Posted by pjgirl on September 05, 2008 at 14:22:08:It’s been too long since my last posting (4mo post MMA)so sorry for the long post. It’s hard to believe how much life has changed. I hope that some of these experiences will help someone else going through this.
History: LAUP – some 15 years ago. Worked well for a while but then my OSA worsened due to the scarring. GA – 4 years ago
MMA – 11 months ago. At 6 wk and at 11wks, I ended up having some of the plates removed. The lower jaw plate was removed due to an infection.There’s been some previous discussions/posts wrt the timeline for regaining one’s original jaw opening. Due to the infection and some TMJ pain, I wasn’t able to start stretching my jaw until after 14-16wks post surgery and I was really worried that I may end up with a limited jaw opening. I’m happy to say that by ~25wks I hit my original opening and actually exceeded it a little. Well…having a bigger mouth doesn’t actually help the diet!
Numbness: I’m really happy to hear from some of the other posts like brandyleigh that feeling continues to come back at these later stages. I’ve also experienced the same. Improvements are much slower and sometimes not even noticeable until one day something happens. Currently the area below my lower right lip/chin is still a bit numb. I can feel the surface layers but deep down I couldn’t feel anything (or so I thought!). I recently had to have my filling replaced in my lower molar. During those few hours of novacaine, I experienced real numbness, and the light bulb went on. It reminded me that after my GA, feeling continued to returned even at 2yrs after surgery!
My teeth were straight and aligned before the surgery. After surgery, chewing and biting were awkward and continued to be difficult. But food is one of my all-time favorite pastimes so I recently got braces 2 months ago. They should be off in the spring.
Would I go through this again? This has definitely been a process that really makes you go through some deep introspective thinking, will get you at a point where you think about it too much, and will force you to NOT think about it and be patient! I’ve had some unexpected obstacles but I’ve also had some extremely fortunate results. Friends and family see a "new" me. Literally... I do look different, but they’ve also noticed that I’m energized! So the answer is “Yes”. BTW, I had the follow up sleep study done a few months ago. My RDI went from 29 pre-MMA to 2.5!
Looking forward to seeing all of you in Sunnyvale!
pjgirl