain to have the breasts they desired. I can understand why women would want to "improve" their breasts but im not sure that many of them understood that they may have these complications and i dont think they understood how serious it could be. Im pretty sure they were talking about where the insisions were made.
I hadnt given this much thought until i read this and thought it might be helpful. It might be worth investigating the risk of nerve damage with breast surgery. Especially because we are at risk of spread. I get it though im "blessed" for size in the chest area and it was fine when i was 21 and its fine now with a bra, but........

No judgement, I get why you want it, but this might be worth investigating further.