Day 15 - Forced Smiles

Ok, these pics are mostly for Mary, because she is soooo...demanding! ;) The reason I have not been posting pics of me smiling is that its hard! Half of my lower lip is numb, and only in the last two days has it even begun to feel like I have control over it. There is still a lot of swelling in my mouth, and when I try and smile, the swelling in my cheeks feels so much more noticeable and tight, like I'm forcing them to be all scrunched up! The first pic is one I had my mom take this morning, you can really see how puffy my cheeks are! The other two are just close up smiles.  
 
I saw the OS again today as I feel like I might be starting with a sinus infection. He again said I looked fantastic. He told me when I go to see the ortho on Monday to get all dolled up, and that he will be "floored by how great I look" LOL....I'm sure he says that to all his patients. I told him thank you, but that I still feel like I look really fat and puffy. He told me that he understood, but that the swelling could and probably would stick around for a few months. :(
I talked to him about my lack of sleep, and that it is really hard for me to sleep on my side (since its not comfortable.) I told him that when I sleep on my back though that my mouth falls open and then I wake up in the middle of the night with really sore aching muscles. So we are going to try using some rubberbands at night for sleeping. He wants me to run them at and angle from top to bottom and see if it helps.

In addition to this he took out my stitches on the bottom, which I didn't feel thankfully. He then took a flashlight and showed me the screw that was just below the gum surface on my bone graft/implant site. That was pretty cool to see! He measured the distance I can open my mouth which is now 24mm instead of 23, and said that honestly, given the fact that I'm over age 30 that I can pretty much count on about a month of feeling pretty punk. He said that it takes the body awhile to recover from the blood loss, and regain its energy level. He said that I'm actually way ahead of schedule due in part to my small blood loss and that he is very pleased with my progress. My next appointment is June 22 and also the day I leave to Las Vegas for a week. Hopefully I will be feeling considerably stronger and sleeping better by then. A lot can happen in two weeks, and I think Vegas will be good for me as I will be busy and have less time to focus on the daily irritations. I see the ortho for my first post surgery visit Monday, and my son gets his braces removed then! Yeah for him!