Day 509 –Last chance saloon

It's been 10 days since I had the hole in my gum restitched.

Unfortunately I have no gory photos as I am not allowed to stretch my mouth to even look at the wound.

It was pretty painful for the first couple of days: The stitches were so tight that laughing was agony. And there's a lot of laughter in Filipino offices. There was also a bit of swelling. Obviously, it was nowhere near as bad as in Days 2-7, but that area was swollen enough for me to add an ice-filled water bottle as a cold compress to my already-ridiculous regimens.

The situation was not helped by the fact that I have spent most the week dying of manflu. Anyone who knows me IRL will know that my sneezes are epic, so that causes some extra unwanted pain.

I went back to the MaxFax today. It's a friend's leaving do tonight, which may involve karaoke, so I was hoping to be given the all-clear to eat, drink, sing and rap.

The good news is that the wound is healing, and that I can go back to the chlorhexidine mouthwash instead of the potentially-staining iodine.

The bad news is that if it hasn't healed by the time I go back to the MaxFax in 10 days' time, the plate will have to be removed.

This morning's menu:

Omelette. As I breakfasted immediately after I got home from nightshift, there was still some fruit available.

Day 499 – Screw loose

It's been over a year since I abruptly stopped posting due to having to nothing interesting write about. Since then I've had the braces off and moved to Manila. The rest of the recovery sent well and was pretty uneventful.

Until last month. My dentist noticed a cut in my gum and I had probably the scariest medical conversation since I had my fingers chopped up.

Dentist: *hands me mirror* "What is that cut?"

     Me: "Please tell me that is not bone."

     Dentist: "It might be food. Nurse, please get me the Bone-Scraper."

     Me: "The BONE-SCRAPER?!"

     Dentist: "Don't sorry, that's just the name. *tapping and scraping noises* Yes, it is bone."

Then she gave me the mirror and I looked at my jawbone. Apparently, one of the titanium screws had poked itself through the gum. Not good.

Anyway, she stitched the gum back together so I got referred to a MaxFax surgeon.

She banned me from drinking alcohol, talking, and eating chewy or crunchy foods, so that the gum has the best chance to heal. Being banned from the first hasn't been too bad as I have been studying for an exam. The second has proved impossible, so I've offered myself the compromise of not singing (loudly). No no karaoke or Liam Gallagher for me. Chewy foods include:

• Meat
• Vegetables
• Most fruit
• Fish
• Basically anything that is neither liquid nor small enough to be swallowed whole.

So I am living on a diet that predominantly consists of omelettes and soft tacos.

According the the MaxFax, the titanium plates can cause irritation and cause tissue to break down.

I've seen her three times now. The first time, she gave me some antiseptic, alcohol-free mouthwash. That worked to an extent, but I maxed-out the treatment period of that.

The next step was to use iodine mouthwash, and a saline water jet. I say "waterjet" but what I really mean is that I have been using squirting saltwater into the hole after I've eaten. Needless to say, I've been getting strange looks in the restroom at work...

When I went today, she said it is still healing. It's healed enough to have another attempt at stitching it. I am now banned from using the waterjet for a week, or moving my mouth. Let's see how that goes.

I took this photo¹ just before I got stitched. I can't take one of the actual stitches as that will involve moving my month...

I'm going back in a week. Depending on how it's healing, we might wait a bit longer. Or the plate will have to come out in a quick procedure.

It's so typical of me that I recovered from the major surgery so fast, yet the saga of the exposed bone has so so latest longer than the initial run of this Jaw-Breaking Blog.

Today's menu, like pretty much every day's menu for the last six weeks, has featured a Northern Ireland-shaped omelette for breakfast.

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1. Please do not judge the state of that tooth. It needs crowining, but it's also the one with the shortened root and will thus likely fall out soon