My Double Jaw Surgery: Day 5 After Surgery:

Thankfully today there has been a more significant drop in pain. No narcotics today, so that is a win. My upper lip is still quite swollen and the internal incision just under my nose seems to be my main source of pain. I know my way around what an incision site should look like, so i tried to get a view into the area to make sure I don't have an infection. My darn upper lip is so thick though that it makes it quite immobile. I couldn't actually pull my lip away from my teeth to see the actual sutures (stitches). Oh well, better to leave it alone at this point, as it's only been 5 days and there were several layers of tissue that were cut through. No wonder my upper lip can't move yet...

Here I am attempting a smile - see, that upper lip just refuses to move - like a botched up botox job. My neck has a pretty good bruise today, but the rest of my face really doesn't look too bad other than the upper lip which is still significantly swollen, as mentioned above. And the facial recognition software on my iPhone X now recognizes me and unlocks the screen when I look at it, which is the first time it's done that since surgery.

What's interesting though is how my face actually feels. It's as though one of my dentist colleagues loaded me up with local anesthesia just for practice (believe it or not, this is how we all learned how to injections while in dental school...), especially around my nose, lips and chin. That whole area feels huge and puffy, and very cold. I am getting slight sensation back around the upper lips and one lower lip, so that is a good sign.

My upper jaw is being held in place with a large acrylic splint, which is somewhat like a nightguard looks like. During the surgery my palate was split apart, so the splint was wired into place against the buttons that were placed on my teeth the week prior. So now my entire maxilla feels numb and enlarged, plus I have a bulky splint wired over the teeth. I know there are metal plates holding my maxilla and mandible, but what it feels like is that my entire maxilla is made out of metal. Like what I imagine Jaws from James Bond may have felt like. A strange feeling indeed.

One of the highlights of Day 5 was that I was finally able to open my mouth enough to remove the lower invisalign tray and at least do a partial job of brushing my teeth. For anyone 5 days of not flossing and brushing probably feels pretty icky, but especially for someone in the dental field, it's practically torture. I'd only been able to gently swish with warm saltwater or antibacterial mouthwash until now. The upper splint is actually wired into place so I couldn't remove that, but at least I could brush the lowers and brush the invisalign tray. The majority of my lower teeth are very loose from all of the movement, and I just happen to have a combination of rather short roots and very thin jaw bone, so my teeth become mobile quite easily. It makes for an interesting sensation as they move even from the gentle pressure of brushing with an ultra-soft toothbrush. Oh well, brushing is progress, so I'll take it.