Day 11

Day 11 of Post-Op

Ok, I'm crawling my way in to week 2 of recovery.

I just want to give some warning about the nasal rinse. When you think you got all the "drippage", you didn't. It will also come out of your mouth sometimes so don't freak out because that's normal.

That rinse really gets all up in your sinuses. No matter how long I stand over the sink, which way I tilt my head or how I blow my nose I will always have more of that salt water rinse drip out a couple hours later at the most inopportune time.

For example one, I was doing my homework and leaned down to get the pencil I dropped. I sat back up, water spilled right out of my nose onto my notes. Ugh. Could be worse.

Example two, I went to the Dr on Monday this week right after doing my morning nasal rinse for my normal checkup and just as the nurse goes to wrap the blood pressure cuff on me, water drips on to my lap. I laughed it off (nervously with a hint of embarrassment) and explained the situation. She said she understood but who knows haha.

So yup, just prepare for that. Here's a diagram of why that happens exactly. I think the excess is coming from when the frontal sinus drips out whenever it feels like it. I found it quite interesting. The arrows are the sinus rinse solution going in then out of the nose as it flushes it.

Clipped from NeilMed video.

In other news, the stitches are still there and my nose is still super sensitive to being touched or stretched. You know when you go to lick your lips, it stretches the top lips all the way up into your nostrils actually, yeah it stretches the area of my stitches which isn't really a pleasant feeling if I'm being honest. There's very little blood now, I can tell the holes are still healing and trying to close up though because the most blood I get is during the morning nasal rinse when I wake up. It's no where near the amount as the first time I did the rinse, just a tiny bit.

I think I might actually keep doing this even after the 3 months are up, that rinse seems like it would be great for when I'm sick and congested.

I did get sick this weekend though, based on most common illness incubation periods, it was probably at the hospital when I got my surgery (most places here don't wipe the pulse oximeter, that device that clips on your finger, after each patient. Hands carry a shit load of germs, especially under the nails.). Throwing up grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup was not pretty. I know it wasn't he antibiotics because I also had a fever and other symptoms.

I finished the amoxicillin thankfully, that stuff tends to make me nauseous half way through and I often forget to ask for Zofran. I love that stuff. Knocks out the nauseous feeling without knocking me out for two days like Phenergran does.

Anyway, I figure if the stitches aren't out this Friday, I'll call the ENT and see what can be done. I can't wait till my nose isn't so sensitive so we can start going to the Amusement park that we bought season passes to. We've only gone 2x since buying them, not even enough to make the purchase worth it.

I do have to say, the ENT I have seems really nice and professional. He knows his stuff! A Dr that seems confident and can make a patient feel at ease is a huge plus in my book. I rarely find one these days.