My first post operation checkup

Yesterday I returned to the hospital for my first post operation checkup! My jaw surgeon was very happy with the result and after taking a quick look in my mouth, he proceeded to place four rubber bands on my braces. These brought my jaw into the correct position and are so tight that I am unable to open my mouth! It is a bit uncomfortable and it hurts a medium amount right now because my jaw is forced into this position. After the operation your body senses that something has happened and tries to “correct” the damage. It is of course not fun when you had surgery to fix your jaw and your body undoes it.

The rubber bands will prevent that from happening and I will wear them now for five weeks = until my skeleton is healed and my body has understood that this is the right position for the jaw to be in. I remove them three times a day, for breakfast, lunch and dinner, to eat and then put them on once more. The rubber bands themselves are stiff enough to be effective for about 30 hours and therefore I will change to new one’s every 24 hours more specifically after breakfast.

I almost forgot! Before the appointment with my surgeon I had to get x-rayed (which I love since I am basically Marie Curie’s biggest fan!) and I managed to snap a picture of the x-ray from the computer screen. The top picture is what I look like now and the bottom one is from before the surgery. Note that you can see the two places they cut the bone in the top picture + that you are able to see the amount of metal that now forever will be in my jaw.

The second picture shows the rubber bands placed in my mouth.

The third is a drawing of how the rubber bands are placed in my mouth and finally the fourth is a picture of what the rubber bands look like in the bag + the small tools I use to remove them from/put them back on my braces.

That is it! Until next time :)