One Month!

I should've taken pictures...but not much difference from the past week. In fact, I looked more swollen this morning and I'm becoming more squirrely about my meds b/c I joined Yahoo's Orthognatic Surgery Support Group yesterday...

...and I asked about little red bumps (that I thought were tiny pimples at first) around my mouth and nose...and happened to mention that I started taking Doxycycline (hycate). And I got a reply from someone else who's having surgery in Sept. that includes the three procedures originally planned for me--LeFort 1, BSSO and Genio--told me that s/he's been taking it since Nov. and her doctor prescribes it to all his patients who has TMJ b/c even though it's an antibiotic, it stabilizes the joint. Well, she also told me that she's developed throat ulcers b/c of them b/c they can be harsh on the stomach and throat and must be taken w/ a full glass of water to make sure it doesn't stay in the throat and irritate it. Also, that taking calcium supplements or dairy w/in 2 hours of it hinders absorption. And that I shouldn't lie down for 30 minutes after taking it b/c nausea can get bad...and s/he was right. I've had stomach aches and severe nausea after taking it, and the capsule has stuck to my throat.


So I did some reading up on Doxycycline...and it's pretty strong, used for inhalation of Anthrax and malaria (and its prevention or travel under 4 months) and diseases like Syphilis and other STDs, Typhus and Lyme disease, and some bad, bad, bad strains of amoebic infections including fatally severe dysentery. And reading that reminded me of one of the worst bouts of dysentery I had, my senior year in high school.
I think I was out of school for at least a week, dying and running to the bathroom like every 20 minutes and was really weak and very dangerously dehydrated. I believe my mother was there at the time, but the lady who stayed w/ me during the week before my mom got to Kenya was a nurse and she ran to the pharmacy and got me an antibiotic. I took it, but noticed it was really strong and in my weakened state the smell of the pills was offensive. I don't know if it was the first time I took that pill, but it was maybe after the first or second dose, w/in 10 minutes of taking it, I had to go again and I could smell the antibiotic in the clear-liquid diarrhoea. I wasn't keeping anything in my body at the moment and certainly wasn't trying solid food so I went several times an hour, but it was very clear liquids and not too much of it either. I took small sips of warm water or tea or broth my mom brought me.
The whole point of this story is, that I remember reading the envelope the pharmacist gave/prescribed me, and it was an unfamiliar antibiotic. Trust me, I used to be familiar with all the usual types and often would self-prescribe to myself and to my dogs, this was Kenya and no one in our family was dumb enough to misuse our stock of everyday penicillin, amoxicillin, ampicillin, tetracycline and even Cipro. We had large brown bottles of the more common ones for our personal use as well as for emergency use on people we knew who didn't have access to doctors or pharmacies. We usually had missionary nurses and doctors we could call up in a jiffy to ask about dosing and prescribing, or if it was really serious case, had them come and check the patient out. Going on with my story, I hadn't seen too much Doxycycline around, and I believe the pharmacist had given me Doxycycline for my severe dysentery back then...and I smelled it in my liquid poop, b/c whatever I swallowed would go straight through me before my body had a chance to take it in. So I remember being worried about whether I should be taking another dose b/c obviously the last one didn't stay long enough to do much good...but then the next dose was supposed to be after 3 or 4 hours.
So, Doxycycline, we meet again. But this time, I'm not actually drying and dying in bed, just suffering and having mechanical trouble eating. Last time, the mechanics of food consumption wasn't my problem, just the functionality of my digestive system was in lots of trouble. Last time I didn't have to worry about venturing out into the equatorial sun and my skin being too sensitive to the UV rays, I was shivering and sweating under a blanket. This time, the sun seems reluctant to visit these northern part, despite it being May already. But this time, I know my nausea and stomach aches aren't caused by some dysentery-causing bacterial infection, but the pills that are used to cure such illnesses and to stabilize my Temporo-Mandibular Joint.
Great, eh? At least I won't be getting malaria or amoebic dysentery while taking this.

And, another almost-mile stone.
To celebrate my first month anniversary of my orthognatic (which I read literally means, "straight jaws") surgery, I tried to do my own laundry! Well, my brother was in a helping mood, so he helped, but I still had to fold and didn't get to it and threw a hissy fit instead upon finding my rumpled clean clothes strewn on my bed. It's a pet peeve of mine, b/c the whole point about laboriously folding clothes is so that they won't be rumpled when you pull it out and wear it. Folding rumpled clothes is dumb...and to remedy the problem, I usually just toss it in the dryer again to fluff it, but I thinkI might spritz some of the cotton shirts to help w/ the over-night crumples.
I cleaned the upstairs bathroom a little too, just like the old days. I did the toilet, scrubbed the sink and wiped the floors with Lysol wipes. I even wiped down the top of the toilet, toilet seat and tub ledge, but I didn't attempt the tub. My head didn't feel like it could handle leaning over and scrubbing after the other activities.

Excersize, or movement for the sake of excersize was attempted. I did some demi-plies in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th positions. I also added some temps lies in 4th and did some tendus in parallel en croix and threw in some passes (properly known as retire). No ports des bras, just arms a kimbo not to complicate things...and just arms in second for the tendus in parallel.

I also went "shopping" with my brother, to Costco to pick up stuff we need...food. And I bought mushrooms and bananas and organic chicken stock for me. We also got more fresh strawberries which prompted me to puree the ones macerating into a wine in the fridge. Picked up 3 types of juices, one for making jello...which wasn't sweet enough w/out the extra honey or sugar...and some cottage-cheese cups version of Activia, but by Breakstone and Skinny Cow eskimo pies. Yum. I ate half of one of the chocolate ice-cream ones...the cookie part is actually soft enough to melt in your mouth! And Josh got nuts and gum.

I also cooked!!! I made some creamy mushroom soup:
Peel about 7 baby bella mushrooms and 1 small-medium onion. I run my mushrooms under the faucet...I tried to just wipe them, but these were so dirty I just did my usual peel-and-rinse, and rinsed the onion too. I sliced the mushrooms and half of the onion, wrapped the other half in plastic wrap for the fridge. I sauteed the mushrooms and onion in 1/2 a stick of butter in the soup pot. I know, it's alot, but the veggies sucked up most of it! I'm trying to eat calorie-rich foods, so I did the butter over-load, like Paula Deen! I then scooped out the mushrooms and onions and dumped them into a mixer cup (bullet-type blender) w/ about 1/2 cup of milk, and let 'er rip. I did it a few times to get it to a puree while I made the roux out of what little fat was left in the pot, which I did by sprinkling 2 moderate fork-fulls of flour into the oil and stirring it w/ my spatula-stirer. I guess one large forkful of flour will do as well. When I thought the roux was done-ish, I poured just a little organic chicken stock and brought it to a boil while I whisked the roux into it. Then I added my mushroom and onion puree, brought that to a boil and added more chicken stock. I then remembered that I meant to add garlic to my veggie mixture, and found a garlic pepper powder to season the soup, and then got creative and added a few dashes of paprika powder and some fresh-ground sea salt and fresh-ground pepper to taste. I used a total of 3 cups of organic chicken stock in my soup and boiled everything.
I found the soup a little spicy which I think might be b/c the onions might not have been fully cooked. But my mom didn't think it was spicy. Maybe my mouth is just super-sensitive. I meant to add the half of avocado I had in the fridge, but I think that might make the soup too green...maybe I will anyways tomorrow.

Yesterday, for the first time since the surgery, I took pictures of my meal. I had pureed a can of Chicken Noodle Soup, and it turned out an orangey-yellow color b/c of the carrots. I stuck half of it in the fridge and added about a quarter of a slice of provolone cheese, crumbled/broken into tiny bits and pureed that. While I microwaved that, I pureed three small clumps of yu choy (I think it's also called chinese broccoli?) with a little dash of milk. The greens didn't puree so well, but I tried hard and scraped it into the middle of my deep yellow/light orange soup and it looked pretty! It also tasted pretty good.

I read and heard from my cousin that pizza can be pureed...I don't know if I'm that desperate yet, but my family had Chicago deep dish from Lou Malnati's today and I took small scoops of soggy crust, some melted cheese and tomato sauce and ended up swallowing them b/c I wasn't able to break it down in my mouth.

I think that's it. A couple nights ago my mom asked how long it's been since the surgery and I told her it'll be a month this Sat, today, and she was surprised. Tonight she noted that I'm doing much better. Which is so true. I even cleaned the bathroom and went shopping and cooked a new soup for myself! I mean, I don't cook much b/c I hate the clean up and planning/prepping, but it was hard! Given, I took some breaks and a nap. I'm hungry again...whoa, it's 2 am and no longer May 3rd...so good night!