7 weeks on

Another week on and still struggling with infection on the left side.  It has been pretty uncomfortable and the lack of any visual progress has been a bit demoralising.  I finished my course of antibiotics just over a week ago and over the past weekend I felt as though it was starting to flare up again... so I took a look as to what might be causing the infection.  (By the way, holding a torch, a dental mirror and a pick whilst trying to get a view of the back of your mouth is not easy!).  I was a little bit freaked out when I saw what appeared to be a hole at the back of my gum on the outer 7th molar on my bottom jaw.  On even closer inspection, I could see the root of the molar and I'm fairly sure I could even see a small part of the jaw bone.

So today I managed to get an appointment at the dental hospital so that they could check it out.  One of the MaxFacs (maxillofacial) team was there along with my regular consultant orthodontist and they had a good root around but I'm not convinced they rooted round enough to see what I was seeing.  They were concerned about the infection enough to send me for some immediate post op xrays which looked amazing!  Aside from the teeth and jaws being all in the right places, I was impressed with the number of plates and screws holding my face together!  From the xrays, they seemed confident that the infection was not due to an infected plate (which would have meant another op to remove it!) but I'm not sure any root cause (excuse the pun) was established, they just said the lack of gum and soft tissue in that area was due to the infection.  So, they have given me another 5 day course of antibiotics, an official post op review appointment for 2 days time and a further ortho appointment to change the wires on the brace.  Gotta be grateful that they are doing all they can I suppose.

So having sorted the appointments I put my hand in my jacket pocket to get the car park ticket and guess what.... no car park ticket.  Shite.  That feeling when you know you are going to have to pay for a full days parking to get your car back, is not a nice feeling.  A better feeling is when you find out that somebody has handed your ticket in to the receptionist.  Maybe things are starting to look up a bit after all.