The Next Stage
Here it is! Finally talking about the next step of our experiences with plastic surgery and Banobagi. Remember how I promised in the previous post there would be funny pictures? Well, here they are in all their brutally honest hilarity – I can laugh at them now along with everyone else, but it was hard not to feel sorry for yourself when you felt like crap and looked like you had the most severe case of mumps known to medicine.
I remember thinking in the haze of post-surgery anaesthesia that everything would only get better from here. After all, my face felt like they were distended to their maximum capacity and couldn’t possible get any larger. Note to self: apparently swelling reaches its critical peak one to two days post operation. Note to self 2: it can and it will get bigger.
The good news is that it truly will get better from this point onwards. The bad news is that it would not be a very enjoyable ride until then. I was icing my face fanatically, hoping that it would have an impact on the rate of swelling (or deswelling, to be specific). Two ice packs come with the compliments of Banobagi, an extremely thoughtful gesture on their part since the ice packs take turn chilling in the fridge. Sleep for the first few days largely revolved around ice pack changing times. Fortunately this task was made easier with the presence of a large fridge in the kitchen area of the guest house.
Upon arrival to the guest house, Banobagi has also thoughtfully provided us with instant porridges and soy milk. I have been unable to ingest anything besides water for the past 48 hours, so soy milk almost feel like a complete meal in exchange. Porridge was completely beyond my capabilities at this point and my only sustenance was a steady supply of soy milk and banana milk which I purchased from a convenience store right around the corner. I do believe that the other guests who did not have jaw surgery were provided with meals (which looked and smelled absolutely scrumptious). It sounds more miserable than I actually felt. My appetite was somewhat dampened and I did not really feel hungry very often.
Blood had also somehow collected under my eyes, giving the impression of rather severe eye bags. These went away after a couple of days though and did not affect me all that much. I think the most uncomfortable aspect of the whole recovery process was that I was not able to brush my teeth. I had to use antiseptic mouth washes provided by the clinic and was warned against using toothpaste until all the internal sutures have been removed.
The days passed by rather quickly. I spent my entire stay there catching up on TV series and movies, and generally just dicking about online. Short walks interspersed this routine and helped keep cabin fever at bay.
Banobagi is located in the Gangnam district of Seoul, and there wasn’t really much to do at night. I didn’t feel up to shopping and cafe hopping (the two major Korean pastimes, it seems) so I just wandered around the neighbourhood. I felt incredibly safe, and as mentioned no one gives you a second look even if you were all bandaged up like me. The highlight of my nightly walks is always this veterinary practice/boarding house. I just stood outside and stared at all the cute dogs like a creep.
My favourite one in particular was this dog which always seemed so friendly and relaxed! Anyone knows what breed this may be? I thought it might have been a beagle cross but I’m not too sure. Whatever it is, it is adorable.
Day 5 was when I was promised there would be a big change. The recovery brochure assured me that the swelling would decrease immensely once the bandages have been removed. I hadn’t even realised how tight they were until I was removing them – it was rather painstaking since they were incredibly sticky, and yanking at it really irritated the sutures in front of my ears. The removal process worked exponentially better after I have soaked the bandages in oil-based makeup remover. I believe coconut oil or even olive oil would work as well.
The bandages constricted the fluids to my face and the swelling went away incredibly quickly now that it was able to drain downwards. I found that sleeping with my head elevated really aided in the process as well.
Now that the both of us felt better, we moved out of the guest house and checked into a hotel in the heart of Myongdong! A large part of the recovery process was really in the mind and I really felt leaps and bounds better now that I was able to get outside and do things. With a pair of sunglasses and a face mask, I could almost pass as normal (albeit with passing resemblance to Michael Jackson). I have went without washing my hair for six days now, way too long in the summer heat. You can see from the picture on the left how grotty it looked. It felt even worse. (I think my mum would have an aneurism if she found out how long I went without a wash.) I was planning to find a hair salon for the sake of convenience, but having found none with a reasonable price I took the task upon myself. Here it is looking much cleaner on the right. The right side of my face remained much more swollen and I kind of looked as if I had a stroke.
I was finally able to ingest semi-solid food at this point as well! We treated ourselves to ginseng chicken porridge but some parts of it still remained too hard for me to eat. Smoothie King proved to be a godsend! It was rather agonising because I wish I had sampled all the street food when I still could.
Find out how it went in week 2 in the next post! I could already see a difference then, and would love to know what you think about it!
Read more about our experience here:
Part one
