Hello Friends! Here's my update. I saw my doctor last week and got treatment with kenalog steroid injections. We did the same routine, with lidocaine cream to numb the area, then biofreeze spray simultaneously with the steroid injections to relieve the pain.

After my treatment, my doctor mentioned a different approach to treatment that I have been thinking about. The new approach would be that my scars would be surgically removed (again) followed by radiation therapy. The new part of this treatment would be the radiation part. It wasn't the first time she's told me about radiation therapy, but it wasn't until now that I've been seriously considering it. I have had my scars surgically removed before in 2012, and they came back even bigger than before. You can see the progress from previous posts.

I've tried all treatments from laser, surgery, steroid injections, cordran tape (steroid tape), silicon tape, essential oils....everything! I am desperate to get rid of my scars, but nothing really seems to work. I couldn't do the radiation therapy right away though. I would need to lose weight before the new approach. I've been in grad school for the past two years, and during this time---I've gained a lot of weight. The scar and weight gain has been huge factors effecting my self confidence. So some good from this talk with my doctor is that I'm motivated more than ever to lose this extra weight that I've put on over the past few years.

Because the scars would be surgically removed, I would need to lose weight before the surgery. My scars on located in my chest, where skin is very tight---and if I were to do this surgery/radiation treatment, I would need to lose enough weight so that there would be enough elasticity to close my incision without so much tension. The doctor said this has worked for the majority of her patients. I think we've done the steroid route for so long, maybe she's afraid it's no longer working. For now, I'm still leaning towards less aggressive treatments. I'm just so afraid that my scars will become bigger if I surgically remove them again. I want to do more research on radiation therapy and look into success rates first.

If I go with radiation treatment, it's going to be a long and well-thought out decision. As much as I want my scars to be removed, I don't want to risk them coming back bigger than ever.

In my opinion, the scars do feel a lot softer and less painful after the injections. However, I have noticed that they have been growing over the years even with the steroid injections. My concern is that I don't feel like my current approach has been aggressive enough. After 3 months, we always take a break from the steroids. But I want to keep going consistently until we see some big changes. My doctor says it's not good to have too many steroid injections though, so I've been putting my faith in her approach.

So for now, I'm doing the silicon sheets and cordran tape in between sessions. Stay tuned!