This is part three from the story about my corrective jaw surgery combined with plastic surgery. You can read part 1 here and part 2 here.
… So I arrived home from the hospital, against doctor’s orders, my head wrapped (in bloody bandages) like an easter egg.
I was so relieved to be back home!!! Leaving the hospital felt like escaping from jail. At home, the circumstances were not ideal, with the BF leaving for a week of skiing with his friends the next day. Luckily the BFF offered to be there for me, whenever I needed her, which was very reassuring.
As I said in part 2, my face was unrecognizable; inflated and deformed. My head looked like a pufferfish, a football and a hamster… a very ugly hamster.
During the weeks to follow, I looked in the mirror numerous times each day, hoping to suddenly see my own face again, instead of looking at a creature that was unfamiliar to me. Needless to point out that no matter how often I looked in that mirror, it did not speed up my recovery in any way.
The first week, my nights were spent on the couch, half asleep, half awake, catching up on movies on DVD.
I lost weight, as a result of the liquid diet. One of the rare perks of having your jaws sawn in half;-).
My face deflated a bit, day after day. The discolorations lessened each day as well. Little by little, the hamster-from-hell in the mirror got replaced my me.
Not little old me, since the new jaw had changed my face. But my reflection in the mirror at least looked familiar and pleasant again.
There were some post-surgery complications; my new occlusion was not good, so a molar had to be pulled. And the pain remained, especially in and around my left ear. My BF regularly found me crying from the pain and it drove him crazy, not being able to help me.
After about three to four months I finally was pain-free.
Picture below: a few weeks after surgery. Swollen face, not able to close my mouth and black and blue down to my cleavage. My mum sits next to me, visiting her recovering daughter.
As soon as the jaw bone had grown back together, I was allowed to brush my teeth again, but first the orthodontist removed the yellow color from my teeth. A bonus-effect of 6 weeks gargling with a special teeth-yellow-ing fluid (instead of teeth brushing).
There were still some months of braces to go before the whole process of my corrective jaw surgery came to an end.
And actually, that was not even the end.
Picture below: about a month after the surgery. My eyes look pretty, the shape of my face is almost back to normal. Still some discoloration on my neck and I can see that I’m in pain.
I know that many doctors and nurses are great: skilled, kind, hard-working. This heartfelt cry is not for them.
My cry from the heart is meant for medical staff like the ones that I encountered during my last hospital stay (read part 2), who made me flee the hospital in barely 36 hours:
“Dear nurses and doctors:
I know that your workload is enormous, the pressure is high and some patients may treat you like crapp. I get that.
Still, patients in general are people at their most vulnerable. They are in pain and discomfort. They are sick and sometimes afraid and emotional.
I hope that you will always remember that. That you will stay able to see patients as people instead of as numbers or troublemakers. That you can stay kind and human. The way you treat us, patients, is crucial. We depend on you and need you.
Thank you for your attention and keep up the good work!”
Corrective jaw surgery can be a necessity, like for me to preserve my teeth or for a friend of mine to cure his life-endangering sleep apnea.If you have a choice though, I do not recommend this surgery. It is invasive, complex and the whole process can take a long time from beginning to end. In my case a bit over two years. I find it a surgery that should not be underestimated.
Do you know anybody who has had corrective jaw surgery? Did they sail through the whole process without too much problems? Or did they find it quite a big deal, in hindsight?
The post Life after corrective jaw surgery appeared first on Curly Traveller.