"I coulda been a contender..."

This morning was my first post-op follow up with my Dr. He basically filled me in on what went "wrong". Nothing with the surgery itself went wrong, it's just that they had to wire me shut when they didn't believe that they would. The reason for this is that, basically, my bottom jaw bone was so strong. He said I could've had a real career as a fighter because it would've been near impossible to break it from taking a punch. At least that's what I took it to mean, because these guys went in with the sole purpose of TRYING to break that jaw, with precision based medical instruments hacking away at the bone, and it took them 2 extra hours in large part because of that. So yes, I will take that as a compliment and that "I coulda been a contender..."

Everything else with my appointment went pretty well. My big concerns were with my lips (which are pretty disgusting), my stomach (due to meds and not being able to take in much), my teeth (again, gross) and these two mystery bandages I had left on my face after surgery.

The issue with my lips are that A). they are numb, which I expected and B.) I didn't know what more I should be doing to protect them from infection/excessive chapping. It went so far as I was pulling full layers of "stuff" off of my lips, and not knowing if it was super-dried chapstick or lip skin. My lips are starting to get feeling back in them, but it really didn't hurt to do that so I don't know what it was exactly. Any lip experts out there? Could chapstick form a layer and harden then get peeled off?

The other issue with my lips are that at the corners it is real bad with lots of crud in there. Basically I was told it's going to be pretty bad for awhile because there is lots of extra skin there being stretched and moved but that it will settle down normally soon.

My stomach has been another real issue. I think I was really taking it hard from these cocktails of medicines they have me on (penicilin, hydrocodone and motrin). So I asked if there were any specific purpose to me taking these drugs, or if I could just cut them out. They said if i wasn't in pain it'd be fine to cut them out so that's what I'm going with - as much as I can. Seriously, I am amazed at how much non-pain there is in my mouth. I have two surgically moved jaws and my biggest complaint is about my shoulder haha. Pretty amazing stuff. I should've talked more trash and got in more fights in high school. Although now I'm worried 1/4th of my jaw is now glass...I won't say which one is my achilles heel though...but it is DEFINITELY not the lower left jaw bone that didn't get done as FULLY as they were hoping...definitely not that one.

The other issue that i had were my teeth...I cracked my lips open the other day to take a look at them, and it is not a pretty sight in there. I think I have some dried blood left on them. Ew. They're still pretty sore (I tried touching one) but in the next day or two I'm gonna start trying to gently brush them. Gross, I know. Sorry for that.

The last major question I had were these two mystery bandages I have on the outside of my face on the outside of my jaws. I was too worried to take them off and investigate myself. I knew they had to go in and make a small incision there to get to part of my jaw but I didn't know if they needed stitches or not. Turns out, they did! I have two small stitches on each side of my face currently. Those come out next week in my visit with the Doctor.

So those were all of the major issues that I had today when I met with my surgeon. He said that recovery has seemingly gone pretty much according to plan and he thinks I will be happy with the results. I won't truly be happy with the results though, unless I can for once in my life, bite my fingernails like a normal obsessive person!

Stay classy everyone!