Day 17: An attractive picture

Pain in Jaw: 1/10

Let me paint you an attractive picture:
My face is peeling due to my refusal to wash and 'exfoliate' all that dead skin of it properly. I class the numb areas as a 'no-go zone.' If it's numb, i'm not touching it at all because I don't know how hard i'll be pressing, or in this case, scrubbing!

I daren't put make up on yet either,
because putting it on also means taking it off, and taking it off means extra scrubbing.

My lips are incredibly dry 99.9% of the time, vaseline has become my new best friend, ontop of the occasional dribble that I have (unless i'm brushing my teeth, in which case I dribble alot). Ontop of this i'm having an extremely congested day - my throat is full of flem and mucus and my nose is totally blocked. Breathing is abit harsh and noisy today, but I guess i've been lucky with congestion up until now!

Last night I got the courage to finally shine a torch into my mouth to see what was going on in there. I checked out my stitches and my surgical sites in real light, and it's safe to say that I don't like looking at them. They remind me that I actually had this surgery, and what I actually went through - including the fact that peeled back most of my lips! I don't like this thought, moving on...

For some strange unknown reason, i'm happy during the day yet incredibly down and depressed towards the night. My mood really dips; I've heard of post-op depression after this sort of operation but this is strange. So far i've put my dipping mood down to the association of night time = bed time = sleeping upright = no sleep at all. However, all blessings sent last night as I realised that my big upright recliner chair actually leans back slightly, so I had a better nights sleep finally (When I say better I mean waking up every 4 hours instead of every 2 - but it's a working progress!).

On a plus note, i've finally started to drink from a plastic cup. Originally I used an osteotomy bottle (it's basically a plastic bottle with a huge thin straw on the end, and if you squeeze it liquids come out, saves attempting to suck which is impossible right now). I go back to uni in a weeks time, and I figured that I need to get fluids into me during this time somehow, so now I know I can rely on my trusty plastic beaker, even if I do spill half of it down my chin. But hey, that's one of the many perks of jaw surgery!