Anybody reading the blog probably remembers my state immediately post op. I was pretty swollen, bruised, and numb up to my eye ball on my right side and had pretty decent feeling on my left. My swelling didn't peak as bad as most, and what I did get went down pretty quickly the first few weeks. Residual swelling was mostly just some puffiness around my upper jaw, lips, and nose. I think this lasted for a good 2-3 months before finally seeing a drop off back to a more normal state. I still think I am a little puffy, but it's something I notice and nobody else. Some days are worse than others, but overall I feel like 95% of the residual swelling is gone. It's tough for me to report on the jaw pain since my bite is so far off that it's causing continued discomfort. I think at this point I have a good handle on what was discomfort from surgery and recovery and what is discomfort from the bad positioning of my jaws. I would say discomfort from surgery is mostly gone. I haven't had jaw aches/pains in a while. A few months ago I did get tired/achy after giving a presentation for an hour, but I feel like that has gotten better in the last 2-3 months. I was able to open pretty wide even shortly after I was unwired. I am definitely back to full range now, and was probably there within a few months post op. My right side clicks, but I have a feeling that is more from the fact that my jaw is crooked and causing tension on that side. I am hoping this will resolve itself with revision surgery since I didn't have any clicking/popping before the first surgery. Numbness has not really changed much in the last 4-5 months....maybe even 6. My gums still have a few spots that are hypersensitive around my right upper K9, and large areas mostly along the bottom front/right teeth and gums that are numb and tingly. When I bite down it sends tingles through the right half of my bottom lip and chin, which is still numb and tingly. It's not dead numb, but it's numb enough where I sometimes don't realize if I have a piece of food hung up there or if tooth paste drips and gets stuck there. I was SO concerned about the possibility of numbness (funny, since that is the least of all the evils now), but you hear a lot of patients tell you it's something you get used to and it really is not a huge deal. For me this turned out to be totally true. I definitely have gotten used to it. I risk more nerve damage with the revision surgery (actually, much higher risk for it now since they will be cutting through old hardware, new bone, and a lot of scar tissue around the nerves), but I'm not as worried about it this time around. Whatever happens will happen with that.
I went in to get a plain old overbite/overjet and gummy smile fixed. My surgical results left me canted about 5 degrees down to my right. I was left with about 2-3mm more of gum/bone/tissue on my right side vs. my left. I was left with a crossbite and a class II overbite/overjet still. My bottom jaw is significantly yawed out to my left, only one side saw rotation, and has caused the left side of my face to jut out and right side of my face sunken in, leaving my face asymmetric. My top jaw was moved 4mm forward (which was 4mm too far since it wasn't supposed to really be moved much at all) and has caused lip/mentalis strain, cramping, and bad lip incompetence. My lower jaw was only moved forward 3-4mm, even though my surgical plan called for 6mm. My bite post op was originally edge to edge on my left, and about a 3mm overbite on my right. I was impacted up front, but not at all in the back, leaving me with a slight anterior open bite. My orthodontist covered up (eerr... I mean, "corrected") a lot of the surgical mistakes to make my bite appear better to the eye, but I am still left with a huge jaw discrepancy. Gaining 12 lbs back after surgery has also helped fill in some of the asymmetry that was more visible in my face. As of now, I am sitting around 6mm for my overjet, I'm still canted 2-3mm down on my right side, and the rotation and yaw in both jaws is still present. With my current surgical plan having my lower incisor extracted, my overjet is going to get bigger in the next few months, and in revision surgery this will give them room to move my lower jaw forward more to the original 6mm that was supposed to be done the first time, my upper jaw will be moved back to where it started so I can close my lips comfortably without strain again, impact me more on the right to level out the cant and in the back to level out the anterior open bite. They'll do their best to unravel the yaw and rotation to both jaws, but they said this will be the hardest to accomplish perfectly and there are no guarantees. Unfortunately the new bone that has healed over the bad placement of the fracture on my left is here to stay. It will require a third surgery down the road to go in and recontour/reshape everything to make my face symmetric again. I'll cross that bridge when I get to it, but as of now I am not interested in going in for yet another invasive surgery that could cause more damage to my already beat up face.
I am back to doing all of my activities. I would say I returned to normal with all of that the last 3 months. I probably could have been scuba diving at this point, but I wanted to wait until at least a year post op, per recommendations from a few surgeons I've seen. I've got my first dive trip booked to Mexico in about a month, I'll report back and let everybody know how that goes in case there are any other pre op scuba divers wondering. Outside of not being able to bite in to anything with my front teeth (due to my wonky bite, missing lower front incisor, and loose tooth on my upper right lateral incisor thanks to the severe root resorption on it), I am eating pretty much anything I did pre op. I would say by 6 months post op I was back to complete normal for my diet. So, that is that. I would say had everything gone right for me, I would call me pretty normal again by the 1 year post op mark. Now to continue the count down until surgery number 2. ETA is about 7-8 months.