Tubes Out!

 

Some flowers perk up the day

So yesterday was a big day. After a week in the hospital, then a week recuperating at home, this first post-op follow up visit was supposed to be to remove the feeding tube and the trach. As soon as I got out of the hospital, I started counting the days until this follow up appointment. But then the doubt started to creep in…

I knew that on Tuesday the 26^th, the surgery would happen. No doubt. And although I knew the tube and trach would come out on the 10^th, doubt started to creep in. “What if I’m not ready” “What if they decide it has to stay in for another week” And so for the last couple of days, the idea of not knowing (control freak much?) was starting to freak me out. But this was almost more nerve wracking than the lead up to surgery because, in my mind, there was a possibility that I wouldn’t be ready and so the relief I had been looking for wouldn’t happen and they would stay in… There were no guarantees and so that caused some nervousness as the day approached.

Dr. S had an emergency, so it was only Dr C today. As a result, there was a long wait…but finally it happened, both the tube and the trach came out. So that was good, but I again started to have questions about the process and so felt like I was being left on my own. Obviously, I am not going to be eating steak, but there are no hard fast rules about what I can or can’t eat and when or how I will know I can move on to the next phase. Maybe that’s a good thing, but for some reason I was feeling like I was a bit stranded. So I guess I need to do some experimenting with food, without choking to death, and we’ll see how things go. I guess I should be happy that I am in control, right?

But the big bummer yesterday was also about timing. B and I had both understood that it would be about 8 to 10 weeks for the graft to take hold before the implant process was started. Yesterday the number he threw out, and pretty much stuck with, was nine months. Nine months without teeth? Ugh. That was a gut-punch. While the one lone molar on the right is able to meet its upper mate. I’m not feeling any “meeting of the molars” on the left side, the side that should be “unaffected.” And with the swollenness of the flap and the numbness of the lip, that nine months really felt like a horribly long time. So I was feeling a bit down.

So the lower lip has some numbness based on the fact that when the cut the jaw, they severed the nerve. This was understood. But I think there is a difference between “numbness” and “not being able to control.” I don’t think that that is just semantics. Despite being given the go-ahead on “food,” I thought I might not even be able to use a straw, given that I am unable to do a good strong pursing of the lips. But somehow, with the straw far enough in the back of my mouth, it works. And the mouth seems to stay mostly closed. So working the straw, sucking up the Boost, it actually doesn’t drool back out of the front of my mouth even when my head is hanging down. So maybe there is some hope.

Sorry if I’m sounding pessimistic, but again, this is what happens when you have specific thoughts about progress and they don’t get met. So this is why no one wants to set you up with expectations and then have to deliver the bad news if they don’t come through…

So I think I need to just chill out for a week while the hole in my throat closes and we’ll see what the swelling in the mouth looks like then…

Tomorrow is the last visit from the nurse, so last night I made some ginger snap cookies for her and her family…so there is a little bit of normalcy returning…