the night before jaw surgery

It's 10 p.m and I have to wake up at 4 to go to the hospital because tomorrow's the big day! I didn't update after my appointments but there wasn't much that happened that was different from other appointments. I got my surgical hooks at the orthodontist and then went to the hospital to pre register for surgery. There, they took my blood and gave me the instructions of what to do and not to do before surgery. From there I went to my surgeon's office. He answered my last minute questions and wrote me all my prescriptions. I will be in surgery for about 5 hours so ill be done around 1:30.
I'm feeling really anxious and just want it all to be over with. My doctor gave me an anxiety pill so I can actually sleep tonight so that helps. I have an amazing support system that's making this process so much easier. My mom, dad, boyfriend, and my sister, who flew in from Alabama, are all coming tomorrow.
Well i'm off to sleep for a couple hours! I've put my boyfriend in charge of documenting everything. I will update as soon as I can.
xoxo
Aubrie

6 days until jaw surgery!

Hey guys!

Well, only 6 more days until jaw surgery! I almost wish the surgeon would keep the date of the surgery a secret so I wouldn't be so anxious. Last week I went to my surgeons office so he could take molds of my teeth. These are used by the surgeon to practice the surgery, so before he goes in the operating room he has basically done the surgery before.
Tomorrow is a day full of appointments...fun stuff. I go to my orthodontist to get the surgical hooks put on. These will be the hooks for the rubber bands after surgery. Then I go to the hospital to pre-register for the day of surgery. Then lastly I go to the surgeons office to go over everything with him one last time.
I'm still in school at UCF so I have plenty to keep me occupied at the time but I find myself dozing off and thinking about Monday. It's almost here! I'll update again tomorrow after all the appointments.

xoxo
Aubrie

Cleared by the Orthodontist and surgeon! Ready for surgery

It's been a while since my last post because there wasn't much going on besides tightening the braces. I finally have some news and things are starting to fall into place! I visited my orthodontist about a month ago and they cleared me for surgery. No adjustments were made to the braces at that appointment and they said if the surgeon likes where i'm at we will schedule the surgery. It took me a month to get an appointment with my surgeon and that was really frustrating at first because I am getting impatient and just want everything to be done as soon as possible. It's really easy right now to get impatient but I have to remember there are other people in my same situation, waiting. So after a month, today I had the appointment with my surgeon. He told me everything looked good and we went ahead and scheduled the surgery for September 9th. He only does surgery on Mondays so I thought he may be booked out for a while. So it's surprising it's coming this fast! But i'm so happy that things are progressing. Up until now I was just going through the steps of tightening the braces and dealing with them day to day. For the first time it's all starting to feel real! I spent time at this appointment to ask my surgeon all the questions that had been on my mind and he put me at ease with every answer. There's a lot of appointments before surgery but the office is handling all the scheduling, so that's nice. Below here I will post some of the questions I asked because many of you probably have the same ones. I will post again when I have updates!

xoxo

Aubrie

-How long will I need to recover? Everyone is different during the healing process but generally a good 2-3 weeks.
-When will I be up and moving? Two days after surgery you will have to go in for your first post op appointment.
-How long do I have to be on a soft-food diet? 5 weeks
-When will the swelling be at its peak? Day 3 will be the peak of the swelling, it won't get worse from there.
-When will the swelling be fully gone? Generally, after about 4-6 week
-Why do some people say their swelling hasn't gone down even after a year? Because they are not used to their appearance. Your appearance changes slightly and some think it's swelling.
-Will I be in a lot of pain? Your face will be numb, other than feeling uncomfortable your pain level (after taking the pain meds) should be close to nothing.
-When can I start eating normal food? After 4 months
-How much weight will I lose? (I weigh 116 and i'm 5'5") Probably no more than 5 pounds and you will gain it all back within the first month.
-Is this surgery common? Very.

The beginning of my journey through braces+surgery

5 months down 5 to go! 21 with braces...

Hey everyone!
This is my first post to start off my journey through braces and jaw surgery. I have an openbite and my jaw comes forward a bit when I am just relaxing (small underbite). This seems like a minor thing to some people but for me, it has become a problem. I can't eat certain things because I am unable to bite down with my front teeth and I have a tiny speech problem because my tongue goes through my front teeth. Also in pictures it would be nice if my teeth would close :) So to fix these problems I have opted to have jaw surgery! I knew about 4 years ago when I was 17 that braces alone wouldn't fix this problem and I needed the surgery. Me, being in my senior year of highschool and about to go into college said no way...due to the braces. I am now 21 and going into my senior year of college and the reality of life is bigger than it was 3 years ago. My parents are willing to pay for the surgery now I want to get everything out of the way before I have a real job and get married... and all that fun stuff.
I got my braces on November 26, 2012. So to this date it has been 5 months and a few days. My orthodontist said I would have the braces for 10-12 months before surgery and 4-6 months post-surgery. Apparently this isn't that long to them since my teeth are already straight. I am aiming for the 10 and 4 months.
I probably won't be posting much until it gets closer to surgery time (hopefully 5 more months) but I just wanted to put some pictures of myself before braces and in braces. Yes, I look a good 5 years younger than I am. It's tough seeing people and trying to talk normally when all i'm thinking about is how stupid the braces look and how i'm stumbling over my words. Being 21 with braces definitely has it's downs but I know in the end it will all be worth it. I would love to talk with those of you who have already been through this process, those contemplating, or those in the same stage as I am!
Good luck to all starting this journey!

xoxo,

Aubrie

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