Recovery Tips
Following is a summary of the most important things I learned during my recovery from double jaw surgery.
- Drink lots of prune juice and water. Your toilet time will be far from enjoyable for the first couple of weeks because you’re likely to be severely dehydrated. The prune juice will provide your body with the fiber it needs to work those bowels properly, but fiber is useless without water because it won’t dissolve in your body. I recommend a bare minimum of 1 L of water per day. Drink 2 L per day as soon as you can.
- Before you attempt to pull any dead skin off of your lips, be absolutely certain that it’s not a stitch. I learned this the hard way.
- Start using medicated lip balm immediately following your return to your own home. If you don’t, you’ll end up with flaps of dead skin that are half an inch in diameter, and I promise you they won’t feel good when they catch on your braces.
- Apply heat to your face 3-4 times per day for the first 5-6 weeks to help with the swelling. The heat will also help you fall asleep.
- Begin each day at a decent time. If you sleep most of the day, you won’t be able to sleep at night, and you’ll hate yourself for it. Get out of bed, shower, eat some breakfast and brush your teeth and you’ll enjoy each day a lot more. (This is good advice for any day of your life, but it especially applies when you’re on the verge of depression from having jaw surgery.)
- Go to bed on time. Yawning will cause you quite a bit of pain, so prevent it by getting the right amount of sleep during the proper hours.
- As soon as you’re able to talk clearly enough for friends and family to understand you, call people and be social. Go outside and enjoy nature. Whatever you do, ensure you don’t fall into a trap of loneliness and self-pity.
- Start drinking from a cup as soon as you’re physically able to. Your upwards trek back to having full energy begins the day you can throw your syringes in the garbage.
- Eat solid food as soon as your surgeon gives you the go-ahead. It’ll be a slow, tedious and frustrating process, but you need to go through with it in order to build your jaw muscles back up and learn how to chew properly once again.
- It may take some time to get used to your new smile and your newly structured face. Don’t be ashamed of yourself. You don’t look funny at all. You’re simply not used to looking like you’re supposed to.
- And lastly, don’t worry about your looks, bite or facial feeling for at least 6 months. You may have an open bite, but you’ll wake up one morning and your teeth will have migrated back together. You may be completely numb, but feeling will return almost overnight.
If you have any questions about the recovery process, or perhaps have other pointers to share with upcoming jaw surgery patients, feel free to jot them down in the comments.
May 25, 2011 at 8:34 pm
Hi readyforachange,
Sounds like you’ve had a rough ride. I hope the surgery solves the problems you’ve been having and that you can take on a new life with a new smile soon!
Best of luck with your recovery and with your personal situation. That’s no fun at all. This is something that can heal up though, and I have faith you can move on and make the best of this.
May 25, 2011 at 8:32 pm
Andy, I didn’t have any bruising, so I’m not too sure on that one.
Swelling should be mostly gone by the 3-month mark, but it will stick around in small doses for another month or so past that.
May 24, 2011 at 5:25 pm
thanks for creating this blog, btw.
May 24, 2011 at 5:24 pm
glad i found this. had first surgery march 10th, for broken jaw. I am also a bad grinder. They inserted a plate. About six weeks later, they x-rayed, and i had a screw that came out, they reopened, and removed screw. couple weeks later, i could “feel” another screw came out. they set up a date for a week later, which was last week on may 19th, took out the plate, which i had grinded into an awful shape, and put lots of wires in, and this time wired me shut. am trying to stay positive, focused, but is hard. my husband broke my jaw, and I filed dissolution papers, he will be served this week. i need to be strong mentally right now, and being physically weak doesn’t help much.
May 23, 2011 at 10:48 am
Ok cool, I have had it in the off season over here anyway so don’t start games until September and will probably do pre season conditioning with a jaw shield on.
From what you have said the swelling takes a while to come down. I am currently in my Simpson/Quagmire phase due to the brusing etc, what can expect to come. Will the neck/chest bruising leave and the chin/jaw swelling gradually go down over a longer period of time?
May 22, 2011 at 10:18 pm
Hey Dawn. That rash was so annoying! I just put lip chap on my lips and unscented lotion on the rash and waited for it to go away. It won’t last too much longer, so you’ll be good to go soon!
May 22, 2011 at 10:14 pm
Hi Andy. I guess that important thing is that you don’t want to impact your jaw for at least 3 months because that’s when the actual bone itself will be fused back together just as solid as it was before the operation.
If I was playing hockey, I would shy away from it for 2 months (and then be extremely careful for a month), but make sure to run it by your surgeon and see what they say!
May 22, 2011 at 3:58 pm
Hi Graham! Great blog, it’s actually helping me throughout my recovery.
As of tomorrow, I will be on week 3 of my recovery. I underwent a double-jaw surgery as well. Not much complaints from me, I’ve been pretty positive throughout this whole ordeal, BUT there is one issue that’s bugging me.
I saw in one of your posts that you developed a rash around your nose and lips? I’m currently going through that and it’s just really gross and I’m just wondering what you did. It is mostly the parts of my face that are numb that are peeling and greasy and such no matter how many times I wash it or put moisturizer on it.
Anyways, I’m glad to hear that you’re all better. It actually makes me feel a lot better!
May 22, 2011 at 1:01 pm
As everyone else has said this is a great blog!
Had my lower jaw done 5 days ago. I play semi professional ice hockey so was wondering in terms of recovery time what you think I will be looking at.
All in all it has been ok so far. The first two were pretty nasty, while I was still bleeding (Had wisdom teeth out as well), but been taking it in bite size chunks. I’m just hoping that I like what I am going to look like when the swelling has all gone. (Kind of liked how I looked before, had a 8mm overbite but a pronounced chin meant you couldn’t easily tell)
May 19, 2011 at 11:19 pm
Omgsh *breathes* THANKYOU so much, really appreciate it(: I was hella freakin out lol. I’m happy to say I can drink from a cup now, messy! But I get it down and I’m only 13 days in^_^
May 19, 2011 at 10:14 pm
My bands snapped constantly the entire time I had them. Just try to get them back on where you think they should go. Call your surgeon if you’re not sure which teeth they were on.
You’ll be fine for a few days though. There’s nothing to worry about if they snap randomly. =)
May 19, 2011 at 9:03 pm
Eek help!! My bands ripped I replaced them but not sure if on the right tooth is this going to affect anything while I wait to me my surgeon? Hope u can help asap<3
May 17, 2011 at 3:28 pm
Thanks Graham, and thank you to Grace. I feel relaxed now about the situation ;]
May 17, 2011 at 11:43 am
You’ll probably be eating sooner than 8 weeks from now. I was slower at the recovery game than anyone else I’ve spoke to.
You really just need to ask your surgeon what they think. After all, they know your case better than I do! =)
May 17, 2011 at 11:38 am
8wks huh hmm well I suppose I can survive off chunky soups I think it’ll be better than the water down ones ugh. I just can’twait till I’m not banded shut anymore. Bit on the bright side my swelling has gone down so much and can make the spit face again horray baby steps!
May 17, 2011 at 9:09 am
Gracey, I wasn’t able to open my mouth and start eating solid(ish) foods until about the 8-week mark, but most people luck out and begin chewing a lot sooner than that.
I started with soups of all kinds and then moved into pasta and mashed potatoes.
May 17, 2011 at 9:08 am
Jose, you’ll experience that tingling for a few months, so it’s nothing to be worried about. You’ll also be numb for 2-3 months minimum.
May 17, 2011 at 2:36 am
Heyim curious when you were able to open your mouth again and were eating more what were some of the foods you could chew and what do you recommended?(:
And @ Jose the tingly feeling is just your nerves waking up again if you will. You’ll be feeling that for a while since it was lower jaw that area takes longer to get feeling back, so give it time the more tingling the better. Hope it helped.
May 16, 2011 at 3:33 pm
hi graham i had bottom jaw surgery almost two weeks ago and my bottom lips left cheek and my whole chin was numbb like 3 days ago my cheeck started feeling normal again but my chin and lips havent yet they just get these wierd tingeling feelings what does that mean ? anybody could tell me ?
May 13, 2011 at 3:00 pm
Omg..perfect that’s all I needed to know I have an app Tue but not sure I can wait that long I wanna spit so bad its soo so gross in there 🙁