Arm nerve pain post surgery

Hi Newbie3312, numbness is very normal, you may get tingling down the track when things start to heal more.  I remember shooting pains after surgery. It’s early days yet as you have just had surgery, your body is saying what the hell just happened, take pain relief and do your exercises. 

@Newbie3312 the exercises that Tinks suggested are what I was given too. The level one is for the first couple of days after surgery then start doing all of them on day three onwards but if you haven’t done any probably start with the first group. My breast nurse referred me to the physiotherapist for some others. I think there’s some videos on this web site, too. Good luck xx

I had a single mastectomy and auxiliary clearance ten days ago. Three days ago I was in so much pain with it shooting down my arm and in my shoulder. I have a nurse that comes daily and she was doing her best to try to help. In the end saw gp who sent me straight to my specialist/ surgeon who took out the drain as it was sitting on a nerve. I can’t tell you the immediate relief I got.  Not sure if it is the same as yours but my best advice is trust your gut. If it feels not right then do something ( I needed to be told this yesterday morning when I was crying with the pain and I have a high tolerance for pain). It’s your body so please don’t think terrible pain is ok as it’s nit. I hope this helps and let us know how you get on x

@Tinks thank you 🥰

Here’s the initial exercises I was given in hospital from The Cancer Council.


https://www.cancer.org.au/content/about_cancer/factsheets/Breast%20exercises%20after%20surgery_fact%20sheet_September%202014.pdf

Lots of love Tinks xx

@primek thank you. Will try that. It’s the catching that’s the worst atm. It is just at random times and drops me to floor. From the posts I’m assuming this is all normal. I wasn’t told about any side effects after surgery so just trying to work my way thru things. 

I had pain from my sentinel node biopsy and mastectomy and it was a real issue for me. I couldn't stand things touching it. It wasn't  an issue initially but as healing progressed as nerves cut in skin started to reconnect a little. I ended up on lyrica for a short time and once able to tolerate my physio suggested to brush the skin lightly to help desensitize. I did this a couple of times a day and was off lyrica quickly. I still have numb areas but no nerve pain now. The skin brushing really helped.

That’s very poor from staff!  I no longer have mine (committed to memory long ago) but someone on the network may be able to copy and paste for you. Apart from providing help with mobility and repairing mangled nerve ends, the exercises help prevent lymphoedema - unlikely to occur in your case with only a few nodes removed. Just good to do all round. 

@kezmusc thanks. What arm exercises were you given ? I’ve been basically sent home with no instructions which is why I posted here...

Hi @Newbie3312 I had the same thing but the BS assistant told me they hadn’t touched the nerves and that it wasn’t their issue. Felt like someone had a knife in there and was twisting it. Weeks later I spoke to my BS who assured me they dug All around that area and the pain in the back of my arm would be because of that. He suggested I just keep taking pain relief until it went. I objected to this so did my own thing. I massaged it a lot especially when it hurt. Seemed to help a bit. I still get random stabs of pain there eighteen months later but I have learned to tolerate it.