I want to apologize for being MIA the last few months. One of my goals for 2015 was to focus on this blog, but little did I know the beginning of my year would be so awful!

The Friday before Christmas I had all four wisdom teeth removed. No big deal, right?! People have that done all the time. Obviously I am not like most people. I had three major issues stem from the procedure.

#1. Evidently, the wisdom tooth on the lower right grew through the nerve in my jaw. The surgeon cut the tooth to the nerve, then split the nerve in half to remove the root of the tooth. (slowly I have been getting feeling back in my lower lip and jaw on the right side. It’s not completely back, but I think I can live without any further feeling returning…maybe)

#2. In the recovery area, I had a seizure. I was told it was 25-30 seconds long. By Monday, I had a high fever, cough, and difficulty breathing. After work, I went to the Convenient Care. I was diagnosed with aspiration pneumonia; most likely caused from inhaling saliva or blood from the gauze in my mouth during the seizure.

#3. Just after the New Year, I started having some weird horrible tasting and smelling, pea-green fluid draining in my mouth from a hole in my upper jaw. During the procedure, the floor of my sinus was broken, because my upper left tooth’s root was in the sinus. This meant there was an open communication between my mouth and my sinus. Now if this would have been on the right side, I might not have had an issue. In 2001, I had sinus surgery to open the sinus to promote proper drainage. For one reason or another, I never had the procedure done on the left. Because of this, the bacteria from my mouth was going in to the sinus and basically getting stuck there.

A month after getting my wisdom teeth removed, I had a second procedure to close the hole in my jaw. The procedure went very well, but the recovery was much more difficult than I expected. I couldn’t open my mouth all the way for almost a month.

This was the day after the closing of the hole in my jaw.

My oral surgeon really wanted this procedure to be done in tandem with the sinus surgery to be done by an ENT. Unfortunately, the ENT to do the procedure was going on vacation, and couldn’t fit me in. So instead I was given a consultation appointment for 3 weeks after the closure procedure.

Fluid from my sinus was collected for cultures. The lab at the hospital was not equipped to give a complete analysis, so the sample was sent to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota. After about a week, my results came back as bacterium that “should” be killed by the array of antibiotics that I had been on for the last month. But just in case, I was given stronger antibiotics and some steroids.

I finally had my consultation, and she decided that surgery was needed to solve all the sinus drainage issue. She scheduled the surgery for 5 weeks from that day. I was more than upset about this.  I had been having issues, that were seemly easy to fix for 2 months at this point, and now would have to wait another month.

This past Friday was the T-minus 14 days until sinus surgery. I had a pre-op physical. At that physical, I was told that I would probably not be able to have my surgery as scheduled at the out-patient surgery center due to my weight, I would have to have surgery at the main hospital OR. I was furious. If there was a weight limit to have surgery at that center, the ENT’s office should have NEVER scheduled me to have the procedures done there.

So now, I am waiting to hear back from someone from the ENT’s office to either a. reschedule my surgery or b. tell me my surgery is still on for the 13th. I am hoping for b, because I was given the first available appointment for surgery and that was 5 weeks from the date scheduled. I don’t know if I could handle another 5 weeks of sinus pain, pressure, and fevers.

I am hoping to create a posting schedule soon, and get this blog going again! I know y’all have missed me!