Hurrah Jaw Surgery!
And here I am on the other side of surgery in the ICU:
One unexpected side-effect of surgery was the emergence of compulsive thumb-upping behavior.
You'll note my shoulders are bizarrely bare in the ICU picture - this is because as soon as I arrived in the ICU I began (to the horror of the nursers settling me in) to sweat profusely. And I mean profusely. Not a fever - just my body's reaction to stress, I guess. Happens to me sometimes after stress dreams too. Who knows? I was pleasantly sedated enough that I didn't really care one way or another. The plus side is that, in addition to airing me out in general, they took my socks off, so the whole world got to see my AWESOME nail polish.
See? Nurses in the ICU probably don't see bare feet that often... It was the highlight of their day.
And just so you can get an idea of the swelling I experienced (pretty minor, considering the intensity of the surgery!), here I am on Day 2:
See - there's that damn thumb again!
On the other hand, my swollen cheeks and numb chin/lips made it virtually impossible to smile.
To all those not under general anesthesia for the duration of my surgery, the procedure took about 5 hours, from the time I was wheeled into the operating room to the time I was brought into the ICU. For me, surgery seemed to last approximately two whole seconds. At that point someone told me that surgery was over and I could feel myself being rolled to the ICU. I could tell that my mouth was rubber banded closed and it felt as though my chin and lips had been pumped full of Novocaine (I guess having facial nerves moved around will do that to you).
I know a lot of people struggle with coming out of anesthesia (experience disorientation, anxiety, nausea, etc), but I woke up ridiculously quickly and painlessly. My parents and Costa headed to the ICU as soon as they got the phone call from Dr. Li saying I was done with surgery, and by the time they got there, I was alert and could communicate with them via pen and paper. Not to mention my incredibly expressive thumbs.
In between visiting times, I listened to music on my mp3 player and slept A LOT. Once I was up to drinking fluids, they started me on water and then juice... that part was tricky because my lower lip and chin was COMPLETELY numb.
Besides a sore throat (the only evidence that a breathing tube had been used that I was ever aware of) and some general achiness, my pain was pretty under control during my entire stint at the ICU. My nurse, Jen, was absolutely phenomenal. She was warm, responsive, and very very funny - which made my stay over night in the ICU pretty pleasant. Between Jen, ice packs tied around my face, the humidifier keeping my nose clear, and the morphine, I was pretty content. There was some noise from other patients and from the hair-trigger vital sign alarms that go off when jostled by the butterfly passing by the ICU window... but that's to be expected. I was tired and comfortable enough to get a reasonable night's sleep.
I was very surprised by how un-miserable I was after surgery. I know that some people might have a rougher time of it than me (the nurses were all impressed by how little swelling and bruising I had, and by how quickly I recovered from anesthesia), but for anyone considering the surgery - the experience really isn't as bad as you think it's going to be.
Since I did great overnight and was already drinking lots of fluids without issue (besides spilling), I was released from the ICU the following morning and relocated to a normal hospital room.
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