46 Year Old Double Jaw Surgery for Sleep Apnea. Canberra, AU

I Had my first post op appointment with Dr Vickers , i felt quiet self conscious but it was nice to be out and about.
I had an Xray done and was told that during the operation one side of my jaw moved quiet a lot more than the other side! The Doctors were keen to check my alignment and make sure it all looked all right ,I had much more swelling on that side and felt quiet lopsided! I am still not sure exactly how much each side moved, but it was just the way my jaw worked...
It took months to settle down and i can still tell a difference.

My surgery finished at about 2 pm on May 1st but i woke up next morning at 11am in ICU. It felt strange to know i was out for that long. My partner had come to check on me me night before he said i looked a sorry sight i had a big head frame on so as not to move and nostril expanders in so i could breath. As i was waking up i felt compressors still on my legs and the blankets felt very heavy but was not in much serious pain. It was hard to breath as your jaws are wired together but i had read enough other blogs to be prepared and was not panicked . I had a breathing tube from my nose i think down into my lungs which was removed in the first day after i woke up. it was a relief to get that out but it also made it harder to breath. i was given nasal sprays to keep nasal passages open but you also just had to try breath through your teeth as well. I was sharing ICU with another of Dr Vickers patients who had similar surgery and he was managing to communicate quiet well whereas i just was incomprehensible, lucky we had bought the costco electronic writing pad but if i got over enthusiastic no one could read my writing! Also your face does not move so people have no other clues to how you are feeling... you can't smile or laugh. I now know how it feels to have a disability and how other people cope with that. I spent another 24hours in ICU with a nurse just for me and was given cold packs for my hot face and given lots of small amounts of liquids to get use to drinking slowly through a syringe with very swollen lips and face.

I was then moved to another shared room in high care and next 48 hours were spent sleeping, you are very tired after this surgery and trying to communicate is exhausting. I was given self administered pain killer but i don't think it works that well ...when someone is sleeping this much you wake up in pain then have to press button i would have preferred to have shots every six hours or whatever they do instead. I had some very good and very bad nurses i wish i had the energy to complain. One male nurse thought he was funny when he said i looked like shrek,he was also very full of himself and very impatient of someone who was finding it hard to communicate lucky I'm not a young girl and didn't get offended but he did make me cry and it was very dangerous because i could hardly breath i think people like that should not work in that sort of industry. I also bet he is divorced!
It's very important to keep calm and just let the process progress there is nothing you can do to speed it up!

I spent 4nights in hospital and left in the evening before the 5th night i was so glad to be getting home to my own bed, pillows and cats,without all the strange hospital noises and nurses waking you up every few hours to take your blood pressure! My partner was now wholly responsible for me and i am a demanding patient.
I didn't have the dribbling a lot of people complain about but the last nurse i had before i left hospital was lovely and attentive but i think she gave me her cold so i had a humidifier in the room 24h and took lots of nasal sprays to help me breath. When got home i also had a hot steamy bath and got heaps of hard disgusting hard lumps out of my nose so felt heaps better!

Eating was a challenge we started with 20ml syringes and also tried 60ml ones as long as everything was very very well blended with enough water or liquid it was ok but often my partner would have to reblend with more liquid to pass through gap at back of the teeth and through the teeth.We found the ninja blender much better than our expensive breville one, it was better for the small quantities and also blended it much finer.I could also just try drink it out of a cup which was easier but didn't always work. I blended anything i felt like eating i tried to mainly eat nutritious food but if i felt like cake i would blend it with a hot chocolate and it was heaven! I tried to have vegetable soups some of which i had already prepared and frozen with a little bit of meat protein to fill you up.breakfast was yogurt and fruit with oats and hospital sustagen. Raw green juices in the afternoon just whatever worked !My friends were quiet disgusted i managed to have a blended french toast with maple syrup!
Just don't think of the calories and do whatever works for you! Because you are on so many pain killers and not moving much make sure you have plenty of fibre, i wish i had started taking stool softeners from day one.

Exercise was really important it make you feel much better and get you out of the house. At first i tried to just walk around the house and garden as often as i could between trying to eat and sleep. Make sure you have plenty of tv series to watch nothing to full on, just something on to keep you entertained i couldn't concentrate on reading

I think swelling is worse day 3 and 4 and then slowly starts to get better from then on. I am almost 6 months now and people are still commenting that i look less swollen.