Day 26

3 weeks and 5 days post op.  I am so bored. Having been patient enough to sit through X Factor, I am now being forced to watch A Night with Will Young.  Fabulous Darling.  Waiting for Match of the Day.

Back to the whole flawed jaws thing.. today has been horrendous.  I visited the dental hospital yesterday and they said I needed to persist with the elastic bands as the centre line of my front teeth still requires a bit of tweaking for it to be perfect.  It's probably only about 1mm out but I suppose that having gone through everything I've gone through, we may as well get this thing done properly.  I also asked the orthodontist to take out the dissolvable stitches out as they hadn't dissolved and they felt quite uncomfortable.  I have to say that it was bloody painful.  I had read up on this beforehand and most people say they just felt a slight pulling.  I was prepared for that.  What I was less prepared for was feeling as though they were slicing open my gums and my upper labial frenum (that little piece of stringy tissue that connects your lip to your gum - I Googled that by the way) with a blunt stanley knife.  It was so sore.  Nevertheless, I was a good little soldier and didn't utter one swear word whilst they went about their snipping and pulling.  I think that's why today is horrendous, it just feels really aggravated.  They left a small bit of suture (stitch) in that really sore part of the inside of my upper lip.  I saw it today and proceeded to pull it out myself without causing any real discomfort.

I also found out that the left side (lower) was actually infected which is why it is more swollen than my right side.  I thought it was as it feels a lot more swollen and I sometimes get that metallic taste.  So for the last few days I have been gargling with hot salt water.  They haven't prescribed any antibiotics.  I also went to see my Doctor on Thursday.  He suggested I go back to the gym now starting with low intensity cardio work.  It was music to my ears as I have really missed the whole gym thing.  So, I went back on Friday morning and did some fairly slow pace treadmill and bike work.  Loved it.  The doc also signed me off of work until the end of September.

The fact that the swelling keeps going up and down is frustrating.  Just when you think you are making progress, BANG, Errol the Hamster makes an appearance in the bathroom mirror whilst I'm shaving.  It's not just the look of it, I feel as though I have a gimp mask on (complete with snooker ball gag) Just for the record, I have never worn a gimp mask nor do I wish to ever wear one.

Time for bed I think, I am shattered.  Good night all.