A Little Ugly Truth

To all double jaw surgery candidates,

This shit is not for wimps. This is really hard and I am definitely struggling. I am hungry but if I have to eat one more can of soup or protein shake I will lose my cool--not that I have much of it right now as I cry and complain on my keyboard. The doctors are all really nice but they keep leaving out parts of information. My teeth hurt, my lips are still really swollen and numb and this might be TMI, but the drooling is getting out of control.

If I am being honest in the last few days I have definitely said the words "I wish I didn't get the surgery". The more accurate statement is "I wish I didn't get the surgery now". I really wish I had scheduled it so that I didn't have to go back to school mid-way through the recovery process and that I had the whole 6 weeks at home. I am totally nerve-wracked about how I am supposed to transition into my senior year when I can't even eat solids. Granted, that is only going to be for about 3 weeks but I'm still not sure how that is even going to work since the doctors gave me the time frame but no instructions. I'm going to be a pain in their asses next week about that. Seriously do I take the bands off when I eat or not? I'm really not sure how I am supposed to regain full use of my jaw if it has to stay banded this shut the whole 6 weeks...there are so many questions that they left unanswered. Hopefully my orthodontist will be able to answer some of those questions tomorrow.

All the other blogs I have seen don't seem to accurately describe the struggle that is this recovery. Liquid diet, no matter how short, sucks. Literally, sucks. I don't understand how people are so nonchalant about it, my dad made shrimp tonight and I just sat at the table and whimpered because I couldn't have any. I don't even like seafood! I'm sick of not being able to sleep comfortably, I'm sick of eating with a syringe because my lips are too fat and numb to handle a cup or straw. I'm just really frustrated with the whole process and I'm not going to pretend that its easy.

I hope anyone about to go through this process or going through it now, finds this a little comforting, I wish one of the blogs I read had been this real about it. Sorry for all the complaining, I'm sure you are tired of reading it.

Good luck,

Bailey