Here’s the septoplasty update. My nose seems to have completely healed, but there are some post-operative swellings that refuse to die down.  I believe the technical term is “edema”. In any case, they must be dealt with, and so the surgeon’s prescribed all manner of pills and nasal sprays.

The side-effect: insomnia! Sleeping at 3 AM and waking up at 6 AM makes it only the partial form of insomnia, as opposed to the full Fight Club kind. You might think I’m getting a lot done with all this spare time, but that’s not true. You feel as tired as you do without any sleep, so it’s not exactly helping the productivity factor.

Luckily, I only have to take these blasted pills for another few days, and then I should be back on track. The sprays and whatnot have to be continued for a long time, though. I dislike complications. However, I’m allowed to exert myself now and have been hitting the gym three times a week, as always.

Oh, and Happy Canada Day!

I’m back from the checkup at the surgeon’s. He castigated me for not hydrating my nose with the prescribed saline solution, but in all fairness, I wasn’t exactly eager to shove hot salt water up my nose in the hours following my surgery.

In any case, I have to do it now to dissolve the blood clots and assorted gunk up there. Quite disgusting but mandatory. To show me why I had to do it, during my checkup, he inserted tweezers into my nostrils and pulled out a giant blood clot. If you’ve ever extracted any nasal hair by giving them a good tug and enjoyed the sting and watery eyes after, then you can imagine what it feels when around 40,000 hairs are forcibly extricated in this fashion. Ow.

So, I have to hydrate with this hot water and salt solution four times a day until May 22nd, when the splints come out. The blood has stopped flowing down the front of my nose, but the seepage continues down the back of my throat. My painkillers have almost run out and the hot water certainly makes my entire face ache with a dull pain. It’s not pleasant, but only a few more days.

In conclusion, things are better than they were last week, but there’s a dull ache, only relieved by the promise of the splints’ extraction on the upcoming Friday. One can only hope it won’t hurt too much, but I think I’m being overly hopeful. They are stitched to my healing septum after all. Ow.

Last week, on May 6th, to be precise, I underwent a septoplasty. This post will chronicle some of my experiences in the hope that it might help people with questions about the procedure, espeically if they are about to undergo it themselves.

Last Feb, the specialist diagnosed my chronic sinusitis as being caused by a deviated septum. Apparently, I broke my nose as a kid, but never realized it and my septum grew all crooked ever since. It wasn’t a problem, until my mid-twenties when it started to obstruct a nostril and impede circulation, thereby causing all sorts of sinus problems.

To cut to the chase, I didn’t eat or drink anything (even water) after midnight on the 5th of May. I showed up at the appointed time of 9.00 AM and sat there. At 10.20, they wheeled me in and put me on an IV feed. Then I was subjected to a barrage of questions about dentures, blood pressure and whatnot, all because of the imminent anesthetic. I was anesthetized at 1.00 PM and I don’t remember a thing after it, obviously.

I came to around 4 PM, groggy as hell and in pain. The nurse asked me to rate my pain on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being unbearable, 3 being tolerable and 1 being bliss. I said 3, because the pain was present, yet tolerable. Around 20 minutes later, she asked if I was in pain and I said yes. The right answer is always 10, since if you say anything below that, they think you’re trying to be a tough guy. Having said 7, they pumped me full of morphine and I drifted off again.

I came to and they were measuring my blood pressure, which was insanely high because they’d pumped me full of cocaine during the surgery, to aid with the septoplasty. What a day, being pumped full of cocaine and morphine and not feeling a damn thing. I understood that they weren’t going to release me until my blood pressure returned to normal, and I drifted in and out of consciousness.

Around a few hours later and several bandage changes later, I was allowed to leave, it being a day surgery and all. Fortified with plenty of T3s and that huge dose of morphine, I was wheeled out to my car, which my girlfriend then drove home.

The last seven days have been a blur of painkiller-induced sleeptime and hazy bouts of pain. My nose leaked blood down the front, which was heavily bandaged, and also down the back of my throat, but I wasn’t allowed to clear my throat or blow my nose, for fear of dislodging the blood clots.

Other things that were verboten:

• Hot drinks
• Hot Showers
• Steam of any kind
• Exertion of any kind

Luckily, thanks to the painkillers, discomfort was minimal, as long as I remembered to take them regularly. The strong antibiotics  make me fairly dizzy, so I’m still not allowed to drive or anything like that.

As for my diet, it was basically soup and soft foods for the first few days after the surgery, since chewing anything hard jarred the upper jaw and caused pain. But now it’s fine, I can eat almost anything, but I’m still taking it easy, at least until the bandages come off.

One week after the surgery, tomorrow, I get to go back to the specialist to take my bandages off. They’ll examine the nose and check that everything’s ok. I really hope everything is, since I really don’t want to undergo all of last week again.

If all has gone well, one week from tomorrow, they’ll take out the splints from my nose and it won’t be so swollen anymore. I’ll return to looking normal, and not be a bandaged freak of nature.

Speaking of a swollen nose, the outcome wasn’t as bad as I’d expected. I had anticipated black eyes, a fully swollen face, the works! But luckily, all that’s swollen is my nose and upper lip (not that I can see them, they’re under the bandages, but they are puffy and tender). The doctor assures me that my nose will look the same externally, so I guess I’ll find out tomorrow when the bandages come off.

I’ll keep you posted.