I had my pre-op appointment yesterday with my surgeon and found out that I will be undergoing top and bottom jaw surgery in order to properly align my bite. As I pointed out in my last update, the front two teeth are 2mm out of alignment from the middle of my face. This has to be fixed at the same time as repositiong my bottom jaw. From what he explained to me is that he will have to go in and break the top jaw in 3 places around my incisors and put it into proper placement. In doing this they will have to go through my sinuses which will in turn help me be able to breath better through my nose. The bottom jaw will be broken in 2 to 4 places and squished upwards to close up my bite. In doing this it will elimiate a little bit of my natural double chin look and position my bite into a more stable place to help relieve the tension on my joints. I was warned that by having to do the top jaw again that I might end up having to get veneers to fill in some spacing that may occur between the two smaller teeth beside my front two big ones. The little teeth may be too small to fill the gap that he needs to create for the bite to work. I am so dissapointed as this may mean that I could have to dish out even more money afterwards. He did say that may not be the case but it is a possibility that he wanted me to be aware of. I was not expecting to have to go through so much again..
So now that we know how I am going to be tortured next week, here is the breakdown of what I need to do for recovery afterwards:
- I was given a prescription for liquid morphine to take care of the pain however they no longer make liquid naproxen which would have helped with the inflammation. In order to control the inflammation they recommened that I stock up on children's liquid advil or crush up extra strength advil but it is extremely disgusting. On top of that I HAVE to keep switching out my facial ice packs every 30 minutes for the first 72 hours. That means during the night and everything with no exceptions.
- I need to sleep sitting up at a 45 degree angle for 2 weeks
- I need to drink clear liquids only for the first 2 days with a minimum of 2 - 3L a day for 6 weeks. Apparently 2L of water is 40 full syringes
- I will be given a syringe with about a foot long hose to attach to the end which will be my life line for feeding myself for a long time. The hose will go to the back of my molars where I can shoot the water , juice etc towards my throat. I will be able to have watered down smoothies and protein shakes after the 72 hours as I can stand for the first 6 weeks. I will be aloud to use a straw after 10 days but not a day sooner they kept stressing.
- I will be "wired" shut by strong elastics for the first week and then at my post op one week later they will switch out the stronger elastics for a little weaker ones which will alow me to be able to swallow pills if need be. They recommended some kind of benadryl to help with the anxiety of being wired shut.
- I was given sponges on a stick that are to be used to "brush" my teeth with a solution that was prescribed to me. I remember I had to use these last time as well but at that time I didn't have all the brackets and wires in my mouth. All of the incisions will be inside my mouth with dissolvable stitches again.
- I am not aloud to raise my heartrate for the 6 weeks and limited to light walking and not lifting anything over 10 pounds
- I can expect nose bleeds for the first two weeks
- Swelling and bruising will be bad and I will be numb especially around my lips so I won't be able to drink from a cup for quite a long time. After 3 months I can expect to get some feeling back but after a year whatever hasn't come back won't. I am still numb under my top lip especially along the gum line and now that they will be re-entering that area, I am worried that I will lose even more feeling this time. It is hard enough to smile so I hope I don't lose even more ability to do that.
I am scheduled to be at the hospital at 9:30 am with my surgery time booked for noon. The surgery itself is roughly 4 hours and then into recovery for 1 or 2 before I get to go to my room. I will have to stay over night to monitor bleeding and keep the ice packs going. I am told the actual breaking of the jaw isn't painful aftewards, it is the swelling and the incisions that are the painful part.
I guess the elastics have a habit of breaking during that first week but the surgeon informed me that if they do break my jaw won't fall off. Everything is screwed into place securly and the elastics are there to help hold it in proper placement. The surgeon also mentioned that he can tell I am a mouth breather due to my red puffy upper gums. I remember after my last surgery for a while I could breath amazingly clear through my nose but after a while it all closed up again. He mentioned that it will get even better this time and should be more permaent. The best part is that my lips will be able to properly go together without being forced and then the gums won't be exposed to the air so much and will have a chance to go back to their pink not so puffy color.
The surgery itself is covered under our provincial health plan however the office fees for the molds, measurements, scans etc was $3100 which I had to pay before I left the office yesterday. He gave me all my prescriptions ahead of time so I will need to get those filled and then I will be almost ready for next week. I have attached some pictures of where I am at now and we will see how different I look after this next adventure:
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| All the surgical hooks are on in between every bracket top and bottom and you can see how off centered my top jaw is |
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| You can see that my two front teeth are off centered and goofy looking |
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| Showing how off my bite is |
