Day 17: Getting on my nerves . . .

Now that I am back in the swing of life in terms of working, meetings, talking everywhere and to everyone, etc., my jaw joints and muscles have decided to be as tight as they possibly could be! They feel a lot more swollen than they have in days and bizarrely enough the inside of my mouth seems swollen as my cheeks are permanently pushing against my splint. Ice and heat, ice and heat.

The reason for my post title is because the nerves in my bottom lip and chin have decided to 'switch on' and, at least for today, permanently tingle which is a really strange sensation. I can deal with a numb face and I could deal with my tingly chin as it really only tingled when I touched it but now it is permanently tingling and it is most definitely a different sensation. Could I use the word tingly any more in a sentence?

Apparently this is a good sensation in terms of recovery as it means that my nerves are recovering and healing from whatever damage occurred during surgery but still, wow. During the last fortnight I have used the word, wow, significantly more than I hoped I would! I hope these nerves decide to heal themselves rather quickly as I am not sure I want to deal with this sensation for an indefinite period of time.

I am realising more and more that just because I hear what I am saying and therefore make the assumption that it must be discernible also for the listener that, in fact, my assumption is erroneous. I participated in a meeting over the telephone today and it was quite apparent that many people did not share my belief that I was talking quite well! Quite the opposite actually which was amusing as I was really trying to speak clearly by opening my mouth as far as it can go whilst talking (remember however that my mouth barely opens wide enough to let a baby spoon in!). Ah well, perhaps I need to limit the amount of telephone meetings I am part of as apparently the telephone must distort my very clear talking voice! :)

As you know, I read a lot of blogs and forums about this type of surgery in an effort to understand the post-surgery recovery phase and what to expect. Clearly, everybody is different in term of timeframe for recovery but the main issues concerning swelling, bruising, nerve damage, numbness, talking issues, splint frustrations, eating, etc., we all have in common. Everyone who has had this surgery will experience these symptoms, issues, frustrations, etc., and it is somewhat comforting to know this fact to be honest. Hopefully, this blog is proving beneficial to someone just as other blogs proved helpful to me in my understanding!

Finally, a note about my photos. As I mentioned the other day, I noticed that I was wearing the same shirt in consecutive daily photographs which was a tad embarrassing. I simply throw a shirt on when I get home or in the evening and apparently I threw the same shirt on for a few too many days (2). I am now highly conscious of this fact and it will not happen again! :)

As for what foods were eaten today:

1. Mac and cheese


2. Cookies and Cream pudding - I told you, I am addicted to pudding! A new flavour today just to spice things up! :)

You can see additional photographs under the ‘Photo Journal’ section above