P.O.ST

Post Operation Status

I know many of you may be wondering if I died in my oral surgery operation since you have not seen anything from me this week. Well, let me dispense with that rumor. I'm alive and eating, again.

Here's a brief summary of the day of surgery (last Monday) and the subsequent days. You can also read my wife's version of that day.

• Arrived a few minutes prior to my 10:00 a.m. appointment. They took me back, had me sign a consent form and had me knocked out within 10 minutes.
• About 45 minutes later I was back in the land of the conscious and was assisted to a recovery area, mouth stuffed full of gauze.
• After recovering sufficiently, my wonderful wife assisted me to the van. That was after she took the kids out and strapped them in - yes, she had the kids with her in the waiting room. Brave woman.
• Went to the Wal-Mart pharmacy to get my prescription of antibiotics and pain killer filled. When I say went, I mean I sat in the van and waited (holding an ice pack to my swollen face and tried to keep the kids happy) while Stephanie went inside. She came back out and we went to another pharmacy because Wal-Mart was out of stock of the pain killer - no I could not wait a day or so to have it filled.
• Got home and climbed into bed.
• I stayed in bed most of the day. The routine went something like this - apply ice pack, take off ice pack, apply ice pack, take off ice pack, sleep, wake up, take pain killer, apply ice pack, take off ice pack, ....
• By Tuesday morning, New Year's day, I was feeling better. All bleeding had stopped. I was still swollen, but I did not need the pain killers until I went to bed that night.
• Wednesday I went back to work. Good thing my beard helped hide the swelling.
  
• Since then I've improved each day. The swelling is pretty much gone. Yesterday, Saturday, I was able to eat pretty much normally.
• I'm brushing my teeth pretty normally now too. I started on Wednesday, staying away from that whole lower right side of the mouth but now I do those teeth as well, just gently.
• I go in for a check up tomorrow afternoon. I'm feel pretty confident that the cuts from the surgery are healing nicely. However, I think the doctor will say the tooth needs to be pulled. Why? Because I noticed yesterday that there appears to be another fistula forming. So sad. I've grown attached to that tooth.

I just want to say that Stephanie is my hero, or rather, my heroine. This past week she has been sick, all three kids have been sick and I had oral surgery and the recovery from it. And she took care of all of us and herself. There's no way I could have done that (at least not as well) if the roles had been reversed. Thanks sweetheart.

I have a confession. I was not one of those "do it by the book" recovery patients. Monday for supper, Stephanie took the kids to McDonalds so that I could get some rest. At one point I finally roused myself out of bed because I was starving - I had not eaten since supper the previous night. I was eating mashed potatoes and gravy left over from KFC, which was delicious but not very filling. The kitchen table still had the dishes left over from lunch (did I mention she and the kids were sick too?) and Ben had left part of a piece of a KFC chicken strip. Boy, did that smell good to me. Oh yes I did - when Stephanie and the kids arrived home, I was finishing off the last of it. I would pull of little tiny pieces and chew them slowly and carefully on the opposite side of my mouth from the operation. And yes, it did taste as good as it smelled. Stephanie admonished me on my foolishness but my stomach was happier for it.