12 December 2008

The adventures of lumpy lip

The day has finally arrived. I’ll be heading to the Montfort Hospital this afternoon to rid myself of this annoying mucocele. Current mood = bleh! I can’t say I’m looking forward to the procedure, but it will be good to stop biting down on this damn lump or having to rely on my Photoshop wizardry to fix photos.

I’m not entirely sure what to expect recovery-wise, but I imagine that I’ll get the full list of details and marching orders once I’m administered to the outpatient clinic this afternoon. I suspect, after reading a few articles, that I’ll be subsisting on a diet of mush and mouth rinses for up to a week. My mother, being the ever-wonderful nurturer that she is, has already made Jello and pudding for me to eat for dinner. I told her that hubby and I could make our own mush, but she seems a bit eager at the prospect of playing Florence Nightingale to her daughter – once a nurse, always a nurse; once a mom, always a mom.

Not much more to say for now. Cross you fingers and hopefully all will heal well with little scarring and, more importantly, no lump reoccurrence. The cyst will be sent for biopsy as a precaution, but I have no worries there because it looks like a textbook case. On that note, would you like to see what it looks like?

Before:
















As luck would have it (NOT!), I managed to take a volleyball to the upper lip last evening during our final game of the season. I bled like a bugger for a good 10 minutes. Looks like top and botom will match after all...

Stay tuned for drug-induced, post-operative ramblings and gory pictures. Because I know you want to see my stitched-up mummy mouth!

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

UPDATE:

I'm back and all stitched up. The surgery went well is you exclude the fact that I almost fainted towards the end of the procedure. It did not hurt at all, good freezing took care of that, but I am simply prone to faint anytime I have a needle or some medical procedure out of the norm. I wasn't particularly nervous, I didn't experience any pain and yet the colour drained from my face and my blood pressure went down straight away. I wainted until the final sticth to mention that I fel faint and then I was rushed off to lie down in a recovery room. I hate that my body always does this to me, I feel like such a damn wuss.

Faintig scare aside, my lip looks decent. I have a total of 4 stiches and they don't look too gruesome. I have a good bit of dried blood on my lip, but I'm going to wait until tomorrow to dab at it. I'm a bit puffy and get little aches and pains, but the Tylenol is working its magic. I have even managed to chew on some food, although I think that mush will be safer for a few days. All in all though, it's really not too bad. The most annoying thing, is not being able to close my lips naturally because of where the stitches are located. I have to be very careful not to suck on my lip at all while it is healing...harder than it sounds.

And now, to finally satisfy your curiosity, here is my lip. See I'm smiling and all. The doctor said I had about 3-4 small mucocele grouped together - that's what was causing all the swelling. I won't get the biopsy results backs until January, but all seems well. TTFN. I'm off to take a rest and grab an ice pack. My energy is still zapped from almost fainting, but tomorrow should be better.



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