I am having my sleeve done on Tuesday and getting very scared. I have all these questions running though my head non stop.

Anyway just curious how everyone's scars are after surgery? Are they very noticable or are they so small they fade away?

I have more scars than most patients, but mine are fading, and a pretty shade of pink. I'm a nice pasty pinkish-white skin tone. I don't really notice them anymore, but they are there.

I am a week shy of 6 months post-op. I've always had a difficult time with scarring and these vsg scars are no different. They are still very evident (dark) and I'm prepared to not have them ever go away completely.

Just for some background...I had a wart removed by laser 20 years ago, the doctor said the scar would lighten and pretty much disappear over two years. Well, that scar still looks pretty much the same as it did when I was in 5th grade (a little lighter). If I got blemishes on my face, they scarred whether I picked at them or not. I've had many dermatologists over the years, prescribe or recommend different creams or serums, but they've never seemed to help.

This is my experience/story and am not trying to scare anyone, just give an honest account. Maybe if you normally don't have scarring issues, you will be fine eventually. For me the scars are not an issue and not nearly as bad as the stretch marks on my hips.

i am 9 weeks out and my scars ...all 5 of them are still very obvious..my guess is that they will fade like my gallbladder scars did..time will tell. Doesn't bother me a bit tho.

Battle scars!

k

At 2.5 years out from my band, you can't even see the scars. I now havenew scars from band removal and sleeve surgery. I'm assuming they'll fade like the band ones did. It really depends on your skin and how it heals. My red headed, fair skinned friend has 5 yr old scars from her band surgery that are very obvious. I used Merderma on my band scars and will start using it on my new ones soon.

I'm 48 and don't plan to EVER wear a bikini again, so I'm not too concerned about it! LOL

Edited January 24, 201016 yr by annak4

mine are still noticable but i don't care, it's my battle wounds and my success scars. . but i had my gallbladder taken out in 1996 under laproscopic procedure and they are so faded you really really have to look closely, i'm thinking this is what will happen to these too. . . however if you smoke or have diabetes then the scars will take longer to heal and may look different . . .

How many incisions will we have? For some reason I am thinking five or six...is that correct? I know Dr. Davidson uses staples. Is that common?

How many incisions will we have? For some reason I am thinking five or six...is that correct? I know Dr. Davidson uses staples. Is that common?

I had 4 with my band surgery, and they used all of those plus one other one.

I had sutures with band surgery over the port incision which my revision surgeon used the same incision to remove the excised portion of the stomach. With my revision incision, all they used was a type of skin glue, no sutures, no staples, and it took almost 3 weeks for the skin glue to finally flake off in the shower. It wasn't the blue/dermabond type of skin glue. It was pretty cool because I had zero sutures or staples.

Because of my complications, I did end up with more incisions. I have a total of 10 or 11 scars on my abdomen, but all of them are shrinking and fading pretty good.

I did buy some Mederma, but I'm not good applying it on a regular basis. I caught it on sale for $20 from skinwest.com

I heard that prefer-on stuff works to help fade scars just as good as the Mederma.