Overcoming A Life-Threatening Hematoma After A Mommy Makeover

In this gripping episode of Plastic Surgery Uncensored, Dr. Rady Rahban is joined by his patient Christina, who encountered a severe complication after her mommy makeover surgery. Christina, a mother of four, traveled over 350 miles from San Jose, California, for her surgery. Despite a successful procedure, she faced a life-threatening challenge when she developed a hematoma after coughing post-operation. This episode delves into the critical aspects of post-surgical care, the importance of being near your surgical team during recovery, and how prompt medical response can be life-saving. Dr. Rady and Christina share valuable insights on managing unforeseen complications and ensuring safety in cosmetic surgery.

Key Takeaways:

1. Complications Can Arise Post-Surgery: Christina’s experience underscores that surgical complications can occur even after the initial recovery phase, emphasizing the need for patients to be vigilant and in close proximity to their medical team during the recovery period.

2. Importance of Immediate Medical Response: Dr. Rady’s immediate and decisive actions upon learning about Christina’s condition highlight the importance of having access to swift medical intervention during post-operative emergencies.

3. Informed Decisions and Preparations: Prospective patients should thoroughly research and prepare for potential complications by choosing a surgeon who not only excels in performing the surgery but also in managing post-operative care and emergencies.

4. The Value of Patient Education and Preparedness: Christina’s story serves as a crucial reminder of the importance of being educated and prepared for all possible outcomes of surgery, including having contingency plans for unexpected expenses and extended recovery times.

Transcript

This is an automatically generated transcript. Please note that complete accuracy is not guaranteed.

Welcome to another episode of Plastic Surgery Uncensored. I'm your host, Doctor Rady Rahban, and boy do we have a show for you. We have a very interesting and very important show for that matter, because we're not only gonna be talking about what we talk about often, which is great outcomes, outstanding patients. We're gonna be talking about complications, and not just in third person, but rather with a patient of mind.

You had a very very scared complication known as a humanitoma or sudden bleed, and we're very lucky because she's here with us, and we're gonna talk about it, and I'm gonna try to highlight some of the things I think are really important. So let's dive in. We are blessed to have Christina. Right.

I'm not gonna even bother trying to say her last name because I butchered it before. I'm gonna just call you Coco, because I'm sure that's what ninety percent of the world calls you. Who is visiting from, who's visiting who's tuning in from Greece in some island which she did not take me to, which I'm kind of a little annoyed. Everyone has to take their plastic surgeon with them on vacation, and so welcome to the show.

Thank you for joining us on your holiday on the Greek islands of who knows where. Thank you for coming to the show. Thank you. I'm excited to be here.

Okay, we're awesome. Let's choose. So we're gonna just do a little bit of background for those of you who are listening, so you know the context of the story. So Christina is a forty year old awesome boss lady mom who works and takes care of a family and does it all.

And she had had four five full pregnancies, four live births, one unfortunate child who passed, and at some junctures you decided enough. I don't like the way my body has changed as a result of having children, which is super common. Anyone who's listening, the patient or the friend or the person you know who has three, four or five kids who looks like a supermodel, that's the unicorn. That's not the norm.

The norm is that my breasts have changed, my belly has changed, like even my labia have changed. So you don't have to do anything about it, but if you do, it's not uncommon, and you decided, you know what, I want to do something about it. So, if I'm not mistaken, you live in San Jose, California, right, that's up north from us in Beverly Hills. It's not North Korea, but it's certainly not within driving distance.

That is, you can't just walk down here, right, And so let's just start with the basics here. You are, mom, want to do something about your changes in your body and your physiology, and you decide you want to do this surgery, and so tell me your process, because you did end up I want to say, three hundred miles where how far? Three hundred and fifty miles? How far is San Jose? It's quite far. It's like a seven hour drive. Fight great, So you ended up seven hours away from your home.

So tell me what that process was, because there are many many women and men who are considering these types of surgeries, and you know they're do I go away? Do I stay close? Tell me what that process was for you and why you ended up so far away? Yeah. So, really, at the end of the day, anything I do, it comes down to quality, right, And so I looked at all the classic surgeons near me, and what I kept coming to was really one of the biggest things with having my adominal muscles fixed, right, that was like the biggest thing. Having a tummy talk. Having the other stuff was great, But the end of the day, I want my abdominal muscles fixed.

And when I'm done right and be good, let me elaborate them in interjects. Because so what you're referring to is I had a bunch of kids. In addition to the excess skin, the excess fat, the stretch marks, all those things, you had a sizeable bulge. That bulge.

While some of it was attributed to weight, some of it or a lot of it was attributed to muscle separation known as distasis rectie, aka, my muscles have torn apart and that will not go away with diet, exercise or whatnot. And what you're referring to is I wanted my core back and that's a functional issue. Yes it has cosmetic ramifications, but you were referring to that aspect because after five birds that damage is quite significant, So go ahead, keep going. Yeah, And so what was happening is, yes, I wanted to look sexier and prettier and feel better.

To me at the end of the day, to do something like this. It was really I wanted to have that muscle back because I was having back pain, a lot of issues just with the body not being right because I couldn't stand, I couldn't walk, a lot of other issues. So I was calling around trying to find people who could do the tummy tuck but also repair the muscles. I got a lot of people, a lot of doctors I would speak to would say, yeah, but if you're larger than so many inches with your diastasis, we have to fill you with mesh.

And I know how bad it is because when you do mesh, a lot of people have problems where the mesh grows into the skin and then you have other problems. It's painful. They have to take it out, they have to reput it in. So I didn't want to go that route, so I kept searching trying to find someone who specialized in that but also could give me a good result.

The second thing I looked at with scarring. If you go on a lot of plastic surgeon website and you look at the cuts down on the domino they have to make to do a tummy tup, some of them were massive. I mean the scars were huge, and they were probably showing this, and I'm thinking, I don't wear a lot of bikinis. I'm not someone who has to be perfect, but I don't want this massive scar my whole life just sitting there that I look at every day.

So really keen to someone who could prepare my muscles and then do it right, and then someone who could leave me looking nice at the end of all this, so that I can feel beautiful when I look in the mirror. I don't mind having a little seam or something that I see, but I don't want anything ugly. And I didn't want to just do it and then have some result. I wanted to make sure I got a good and excellent result.

Awesome. So let's highlight some of the things you said. So what you were referring to is what you were saying is that if your diacetasis, that muscle separation is significant. And many times doctors and patients and people on these blogs refer to it in them amount of centimeters or finger breaths.

Right, it's three finger breats, it's a fifth wide, or five centimeters or seven centimeters. I actually don't ever use any of those quantifications because it doesn't make a difference to me if you're one centimeter or fourteen centimeters, you're all treated the same. However, on these blogs and many of the doctors use this quantification system. And what you're referring to is if your diastasis is significant, as is the case was with yours, then there is a concern by the surgeons that I can't bring this or repair this on its own, and therefore I need some additional material to help bridge the gap or repair this.

That material almost always is some type of mesh, and ninety percent of meshes are permanent material if you will, a plastic and as you said it, if you go and do homework and just google the word mesh, it is followed by tons and tons of complications. Doesn't mean you should never have mesh. Well, there are indications, but if you can avoid it, which you can with this particular issue, then sure as how you want to avoid it. So that's the whole concept of mesh.

I've been doing this now almost twenty years. I have repaired diastasis in which you could take a bowling ball through and never one time, not a single case in twenty years, have I used mesh. The reason is there is no need for mesh because nothing has been removed. You are the exact same person you were when you were eighteen.

The only difference is you're stretched out, so you will come back together, and you will come back together. And I so that's number one, and good on you. Good on you for saying, oh, okay, you're telling me that my case is so severe that I have to get mesh. I don't buy that garbage.

Let me continue looking. The second is that all often you have this duality, right, you have function form. I got a run bike, my bow, my bladder, my back pain, that's your core. So I want that to work.

And then the other half is like, but I want to look good like. I don't need to be supervane, I don't need to be on OnlyFans. I just want to look good for myself and my life partner, right, And so the problem is many times you won't find that, oh my god, the results looks spectacular and oh, by the way, the function is great. It almost feels as though you have to pick one versus the other.

And so what you refer to was the technical aspects of the actual incision. And I've elaborated in like thirty podcasts that ninety percent of my colleagues will have some assistance someone closing parts pieces. You know, what did we do for you? We did a breast lift, a breast augmentation, a tummy tuck, repair of your muscle, and liposection. So all in all, it's about six to eight hours.

So most surgeons, as am I are tired. We're goddamn tired. And so towards the end of closing this and closing that, you call in the cavalry. And there's people who are closing, whether it's a tech or nurse, another surgeon or whatever.

So I have and continue and probably will you till I die. And the only one that is closing you in multiple layers. And I think that that is, without a doubt, one of the many reasons why our scars are what I humbly think is significantly better. So you decided, Okay, I'm not gonna just you know, I'm not going to throw in the towel and just surrender to the closest guy that's willing to do it.

So then let's shift gears. And then you said, okay, So then what happened next? Yeah, So I had found Okay. So when I first found you, I was going through some groups, some blots. I saw you once and I said, well, he's really far away.

I don't know if I want to go that far away. So I talked to everyone local. Didn't like anyone, so try to find someone a little more local. Fan didn't like anyone.

So I just kept circling back around and I said, you know, I don't and my husband really pushed a lot because he was like, to us, I felt expensive, and so he said, we'll try to find someone more local. We don't have to at least spend money, you know, staying down there. We don't have to spend money trying to get there. It'll just be more effective.

At the end of the day, I put my foot down and I just said, I don't care what it costs. I want to have a good procedure. If something happens, I want to make sure I'm with somebody who will manage it, someone who will take care of it. I don't have to work right right right.

That's something that was really important to me, and so I kept in all honesty, I've probably talked to maybe thirty different Surgeonsay, let's stop right there. So here here are the key key takeaway home messages. If you are looking to do a procedure and here the adds you can find it locally and it is as good as someone that is elsewhere, Absolutely do it. If you can find someone to do your procedure and they are much less expensive as someone who's someone else, but they give you as good a result.

Absolutely save the money if you can not have to make these compromises in terms of driving, paying, and whatever and still get a great outcome. Appsolutely do not waste time, money, or ennery. However, if you find that the delta between where you want to be or where you think you ought to be and where you are choosing to go is significant, in my humble opinion, you could run the risk of having an issue. The second take home point is exactly what you said, and that's the whole premise of this entire podcast.

The problem is not when everything goes well. The problem is when the shit hits the fan. Finding a great surgeon is more than just finding someone who will do the job, because, as we know, their complication rate within cosmetic surgery is very low and it generally goes well, but it doesn't always go without any issue. And the big, big question is if it happens, and it happens to me, what's going to happen then? Because everyone's a winner.

When you win and you go to Vegas? What happens if you lose your shirt? So that is super important because you are paying for an insurance policy you hope you never ever use. And so we're gonna talk extensively about that because that's what exactly happened to you, and we're going to talk about some of those key elements regarding that choice. So you put your foot down, you saw thirty surgeons. Good on you.

You did with your homework until you felt like it could be two surgeons, it could be one surgeon, it could be forty surgeons. The key is to just go until you feel like it's a click and then you can proceed. So you decided that you wanted to come down, We did our consults, we fell in love. It was love at first sight, and so we decided to proceed with the surgery.

So I'm gonna take a quick break and then we're gonna come back, and then we're going to talk about what actually happened. What happened to you on day seven. How did we handle it? And why are we so grateful that we didn't cut corners because in this particular instance, in your instance, I really solely believe and the reason why I have the other shows, I really think that if we had cut any corners, you may not be on the show today. All right, let's take a quick break.

We'll be right back with Classic Surgery Uncensored. Weocome back to the second half of Plastic Surgery Uncensored, and we're doing a deep dive with Christina from some remote island in Greece, and we're talking about Mommy Midicovers, which we've done many, many times, but we're highlighting some very significant issues that revolved around your experience. Before we get into what everyone's waiting to hear, which is what the what happened, I want to talk about one thing real quick, which is what you brought up before, which is the preoperative process. So here you were and you came down.

You told your husband, I'm going I'm going to spend the money. I'm ready. I found this guy. You come to my office.

I examine you, I asked you some questions. You tell me how tall are you? Five? A five eight, I asked you, and at the time, I said, how much do you weigh? What did you weigh? Three hundred and ten pounds three ten and I and then I examined you, and then all of a sudden, I said, you know, all right? This that the other and I said, side, I'd love to take your money. I have a son and a daughter on the way. I need your money, but you gotta lose weight.

You gotta lose a lot of weight. And I don't think you looked at me funny, But often patients are like, what so deflated's so disappointed. The whole thought process and it's so backass words is why would I lose weight? I'm willing to pay to get this shit off. I don't want to lose weight.

I can't lose weight. That's why I'm here. And the answer is I can't help you until you lose weight. And what I said to you and what you would what you just reiterated is I said, this is the problem.

I'm not so concerned about all the weight on the outside. I'm concerned about the weight on the inside. What is the weight on the inside. We have extra abdominal and what we call intra abdominal fat.

That's called visceral fat. That's the fat around your organs, on your momentum. And when I examine a patient and I say, relax your belly and that big bulge comes out, what am I looking for? I'm looking for flacidity. I'm looking that your belly is a floppy bag, and that when I put my hand against your abdomen and I push inwards, I can go right inside your abdomen.

What does that tell me? It tells me that your bulge is predominantly muscle separation and it's empty inside, which means that when I put these sutures, when I repair the muscles, I will push your belly into itself and hence create flattening. But if I go and push on your belly and your belly says uh uh and pushes right back out, and I have to push with great force to flatten your abdomen, that is the equivalent of me trying to close a drawer with a bowling ball stuck in it. Well, that ain't gonna happen, and you are absolutely going to fail the procedure. You will one hundred percent not be flat, not maybe not sort of there's no technique.

It's basic physics. There is X space, and there's why in it. It ain't gonna happen. You'll get rid of the loose skin and the hanging whatever, whatever, whatever, but you're not going to have a home run.

You're not going to look like a superstar. So I said to you, what So you told me about the bulling ball, and you said, whatever you need to do, lose the weight. And to be honest, my heart's sake, because I felt like that. I was like, wait, I'm coming to you to fix a problem.

I don't care about looking gorgeous and sexy like at the time, I was like, just fix my back pain. Fix the pain that I was having from having the muscle separation. And I remember leaving there very upset and everything. But at the end of it, when you told me, it was okay, now I have to do it.

So you said, figure out a way, lose weight, do whatever you need to get the weight off so you can have the surgery and then we'll see if you can get there. We can do it. And I left and I said, I'm going to do it. I'm going to find a way and make it happen, and so what did you do and how much weight did you lose? Yeah, so I did a specialized program from a doctor actually in Switzerland because I was struggling to lose weight, and basically it resets your metabolism.

So I do forty two days of weight loss thirty days of maintaining, and I did that for a whole year. I cut out all my cards, I cut out all my suites, I cut out my Starbucks copies, I cut out a lot with the commitment of this is going to be my new life and if I want to have this body, I have to do it. And I really lost about what came out to about ninety pounds, So it was a big and how long did that take you? A whole year? Okay? So I went everyone who's listening to listen very carefully. Are you listening? This is the key.

There is no magic, there is no quick there's no shortcut, there's no wonder drug. Even though there's a zempic now and everyone loves it. I don't actually give a shit how you lose the weight. I don't care if you do bariatric surgery and staple your stomach.

I don't care if you go on a starvation diet like Gandhi. I don't care if you do intermedfasting and have cheerios every day and subway. I don't care from a physics standpoint, if you want to look good, if you want to fix your muscle, forget about looking good the lead what I just said. If you want me to fix your diastasis so you can run again, play with your kids, get out of bed without having to roll to your side in a log role, I need you to lose sufficient weight so I can close the muscles the end.

As a bonus, you'll look good, you'll feel great, you'll have energy in all that stuff. Now, what you did was absolutely garden variety boring. You lost weight on diet and exercise. What a novel concept.

Holy shit. And I don't care if you went to Switzerland. All this lady has money. Oh that's not me.

I'm not gonna go to Switzerland. You don't need to go to Switzerland to know that you don't drink a venty triple shot a vanilla latte that has seven hundred calgy. I mean, you don't need to be a scientist to figure this shit out. You just need to suck it up and stop making excuses.

So if you don't want to moslotov awesome state the way you are, I'm happy for you. Just don't go waste twenty thirty forty thousand dollars, go through the surgery, have a shitty result, and then be bummed out that I just wasted all this money and I don't look any better and my back isn't better. So I wanted to highlight that because I think it's super important. And you showed up one hundred pounds slit lighter.

You didn't whine about it. You showed up my office. I examined you, and you said, doctor Ravan, what about now? And I looked at you and I said what, Yeah? So you're like wow? You were like holy crap. I said, congratulations, you just earned yourself a surgery.

First of all, good on you. Second of all, how much better does that feel? And third, I assure you you look spectacular right now. I'm not wonder I am certain you look spectacular because there's no way for me to have done. It's like painting pain Like I'm a painter.

I'm on a Vango Picasa, whoever the hell, and you ask me to paint you a mirror on tissue paper. It's gonna look like shit. Of course, it doesn't matter the artists if the canvas isn't correct, So great on you. So we wanted to just add that in.

It was a slight digression, but I think it was really important because you're absolutely right. I tell people that you can just see their faces just go blank, as if I'm you know, just just devastating them. And all I want from you, for you is awesome. I want you to look and feel awesome, and unfortunately I can't do that without your help.

Now, let's get to the crux of the issue here, so we do your mommy make over awesome. We're not gonna spend a lot of time talking about the traditional recovery. It was uncomfortable, but not too bad. You were your binder, you had two drains.

Everything was great, and it was Sunday, Saturday and Sunday. You were going to come into our office on that Tuesday to remove your drains, open up your bandages, and for us to give you a big hug and be like, wow, you made it. Everything's great. I get a phone call from you Monday morning.

Monday morning, that's seven days I did your surgery a week prior, a whole week. You're sitting in your Airbnb chilling with your husband, watching TV, doing exactly what I tell you, and you call our answering service. Let's begin with number one piece of insurance. You call my answering service.

Who do you get me? You'll get a live human being. Three in the morning, four in the morning, five in the morning, Saturday, Christmas, hanukkah, you kippor it don matter. You call the goddamn office and Hi, how can I help you? This is doctor Bond's office. I don't have to do that.

You understand though, right. I pay to have a live person because if I was a patient and I called with a complication or something, I don't want to leave a message with me leave a message. I don't want to do that. So that's number one.

So then they say, okay, we'll call the doctor. They called me, and then your husband was concerned because what had happened? Tell me what happened. So the funny thing is it wasn't even my husband. He was like sitting wait, you're okay.

I was the one who was like, no, something all right, So tell me what happened. That wasn't right, So you're just sitting there. It's Monday at three in the morning or whatever the hell it was. So what happened is on on Sunday, I started developing a cough, and later on I talked to my doctor and found out what it was.

But I started getting a tickle in my throat, so I kind of started getting a cough. And I kept copying, and I was trying to be careful coughing because you know, I was cut out your post stop and coughing is not fun, not done at all. And I was doing what I was. I put a pillow on my Domino's I have a cough.

That morning. I had a really bad cough. It was like almost a tickle where it chokes you. And I coughed really hard and I leaned up what I coughed, and then all of a sudden, I was like that really hurt.

And my husband's like, are you okay? And I'm like oh, And I looked at my drain and I go, this is not right. He's like what, So you have the drain. It's a small little container, right if it filled up one hundred percent with fresh blood, And I told my husband, we need to get it off. We need to drain it right now because it's filling up.

And he starts to squeeze it trying to drain it, and he goes, it's already claweded. I can't I can't get it out of the hole, like I can't move it. And I'm like, well, this is not normal. He goes, well, wait a little bit, maybe it's just it'll stop, and I said, no, it's not going to stop.

I think we need to call and see what to do. And so that's where I pushed to make a phone call to you to see what you wanted me to do. All right, So what happened basically, and I want you all to listen. First thing you need to know is this is super uncommon.

Twenty years I've been in practice, how many times does this happened to me? Zero? It's never happened. I've never had a patient at seven days totally fine, everything is great, no problems, and then all of a sudden at day seven, not day one, not day two, not day three after surgery, but day seven suddenly spring a massive leak and just start bleeding, bleeding so much that you would empty the drain, plug it back up hooop, fill up again, empty the drain, plug it back up foot and fill up again. So now you did the right thing, which is you called my office. Hi this doctor Bond service.

Oh my god, I got a problem. My blah blah blah. Okay, we'll have doctor Bond call you. I call you.

And where am I surgery? I'm in the surgery center. What am I doing when I'm talking to you in surgery? I'm in surgery. I'm in my surgery Monday morning. I have cases Monday morning.

We see you Tuesday and clinic. And then I say, all right, Christina, what's going on? Tell me what's going on? You're like, well, I don't know. I was fine, I said, what was in the train before? Nothing? It was empty, it was almost completely clear. I was done.

And then I started having this coughing fit and I bulged forward, and all of a sudden it started feeling and now I just feel a lot of pressure and there's blood coming out of the right and it's started to come out of left. And I'm like, I said to you, what get in here now? I said, come to the surgery center. Did I say go to the er? Did I say go to the office. Yep did.

I say, just give it some time and let's just see what happens. I said, get your ass up, have your husband drive you to the surgery center. I'm here. Don't eat and don't drink anything before you come here.

So I'm in surgery. For all of you listening, I finished my surgery. No rush, nobody was at no, no animals were harmed in this experiment, because I already know what you Oh my god, he was a surgery. What about that, poor lady? Everyone did great.

I came out. You had an IVY already started. And I came up and I said, all right, Christina, how you feeling? Said, uhh, I'm okay. Not so great.

I could tell you were a little bit stressed out. Your husband looked like he was about to have a heart attack. He was like, just panic. I opened up your binder.

I opened up all your dressings because they were supposed to come off tomorrow, meaning the next day, and I looked and you had a massive him atoma. What the hell does that mean? It means inside your abdomen where we had operated, not intra abdominant, not around your organs, but in the space above. There was a massive collection of blood and it was already black and blue and as tense as a tambourine. So we did what what did we do? Took me into surgery right away.

There was there was no hesitation, there was no nothing. You examined it, you looked at it, and you're like, we're gonna run you in right now. We're prepping the surgery room and we're gonna go take care of it. There was I love the fact that, even under the pressure and everything that was going on and your other clients around, it was here's what we have to do, let's go do it right now.

And that was something that made me feel very comfortable. So I went and spoke to the next patient. I said, I'm so sorry, honey. I apologize.

We have a small problem. This is what's going on. Of course, every patient would understand because they pray and hope that it's not them. And I said, we're gonna have to delay you.

We shouldn't take more than in about an hour, and spoke to the antisteologist, as you know, is amazing, and everyone came together. We took you into the operating room. We opened up a section, not the entirety, a section of your abdomen where the blood was. We drained out like I don't know how many c seas of blood, A lot, A lot.

I found a tiny, tiny, I want you guys to listen, A tiny little blood vessel, a shitty little blood vessel that was just going What what does that mean? It means there was a There are thousands of blood vessels that we go through during your surgery. We cauterize them. Everything is fine, but at the end of the day, if you rub one or too much pressure curse, one of these thousands can pop a leak. And indeed it did, and it was a little vessel that took literally like eh, and it was gone.

But that stupid little vessel was the source of this massive bleeding, which frankly required for you to end up getting admitted in the hospital because we went ahead and drained the hematoma, cleaned everything up. Everything was fine, but we put you in recovery and everything was closed and I came in looked at you. We left you in recovery while we were doing the other cases and checked on you on the monitor and you seemed a little depleted. Uh yeah, I just lost like I don't know, four leaders of blood in about three hours.

So what did we do next? So this is where it really makes the difference. Right, So you had well, you were in surgery and your nurse came in and I told him I felt cold, and he was like, I'll get hee some blankets. And I stopped him and I was very sleepy. I didn't feel well, and I said, no, no, you don't understand.

I feel cold on the inside. I don't. I don't feel cold on the outside, feel cold inside of my body. And he looked at me, and he goes, I'll be back, and he went and he got you, and you looked at me.

He felt my feet, he touched me, look at the monitor, and you were like, nope, we need to send her to the emergency room right now. So you already knew what you know. You already knew that I needed blood. You already knew that I wasn't doing well, and you didn't hesitate on it.

All right, So I want everyone to listen. I can't even tell you how much this speaks volume. Not because I'm such a hero. That's not what this is about.

This is about what I'm going to get to at the end, which is if you cut corners if you if you do something that isn't right, in the one in a million, one in a thousand that you're that person, you're in deep shit. So you came in. I did the surgery, everything stopped bleeding, but you had already lost that blood. So what did I say.

I looked at you you and I said, hmm, she doesn't look so fantastic. I don't want to send her back to an airbnb. We want to transfer to the hospital. Now we now know.

Recently there was a case a beautiful young girl who died after a breast augmentation because she coded because a doctor did not want to call for the ambulance for five hours. Why Because if I call for the ambulance and you get transferred, it's a reportable incident for me. I have to write down that you had a complication, and it's bad on me. That has nothing to do with me.

You're seven days out from surgery. For all I know, you went to Magic Mountain. It doesn't matter. I don't want to report this because then I have to explain myself and I get scrutinized.

So that doctor did not call the ambulance thinking he could manage it. The girl died, so we're not gonna not. And then I'm on staff. I'm at staff at a hospital.

I don't have to just send you to a hospital the er by yourself and then hope somebody takes care of you. I'm at a staff at a hospital one mile away from yours where we did your surgery. They come pick you up, they take you to the hospital. Who's there the next day? You me, I'm there? Why because I have privileges.

I'm on staff, and then I coordinate your care with the ICU doctors because I am your doctor. And I want you all to listen carefully. If you Christina had gone to Guatemala, I am certain you would be dead. If you Christina had gone home, you would be dead.

So many patients have pushedback, how long do I need to stay in La? Two weeks? Two weeks? Airbnb? I gotta pay for this, yes, two goddamn weeks. Two weeks, so you are not that far away. You come, you do your surgery, and you go home because it's cheaper. It's easier to go home.

And this happens to you while you're home. What are you gonna do? I would go to an emergency room. Where I am, which I'm in a great area. But still, here's what I want to say.

If I would have gone to some egency room, they would have ripped me apart. And because when I had a scan at the emergency room for our situation, they said I had a chemo TomEE in inside my dominal muscles. But that was what you stitched up. They didn't know what it was.

They didn't know al if it would have been a disaster. All I wanted to make this is the reason why we had you on the show. The reason we had you on the show is because shit happens. It's going to happen.

It is impossible, it doesn't happen. What we want to know and what we hope for in life is that when shit happens, we're on the right side of that equation. And the key is take find someone who will be there when you hit the shit happens, doesn't run away, doesn't skirt their responsibility, heads it first, and you've done the right things by crossing your ses. You're crossing your t's and dotting your eyes.

If I didn't have privileges, i'd have to send you some remote hospital. I didn't want to send you in. You could have collapsed here in the recovery center. If I would have just delayed and kept kicking the can forward like you're fine, put pressure on it, It'll be okay.

You could have exchangminated in your airbnb if if you had gone home, you could have died on the way home. There's so many of these scenarios. Instead, you went to the hospital, terrible, awful, they gave you blood. You went home, and right now you'll look amazing.

No one in a millionaire, because I went right through the incision, close it beautifully, and no one is the wiser. And yes, we went from A to C to B, but we got there and nothing bad happened. And that is the moral of this particular story and why your podcast and your journey is so critical. And it isn't because oh I'm the only one.

It's just becoming fur farther, more and more rare and less and less common that we do things the right way, because plastic surgery is becoming this sort of you know, very lighthearted whatever whatever. And you hear Miami death, Colorado death, death, death, death. These things are happening because people are cutting corners right and so I really, really, really I'm happy that you're on the show because I wanted to emphasizes because this happened at seven days, not at two days, where it's common, and you're right around the town. You could have easily gone home by seven days.

What if you were in an airplate when you're coughed, and it was an eight hour flight and you were over an ocean and you were going back to my patients from Dubai seventeen hours, we can do crash landing, and like you know, there's so many such scenarios, and you bled silk so much so fast that by three four hours you already had four units of blood. So at any rate, you're awesome. How do you feel today? How far out are you? By the way, I think I am about two months if I remember correctly, two months. Tell me how you feel.

I love it. So I'm in I'm on the island of Crete in Greece. I'm actually traveling Greece for trainings that I'm doing for Relsta agents out here, and I feel amazing. I'm still getting used to using my Domino muscles on triang really hard to make sure I'm always using because I haven't used it for so long, and I put on a bathing suit.

I put on a little outfit bathing suit. What the hell you just wore into hospital? How could you be wearing a bathing suit. You're supposed to look like you just got hit? Know I truck you? Nope, And I want to tell every when. So even with the situation that I had being reopened because of the lead that I had, my stitches and the scars that I have still look amazing, Like you can't even tell that it was opened up again.

They're so tiny, they're so small, and I look in the mirror every day and I just kind of hold my body like I love it. So it's great. I look great. I love it, And I'm so grateful that I found you and I that we are.

We did this together because I want the best. I know you have to pay for the best, but I want to tell everyone who's listening that if you feel like it's a lot of money, save a little longer and do it when you can afford it and you feel comfortable having these unexpected things happen. I had ambulance bill, I had hospital bills, I had to stay in my airbnb and extra week I had expenses I did not expect. The way I look at is, you know what, I'm going to borrow some money, I'm going to pay for what I have to do.

I'm just going to do what I have to do to make it happen. But at the end of the day, I'm sitting here, I have my four kids, I'm healthy, I love the way I look, the way I feel. Everything I did was well worth it. And people keep telling me, why would you do something like that? I'm like, because I want to have an amazing body in twenty years.

I want to have ability to do things that I've never done before. I don't want to deteriorate over the next You know, my lifetime, right, I'm only forty. I have a long lifetime to go. Yes, you do well, Listen, it was a pleasure having you.

I'm so grateful and honored that you let me take care of you. You know, I'm so happy that we were able to navigate this very unexpected event together in as good a way as we possibly can. And most importantly, I'm so happy that you feel beautiful and sexy, because that's really what the ultimate and functioning well, that's what the goal is. All right, guys, So as always two things.

One, if you love our show, do me a favor. Share it with people you love. This is a perfect example. You never know who's gonna want to do what, So if you love the show, you should share it with the people that you care about.

And secondly, go write something nice. Everybody writes nasty shit all day on TikTok and Keyboard Warriors and everyone, go write something nice. If you like our show and it's helpful, We love something nice. It makes everyone who puts the show together feel like they're doing something worthwhile.

All right, Christina, go enjoy the rest of Greece. Send me some photos until next time, your host, Doctor Rady Rahban signing off on plastic surgery uncensored.