CONT from 11th feb 2008

Obviously i didnt know anything was goin on after this point for a few hours. . . .


The next thing i remember was waking up in a very light room and wondering why i was all on my own, i wasnt scared just confused, then i heard someone comment that i was awake and i realised i must be in recovery. I must have slipped back out of conciousness for a time, then i woke up to a very strange feeling in my mouth. I was very confused and disorientated but soon realised that my mouth was full of blood. I didnt freak out but knew that as no one else had noticed i needed to get it out myself, i was still too groggy to sit up, and just sort of spat it out, this kept happening and i still wasnt scared just getting a bit bored of spitting out the blood! Someone came running over at this point and sat me up slightly, i realised at this point how much id been bleeding as the whole of the night gown was soaked someone from the maxillo department came and packed gauze into my mouth, as one of the wisdom teeth id had removed was hemorraging badly. (this is quite uncommon but can happen to anyone, even from a routine extraction, and was just bad luck)


Then i laid there for a hour or so until the bleeding had stopped and i was able to go to the high dependancy ward. I didnt realise it at the time, but by now my family were panicing as they had been told the surgey would take 3 hours ish, and by the time i got back to them id been gone nearly 6 hours.

I was transferred to high dependancy for one to one nursing care, with a very nice little morphine pump to administer my own drugs my family and boyfriend came into see me, and i settled down for the night.


Unfortanetly my body had other ideas, and as the night progressed i became wheezy and my asthma got bad, so i had to be put on a nebuliser. Then the medication id been given caused my blood pressure to drop too. The night wasnt a good one, as i had 2 drips, a blood pressure cuff, my morphine pump, oxygen tubes up my nose etc etc. and as the night wore on i kept needing to go the loo, as the drips did there thing!


The next morning i was woken for my medication, and sat up in bed, helped to wash and some breakfast of porridge was laid in front of me, along with a great cup of tea. Obviously i couldnt and didnt try to chew, but i ate as much as possible.


It was decided i was well enough to be transferred to a normal ward at this point, so off i went via xray to have pics taken of my jaw. I felt really dizzy at this point and the swelling was already pretty bad, and i even had alot of bruising less than 24 hours after the surgery.


As my blood pressure had dropped from the painkillers i spent day 2 only being able to take paracetamol, which quite frankly were no use at all. That evening when the doctor came round, he said he was going to risk giving me some codeine again, as in his opinion it was cruel to expect me to only have paracetamol.


That night was aweful, and i vowed to be home the next day. There was also more good and bad news to come. The good news was that the operation itself had gone well, the surgeon was 100% confident there had been no permanent nerve damage, and the xrays were looking very good. The bad news was that i was holding my jaw very very badly, and although my teeth met fine, i was increasing my chances of a re lapse by continuely holding it at a very funny angle. Bands were placed on, and at one point it looked like i would be completely banded shut, but im still waiting to find out what will happen next

The docs werent too happy to send me home as id had so many issues along the way, but i pleaded with them and eventually they relented and discharged me wednesday evening. It was actually quite scary to be at home, especially as they had wanted to keep me in another night. But i was glad to see my own bed, even if it was hard to see under all the pillows i needed to sleep!!


Here are before photos taken on the night before surgery (10th feb 2008)







This is obviously me from the front view!!











This is my profile on the 10th feb 08, its not too bad although you can see my chin is abit far back. Tho im not having any of this done for cosmetic reasons, a better profile is a bonus.






















Right: this is my teeth in profile, you can see my overjet quite clearly, at this moment it stands at 13mm.











These are photos taken on the 15th February 2008 (4 days after surgery)


















Looking good! This is taken on the morning of the 4th day after op. The swelling was much worse on days 2 and 3.













Right: this shows the swelling on the left side and also the bruise which gets bigger with every passing minute.