More Surgery News

I had my last consultation with the oral surgeon today (Dr. Claudio Tocchio). A routine appointment mostly, took some moulds, x-rays, pictures. Just some stuff for the doctor to make sure everything was ok before surgery, and so that he can make sure he knows exactly what’s going on before he actually operates. He said that everything seems to be ok, so next Tuesday is all go. I also had a last chance to ask him some questions about the surgery before it happened. My major concerns were of course, the recovery time and side effects. I’m glad to say that his answers were a bit better than I expected.

First of all, the best news I heard today, he said that there would be very little pain involved for the entire procedure. This is because the sensory nerves in the area that’s being operated on will be stretched and moved a bit, and will become numb. This means that they won’t be firing, and therefore little to no pain for me (woo-hoo!). The bad part about this though, is that these sensory nerves may take a while to come back. Dunno what exactly to expect, but I guess it’s a fair trade-off for the no-pain thing. The doctor said that there’s a very small chance that some of the feeling in my face my not come back fully. But this only happens very rarely, and in very small areas, so I’m not too worried. This also involves the sensory nerves only, and not the motor nerves. This is good… I really don’t want a Chrétien type dilly goin’ on. >= ) The other side effects will of course be some big time swelling. The good part about that though, is that most of the swelling will go down in a couple of days and all of it should be gone around 2 weeks after.

As for recovery time, I’ll be on a liquid diet for about a week after surgery, and after that I will likely be able to move onto soft foods like oatmeal, tofu, scrambled eggs, and congee. The doc also said that I should be back to my normal diet after about 4 weeks, so that isn’t too bad at all. It does look like I’ll be losing quite a bit of weight, so I think I’ll fatten up a bit this week….=Þ

Anyway, it may sound like this surgery isn’t going to be much of an ordeal at all, but I know it’s going to be a pretty trying process. It’s alright though… I know I should get this done as soon as possible, and especially before school starts again. If you guys can, please pray for my surgery and recovery, and if you already have been, thanks a bunch, it’s really appreciated. I’ll pray for you guys too when I’m stuck in the hospital room without anything to do….