I saw Dr. Mitton on Wednesday and he said we are all done expanding!  Woo hoo!  My upper jaw has been widened by roughly 15 mm.  We may need to go a little more down the road but the second surgery will take care of that.    I’m so happy!  Dr. Matheson cemented my appliance shut and now it’s time to let the bone heal.  I go back in August to see Dr. Matheson and get bands put on in preparation for braces in September.  I can’t wait!  3 months until I can have real food.  The first thing I want is broccoli beef lol.

Yesterday was a bad day.  I’m really hoping today will be better since it’s Friday.   For starters, I got chewed out by a doctor at work for something I have *zero* control over.  I just kept going over the material in my head from the  Customer Service books I have been reading “Yes I understand that must be frustrating.  Mmmhmm, I’ll see what I can do for you.”  Then I got home - had supper and heard a loud bang.  Roy went downstairs and came up and said “Yup 10 years on the nose”.  I had no idea what he was talking about and he said “The hot water heater just died.”  So now we’re left with no hot water in the house and having to boil water to get cleaned up - ugh!  Roy is staying home from work today to get a new one installed.  I hope it can be done today.  I feel gross without my morning shower.

I worked 6am - 2pm all this week with the exception of yesterday.  I have been averaging about 4 hours of sleep so I have been pretty wiped out.  I decided to crash on the couch last night a little after 7.  Woke up at 10 long enough to wash up and crawl to bed and go back to sleep until 4.  Not bad.   I feel like I could still sleep but at least I got 8 hours yesterday.

Anyhow I’m going to eat some breakfast then head off for work.  Hoping today is much better than yesterday!

My old Hirax is out and a new one in place. Dr. Matheson and Dr. Mitton decided my upper jaw needs more expanding so here we go again. Whee! They figure a good week to 10 days will do the trick. I saw Mitton on Friday and the plan is to turn the appliance once, next day turn it twice, then back to once, repeat until Wednesday. By Wednesday I should *hopefully* be done and ready to seal the new appliance shut. Then it’s just a matter of letting the jaw heal. I found out my upper jaw will be broken again when I have my final surgery done. The teeth need to be moved outwards so upper and lower jaw will be broken and work done to the chin. In Dr. Mitton’s words “This surgery was just a small thing - the last surgery is the big one.” Wonderful. I’m in this for the long haul though so I can’t wait. I took a picture of my old appliance below. Dr. Matheson said I could have it after he took it out. I’m emotionally attached lol.

I’m hanging in there diet wise. My typical daily meals look like this:

Breakfast - Shake

1 scoop vanilla protein powder
1 tablespoon of all natural peanut butter
1 tablespoon of dry chocolate pudding mix
4-5 ice cubes
Throw it in the blender and mix away. Tastes like a Reese’s peanut butter bar. Very good.

Snack is usually a bowl of Oatbran or an EAS ready to drink shake.

Lunch is usually soup or another shake

Afternoon snack is an EAS ready to drink shake

Supper can usually be a few things:

Blended chicken noodle soup and whole wheat crackers
Whole wheat spaghettini (broken really small) with lean ground beef (very small) and spaghetti sauce
Poached eggs and Oatbran
A shake of some sort
Puree’d chicken breast and potatoes or cranberry

I’m essentially living off soup, eggs, oat bran, pasta and lean ground beef. I sometimes make some protein pudding for a little dessert now and then but not that often. I know it doesn’t sound like a lot of variety but it’s working okay for me so far. Only another 2-3 months to go and it will be easier.

I have been walking, biking and swimming to get a little exercise in when I can.  It’s tough when I’m turning the appliance though.  I find my upper jaw hurts after expanding and I get dizzy quite easily.  I went for a walk yesterday afternoon, came home to have a snack and relaxed.  I got up later on in the afternoon to get a drink of water and nearly passed out.  It’s scary by times but I have to remember to take it easy.  With any luck I will be done on Wednesday and will be able to start doing more with each passing day. For now I’m doing the best I can and hanging in there.
Anyhow that’s my scoop for now.    I’m at work right now and should get some things done.  Again a big thanks to all my friends for sticking with me during this entire process.  It means a lot.