Day 14: Two Weeks

(June 15th, 2016)

A Video!

I wish wish wish I did this before the surgery. It's so hard to tell what the exact differences are in my speech and smile without a side by side comparison. I know it'll change as the swelling goes down, but still. Oh well. Also, this is a terrible clip of my video cover photo! :-/

Parents... 

I totally love my parents. They are so sweet and loving and caring, especially now, bringing me food every few days and checking up on me. But I got the most annoying texts today. From both parents.

They asked how I was doing, so I sent them a picture. My dad wrote back, "So beautiful, congratulations!" In a separate text message thread, my mom wrote, "So pretty! Like a movie star now!" WTF. I know they're probably just trying to make me feel better about the swelling and what not, but it felt... insulting? My parents KNOW why I got this surgery. Plus, I was already un-ugly. Yes, yes, that's vain, whatever. I'm just saying.

Anyway, my mom came to visit and I told her to please not comment on my looks right now because I just don't like it very much. She totally understood, cuz then she goes, "Oh, I know this isn't cosmetic. It's for your bite, yes, yes. Okay."

As a side note, I think the focus on looks and being vocal about how other people look (to their faces, not just behind their backs like normal people) could be an older Asian thing. Older Chinese people say things like,

• Ohhh, you gained weight, huh?
• What's that on your chin? A pimple? 
• Your skin looks terrible - stay out of the sun.
• You lost weight! What, like 20 pounds?

My parents generally don't say these kind of things to me, but it's really common with all of the aunties and uncles (parent's friends) and you just have to grit your teeth and smile. However, my favorite comment came from my dad when I was 16. He patted my cheek and said, with a smile on his face and I'm pretty sure love in his heart, "Good thing you're not fat. You wouldn't be pretty fat." Nice one, right? I think my response was, "Daaaaaaaaad! You can't say that to a teenage girl!!!" But he just laughed and said it was basically a compliment. Hahahahaha.  

Here's me today:

I'm gonna keep doing these lip pics, sorry.
I wanna see when/if it dissipates.

Pain: 3/10 (Today I woke up and, since it didn't hurt so much, I didn't take any painkillers. But around dinnertime it started to throb some. Still no Advil/Aleve. I'm gonna try to tough it out. I don't know why...) 

Numbness: Same. Gums totally numb. Chin area very stiff/tingly. (When something brushes against my chin, I feel SOOOO uncomfortable all the way INSIDE. It's so weird. It almost reverberates into my teeth or something.)

Discomfort: My cheeks keep getting stuck in the brackets when I talk.

Weight: -4 lbs

(Black items stayed the same as the last post. RED items changed slightly.) 

Jaw surgery day 14, done. 

~m