Welp. It's done!

Hi Mama;

Holy Crap! I can't even begin to tell you what the past few days have been like.....but I'll try!

I hope I can be detailed enough. You see, since I've been on the pain meds Paul says I'm easily distracted, but I think he's full of -- HEY LOOK!! A CHICKEN!!

Okay, where to start: How about this:

DAY 1:

Up at 3:45 in order to get to Stanford at 5:30 for check in. Slept really crapily the night before, but I figured that didn't really matter.
Checked in and hung out in the pre-op area. Um, NO Karen Newburger robes!

Met Dr B my anesthesiologist. Very nice guy.

After asking all the typical questions and hooking up the main I.V., it was finally time to give me "a little something to relax me" and wheel me in to the operating room. Well, being such a "cheap date", I *barely* remember the operating room. I don't even remember seeing Dr. KL before "lights out".

This was taken after I was given "the little something"

.....and then I woke up. It was over. ...and that was that!! Oh Gawd. I've really done it now, I thought....

Paul said it was in the recovery room for longer than usual because they were looking for space in the ICU. After I finally got settled in, Paul was able to come in and see me.

I had the ice pack on and I think I was half in shock. Not that much pain at that time.

Dr KL came in and told me that everything went well. He was able to fix my slightly deviated septum, and he went with the Genioglossus Advancement instead of the Genioplasty.

I later learned that I unfortunately have a "thinner than usual" upper jaw bone, so the good doc had a little tougher time securing it after he advanced it (about 8mm.). Fortunately, he was able to take some of the bone from the Genioglossus Advancement and graft it to my top jaw in an attempt to make it stronger. I'm going to have to take it easy for awhile. In all, including my lower jaw advancement and the GA, the chin is out about 13mm. Not bad.

My ICU nurse's name was Jason. Totally cool guy and he stuck with me through almost the whole ICU experience and was there with morphine "every hour on the hour"!

Paul took a few pics of me when I got there. I was pretty out of it.

........my attempt at a little "ICU Humor".................................................

Not sure why, but I didn't sleep for one minute that first night. I think it was the morphine, in combination with the fact that my nose was totally clogged up. I couldn't breathe through it and I absolutely could not swallow AT ALL becuase of the breathing tube that was down my throat through the left nostril, and the deviated septum was fixed on the right nostril.

Day 2:

The next morning, I was put in a regular room. I had several nurses, and honestly, I was only impressed with one of them. But, love-love!

Dr KL came by a few times to check on me, cleared out my nose, and discussed the surgery .
I was concerened at first because my teeth seemed to only be meeting in one place (my incisers...clear over on the right), and started to feel rather uncomfortable. He assured me that my bite was fine. He adjusted the rubber bands on the archbars which seems to have helped.

I also opted to stay another day - mostly because I was really suffering from re-flux and heartburn, but was still in a fair amount of pain as well.

Day 3;

Anyway, We finaly checked me out of there this morning and headed over to Dr. KL's office to get a quick "nose clearing" and for him to check me out. We got home around noon, and I've just been taking it easy since then. Learian came by and brouht me a pitcher of home-made smoothie and to check up on me. I tell you...she has been so nice to us and has given us so much good advice. I don't know how we could every repay her for all she's done.

So, I'll download some before and after front and profile shots in my next bloggie.

There's still a good amount of swelling, but I figured it's time to put em' up here.

I hope you didn't worry too much. By now, I'm an old pro at these surgical procedures.

.....although I will admit. This was definately the most heavy-duty of them all up to this point.

who loves ya, Mama???

xoxo:
Pinski