Chin implant — My story, from beginning to endish

(Disclaimer: The below story was copied from a journal I kept for the past month. I gained so much from this site and wanted to give back. There are many details within my writing, so please read before posting questions that are already answered. I will not provide info that will disclose details that will identify me. I wish you well in your own journey!)
**Day of Surgery - 2 hrs 45 min before procedure -December 27
The day of my chin implant procedure is finally here! I slept well last night but feel the anxiety creeping in today, more so as the time nears when I have to leave.
I feel my face is very unbalanced, and my nose looks very big from the side and 3/4 view. I am getting my chin done to balance it out more, and if I get the funds and guts, I’ll do my nose a few years down the road.
The insecurities have extended into my career life. I expend so much energy thinking about people’s thoughts on my profile while in the office. I can’t wait to feel more confident and keep that energy for my goals instead of for insecurities. Also, I sometimes enjoy looking younger, but I am hoping to look more chiseled and appear more confident. I don’t feel my weak chin helps me look confident or mature.
My initial consultation was in September, and now it’s the end of December. Since then, I’ve researched the procedure itself and other people’s experiences. There’s not much more to gain in knowledge until I go through this on my own.
My goal is to have a chin that aligns with my lower lip and gives me a bit of a square jawline for more definition. At the consult, the doctor was leaning towards a size large, but I’m wondering if an extra large would be better. We will decide right before the surgery.
Off to eat a final hard-food meal!
**Day of Surgery - ~ 3 hours post surgery - December 27
I’m home and feeling all the feelings. I took prescribed Narco about ten minutes ago, so hopefully I’ll be feeling that soon. The pain and intense pressure started in pretty quickly after the procedure and has only seemed to increase by the minute. After my friend picked me up, I asked to go get prescriptions filled right then. Tonight may be a bit difficult.
The procedure itself went well. They gave me a small cocktail of Valium, Benadryl, and a Tylonel beforehand and had me wait in the waiting room for them to kick in some. Then they brought me back to the room where it’d go down and had me put something on Netflix. They covered me completely with a sanitary sheet and a wrap around my head. They also brushed surgical sanitizer all over my face.
The doctor came in soon after and talked with me about options. We were initially going to go with a size large but ended up opting for a size XL with a bit of trimming on the sides so that it wouldn’t end up too square. I did tell him I was aiming for more androgynous over feminine, and he was completely cool with that. Then Dr. Shah injected maybe 6-8 shots of the local anesthesia. Those were some pretty big pricks, but I had no complaints because there was no way I wanted to feel any of the surgery.
When they finally got underway, I could feel so much due to pressure—and sound! I knew when he cut my chin open. And when they made the pocket or whatever it was in my bone, I heard and felt the scraping on my bone. As they worked the implant into the right position, they tugged and pulled at my face so much that I was worried they couldn’t get it placed properly. Luckily, all was fine, and no one said anything about it being too large. This all was a surprise, as I didn’t think it’d be so sensory overload in that way. When he was pretty sure all was set, he put on a new glove and felt inside my mouth to make sure nothing felt out of place form the inside. Then he stitched my chin up. Since my stitches are so tight, he asked to take them out in a full week instead of five days from now. I’ll just have to come up with an excuse to have to work from home because I really don’t want to go to work with black stitches sticking out of my chin. They’re pretty obvious.
I kept looking in the mirror on the way to get my prescriptions. So far, I’m very happy with the results. If anything, a tiny bit more projection would have been nice, but with me already at an XL size, this was pretty much all I could get, I think. I’m really glad we didn’t go with the large instead. It’s not like this was going to change how large my nose is, only help with balance in my face, which it does already. I’m really happy with the result so far. I’m excited to heal up and see how it all looks after my body has accepted it more!
**Day 2 - one day post surgery - December 28
Today was my first full day of recovery. I slept okay last night, considering. I did wake up in pain and needing to take my pain meds about every 3.5 hours. At one point the pain was severe enough that I had to ice my face. But I was happy to get in several hours of sleep.
The exhaustion from the pain meds and healing definitely kicked in hard today. I spent most of the day sitting on the couch, napping, or at my desk. The doctor’s office called to check in and mentioned that swelling and pain are typically worst the second and third days of recovery. About an hour after this call, I went to take a nap only to be woken by the worst pain yet. It felt like my jawbone was throbbing. I ended up adding a Tylenol 3 to my pain med ritual from an old, leftover prescription, and this seemed to do the trick. The rest of the day I’ve taken two narco and one Tylenol 3.
I’ve kept the tape on my face that they placed right after surgery and have a goal to keep it on at least until Tuesday. At one point this evening, I decided to run to the grocery store for dinner for my son and saline solution for cleaning the incision, and I just kept my scarf pulled up close to my nose.
As far as food, I’ve kept to a strictly soft foods only diet. I’m making myself stay on this through Sunday, which would be three days post op. My main foods are yogurt for breakfast, and soup I sip from a mug for lunch and dinner.
My face is still very swollen and tender, and there is quite a bit of numbness. The right side of my bottom lip is okay, but the left side is still numb. There is tingling once in a while which is a sign that the nerves are coming back into play.
As long as I keep my new pain regimen going throughout the night, I think I’ll get some decent sleep tonight.
**Day 3 - two days post surgery - December 29
Today has been the best day of healing so far. I only woke up once due to pain last night and slept past my morning pain med time. I’ve also mostly cut out the Norco all day and have mainly used Tylenol and Tylenol 3. I have been antsy about taking the tape off my chin, but I think I’m resigned to keeping it on as long as I can. That means skipping out on fun NYE plans and staying in, but it’ll be worth it. Also, swelling has decreased even more, and the bottom of my chin looks more even. I’m expecting this to change daily, but it’s nice to see that the unevenness is definitely due to swelling. My bottom lip is still half numb as well as my entire chin, but that’s also pretty expected. I did take a nice long nap this afternoon, but I did have the energy to take down all of my Christmas decorations and take the tree out. I hope tomorrow is even better!
**Day 5 - four days post surgery - December 31
Happy New Year and Happy New Look to me! I forgot to write yesterday, but after a pretty good day, I ended up out of pain meds and in some decent amount of pain by early evening. I ended up taking one Norco I got from a friend and some Tylenol before bed, and now, almost 24 hours later, I have’t needed any more pain meds.
I woke up feeling positive and in good spirits. I felt good about my face and the healing and lack of pain. It’s now 7 p.m., and I’m still med-free. Earlier this afternoon, part of my tape was coming off of my chin, so I took it all off and cleaned the whole area. I then just put antibiotic cream on the incision and covered it with a bandaid. Much easier to go out in public that way and no itchiness then. It was the first time I’d seen my chin since right after surgery, and I really liked it.
I’m still quite numb and talk as if I’ve got a wad of chewing tobacco in my bottom lip. My smile is also pretty non-existent, but I’ve read that that can take weeks to months to come back. I’m not going to worry unless nothing changes at all within the next few weeks.
It’s New Year’s Eve, and I’ve chosen to stay in and not push myself. I’m cooking a soft food meal and will drink a bit too. The only bad part is, the one friend who knows about the procedure let me down with coming over, so I have to keep my happiness about my new look to myself. On the upside, I’m learning a lot of self-love and self-care lately! Cheers to a new year full of beautiful things and people!
**Day 7 - 6 days post surgery - January 3
Stitches got taken out this morning! Yay! I’m healing up pretty well, and so much of the swelling is gone. My chin is a little lopsided due to swelling, but it seems to change daily. I haven’t been taking pain meds for the most part. I did notice that my neck is pretty yellow from bruising, but I think it surprised me most because I didn’t notice it before. I was told to stop with the ointment so that the incision can dry out all the way, as there’s still a tiny spot that is too “wet” still.
After getting the stitches out, I walked around part of a mall attached to where I got the procedure done, and I felt so good. No band-aid on my face or anything. I can’t wait for it to heal up all the way!
In six weeks, I’m scheduled to go back and have the scar lasered. This should also greatly help reduce the signs that I had this procedure done, and I appreciate this surgeon being so detail oriented.
Currently, there is still a lot of numbness in my chin and bottom lip. Also, the cleft and dimple I had in my chin before the procedure are a lot more pronounced now. They’re not even center, but I like them! I think they were just a lot more “hidden” before when my chin was more recessed. It’s like a treasure chest in my chin! Haha.
**Day 9 - 8 days post surgery - January 5
It feels like my chin augmentation happened a lot longer than nine days ago. I’m not 100% yet, but I’m living life basically as I was before the procedure.
Last night I went to my first social event since before the surgery. It was at a friend’s birthday party, and it felt like a test run of my new look. Two friends I don’t really see that often were eyeing me and saying that I looked “totally different” but didn’t know what it was. I’d also recently cut my hair, and they said it wasn’t the hair but something else. I outed myself to them, and we ended up having a nice drunken discussion on facial symmetry and plastic surgery. There was no judgement, and I felt good owning my new look completely. One of the friends said my entire face looked different, and in a strange way, I felt good hearing that. They even noticed the cleft in my chin and pointed out that it was more pronounced.
The only issue is that, with my lip still numb, I bit it last night on the inside part in my mouth. It’s been a bit swollen today, and it’s hard not to accidentally bite it more often because of that. I need to keep an eye on it and try not to make it worse.
Today I went to a spa and enjoyed time in a sauna and a hot tub. I know I was told to not expose myself to sunlight for six months. I’d read somewhere that this is due to heat making bacteria grow, so this concerned me with heating my body up for a few hours. I feel well now though and think it’ll all be fine.
My incision is looking better every day, and right now I’m really pleased with the healing of it. I use hydrogen peroxide on it a few times a day, and that’s it. I’m going back to work in a day, so it’s nice to know it won’t be obvious at all. I can stick to my story of getting my wisdom teeth out.
**Day 14 - 13 days post surgery - January 10
Things have been steadily changing with my chin implant. The dimple I was fond of before seems more obvious to me lately. I’ve noticed that I’m insecure about it now. I mean, it’s a feature that looks like a “character trait/flaw,” so I feel others are thinking, “Wait, was that there before? Come to think of it, she looks a lot different. I bet she had work done!” Then again, they could be thinking nothing of it. I looked up “dents in chin after implants” and found info that makes me think that it could be a scar tissue issue or a muscle issue. Damn, what we do for beauty!
The pain is now pretty much only in a small area on the right side of my face, right below my jawbone. It feels like there’s a nasty bruise there, but there is minimal swelling and no trauma showing on the outside, such as a bruise. It actually starts throbbing by evening time. I’ll give it a few more days and then call the doctor’s office if it isn’t any better. I’m sure they’ll just tell me I need to keep healing. It’s a strange place to feel so much pain though with it being several inches from my implant.
As far as numbness goes, I am still completely numb on the left side of my lower lip and most of my chin. Luckily, I’ve loosened up enough to be able to talk okay again, and a sore I got from biting the inside of my lower lip is finally healing after almost a full week. This is good news because where I work, I’ve had to present work to a room full of people.
My incision is not completely healed but is getting there. My office is a bit chilly, so I usually have a scarf around my neck, which helps me conceal the redness under my chin besides keeping me warmer.
The thing that gets me is, I now have a new hair cut and a brand new chin, and I have gotten zero compliments. I mean, no one has exclaimed that I looked great or anything. I don’t mean that in an egotistic way, but when you drop $2,500 to look “better,” you kinda expect some sort of acknowledgement. That may be why I’m feeling some insecurities creeping in lately. I have gone to a few social engagements this past week, so, what’s up?
There were a couple of times today I looked in the mirror and thought it was too large, but then, I realized that it’s what I wanted and I’m still getting used to it. My nose is long, and my lower lip stuck out rather far before, so I know this is what I needed for balance. I think the decrease in swelling and tiredness lately, are warping my brain a bit. I’m still very happy with the decision and the implant, even if I end up needing some extra help with this dent in my chin.
Next week, I’m looking forward to tackling a burger! Just maybe!
**Day 14 - 30 days post surgery - January 26
I’m celebrating the monthiversary of my new chin with more confidence and updates. I woke up this morning with more feeling in my lower lip, at least in one part, but that’s progress. Although I still have a lot of numbness, I am feeling confident that I’ll regain all, if not most, feeling again in my chin and bottom lip. Even when I wash my face and run my fingertips over my chin, it sends small pin and needle shocks up through my lip. The nerves are saying ‘hello, I’m still here!’
Speaking of which, it is such a strange feeling to wash my face and feel a whole new chin and partial jawline. It feels hard like bone, and after going almost four decades with a weaker chin, this new “protrusion” is so strange. I love it though.
My dent seems to have settled down some as well, and it doesn’t bother me at all now. If anything, a scar I’ve had on my lower lip my entire life bothers me more, since the surgery seems to have resulted in that being more obvious. Maybe I’ll get that lasered down some down the road.
I’m usually waking up from sleeping on my side, so that’s nice to have some freedom in the sleep department back. I did have a dream last night that my implant started moving around! That was a first, and, hey, it was only a dream. Let’s hope it stays that way.
The pain in my jaw is still there almost daily, but it’s getting better. Talking, stretching my neck, and chewing gum really bother it, but I’m just relieved it’s from trauma and not an infection. It’s better every day though.
I’m still relieved and happy with my decision. I love my “new” look and hope you have a great experience with yours as well!