operation jaw break = top jaw surgery fun!: May 2013

5/31 - friday faces

friday is for faces!!

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5/31 - friday fun

i did that crazy yawn/clank my jaws together again early this morning. not too fun. hurt like hell.

the rest of today was all about eating i guess. :)

lunch was chicken and dumplings. yummy!! had to blend real well. but once again, it needed to be strained. don't think i want any of these bits in my teeth. plus it can clog my rubber tubing mouth piece.

dinner was fueled by another craving... chinese. so mom made some chicken teriyaki. i made some egg drop soup. once again... very yummy.

also had a mint chocolate ice cream shake. that was great. kinda hard because we didn't chop the chocolate bits up enough. but i manage to suck some down. YAY!

i had to let my doggie know that we were going to be going home tomorrow. i think he is going to miss this patio. i am working on smiling. haha it's still pretty hard. the area around my nose still hurts when i try to move it. and with the numbness it just feels weird and doesn't do what you want it to do. i had mom take this photo. thought i'd share.

5/30 - thursday faces

yay for thursday face photos!

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5/30 - thursday tips

today's tips:

#1: you can never have enough paper towels.

tip #2: make a staging area. mom made up two catch-all bins also. i know, it sounds silly. but seriously. you need a box for all the meds and a box for the plastic stuff. we are constantly washing and rinsing out the medicine syringes, the drinking/eating syringes, sippy cups and the cool condiment jar things. it helps to have them all in one area. they can just be thrown into the box while they are drying.

tip #3: make sure you call for refills before the weekend. took my last dose of this today. and the doctor isn't open on the weekend. so we called for refills of both the ibuprofen and the vicodin. i am almost out of the vicodin. even though i am not taking it as much, i don't want to be without it. i am still numb in areas. if those areas wake up before i'm healed i am sure i will want some pain meds. so it's better to be safe than sorry.

i have a list of things you should have in the hospital on hand after surgery. i'll post it later this weekend. i keep thinking of things so i have been jotting them down.

also, i woke up this morning with another painful event. i yawned and my jaws went haywire. they opened what i can only imagine was way wider than they are supposed to... then slammed shut. brought back together by the bands. it's hell to have your jaws opening out of habit while half asleep. once again, i nearly was in tears it hurt so bad.

5/29 - wednesday face photos

here are today's photos... plus a little bonus one. the last one shows my gnarly lip. i wish i could explain how much my lips and cheeks hurt. :(

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5/29 - wednesday

so the food craving thing is no fun. but i think i may have found a solution for the mexican food craving. mom found this chicken enchilada soup on one of her grocery store runs. dang it was good. blended up nicely. i did stain it though. you have to be careful that you don't let any little seasoning flakes or chicken bits get through.

in other news...
- my face is all twitchy and weird feeling
- the feeling in my bottom lip is coming back in bits
- the area between my eyebrows right above my nose is still puffy.
- been sleeping better. that pillow is awesome
- today is the last day that i have to take my antibiotics
- still haven't looked at my stitches
- still have bloody boogers

5/28 - tuesday face photos

dang it... i forgot to take pictures before we went to the doctor. i actually put on a little eye make up. so i didn't look like death. oh well.

10:10pm

5/28 - one week doctor follow-up and then some...

i had my one-week follow-up with the surgeon today. it went well. i was super nervous though. i just knew that he was going to want to adjust the bands or touch my stitches area. my inner lips and cheeks are so raw that just moving my lips around is taxing. i like to blow air in my mouth to get them away from all the metal and rubber. it provides some instant relief.

ok, back to my doctor appointment news... he did looks around in my mouth. but he used these little cotton squab things. so it wasn't too bad. i had to laugh though. he asked me to open at one point. i wasn't sure if he meant my lips or my jaws. haha. he meant jaws. so i had to open and show him that i could move with the bands. that was a bit unnerving. i still can;t really tell how much i'm opening my jaws. so no telling what he saw.

i asked about my stitches. we never discussed that before. guess we forgot. i told him that i have no idea what is going on up there. dis-solvable stitches or the kind you have to have removed. i told him that i haven't explored it at all, just left it alone. he kinda chuckled and quickly told me "oh, don't explore" as if to tell me that i wouldn't like what i found. haha

he told me there were at least 15 stitches. he didn't really count. he also said that there was a baseball-type of stitch. cool baseball! i think i might look later. just maybe.

he said he really likes the way my bite is and everything looks great. he didn't want to change the bands or anything. he said he may need to trim any stitches next appointment that are hanging or anything. YAY!

he even told me that i could start brushing a little. he told me to get one of those toddler brushes and use a little of the medicated rinse. i can officially start brushing what i feel comfortable brushing. i just have to be careful. i'm thrilled.

i made my two-week appointment and we left. :)

after we got home i celebrated with a great lunch - cheese beer soup and bar-b-que chicken. yea, that's right. BBQ chicken... canned chicken, broth and some bbq sauce. it blended up nicely.

that afternoon i finished the candy puzzle. i know, you were wondering. :) earlier that week my brother hid a piece of the puzzle. i was in on the the little prank. that afternoon we had fun with it. fingers were being pointed as to who has it. everyone was blaming everyone else. my dad swore the puzzle makers didn't package it correctly. mom just knew my nephew had done it. it was like watching a TV sitcom or something. later when my brother came to pick up my nephew he let everyone in on the gag. too funny.

in other news... my flowers still look good. i trimmed them and took out some of the dead ones. i even made a couple extra little arrangements with them for other places in the house. :)

that evening i was able to make it out to my nephew's baseball game. i was super tired, but it was fun. i am not sure if this is the vicodin talking... but i thought it was highly ironic and super funny that i was sitting at a baseball game with baseball stitches in my mouth.

and to those wondering... here's my new best friend. man it felt good to brush. i focused on the back teeth. i know there are no stitches back there. and plus that is where i have been forcing all the food and drinks to go. i also brushed the bottom front ones. i was too afraid to go near the top stitches-zone. no way.

5/27 - one week face photos and video

in celebration of it being one week i gathered all the face images from the past week. i put them together in a little slide show. it's cool and shows the progression and swelling. here's the video...

here are today's face photos.

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5/27 - it's been a week!!

i can't believe it's been a week since my surgery. i've come a long way. i know i still have a long road ahead of me. but damn, i've come a long way. i am taking my pills easily. my swelling has gone down a lot. i'm talking better. i'm sleeping better. all in all i think i am doing better than i thought i would be doing. so yay!

i even had coffee this morning!! right from the ketchup bottle and thinner tubing top. it was yummy. haven't had any coffee since before the surgery.

great news... today is last day i have to take those steroid pills!

today mom made carrots. it was so yummy. the only problem is that we have been having trouble with the two big syringes. i had a little accident with the carrots. oops.

for dinner i had roasted chicken and vegetable soup. threw it in the blender and it was great.

i decided to read one of the cool animal fact cards aloud and film myself. i will do it again next monday so i can see the progress. you can really see how the top lip isn't really working yet.

here's the video. enjoy.

5/26 - sunday face photos

here's today's shiny-face photos.

and there's the bruise. that's even cooler... NOT!

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