Greetings All,
Deb has been doing most all of our postings on this thread. With her being smarter, nicer, better with words and art and of course much more beautiful (Laurie, feel free to add any descriptors you wish), it makes total sense that she does do the posting. That said, she is the expert on dialog and travel pictures but she has to sit and worry as I, from time to time, struggle in healing. Those are my words to tell.
Last evening while I was hiding in our room feeling ugly and totally unfit for society, she was down on the beach partying with three Russian guys. That must tell you something about the kind of strain she has been under, if she were clear thinking she would have been partying with some of the beautiful Spanish men around here. On a side note; transitioning has gotten me to look at men from time to time and I can tell you if any of them are pleasing to look at and some of the men down here are very nice to look at (my doctors are beautiful, huggers and one even kisses my cheek from time to time, oh my), but my orientation hasn't shifted an inch.......girls own my lust (yes, there are some lovely Spanish women here as well) and Deb is the only one that can ring my chimes.
A week ago last Thursday we had a pre op consultation with FacialTeam here in Marbella Spain and last Monday was surgery. Monday and Tuesday nights were at the hospital (a ten minute walk from our hotel). Recovery began at the hospital and will continue at the hotel until next Wednesday when we plan to move to Old Town Marbella (far more affordable) for another week of healing before heading home around the 25th of the month. For those curious folks, I had brow and orbital ridge reduction, eyelid reduction, a nose job, lip lift and chin work; both shortening it as well as shifting it a bit. Today is my fifth day post op. There is some pain, better described as strong discomfort from head aches and the swelling. And there is bruising! A couple of weeks ago we were in the l'Orangerie museum in Paris being awed by Monet's work. He would paint a brown tree trunk, but looking as closely as I could, there was no brown on the panel, his use of every other color in creation with wild and free brush strokes to create brown was amazing.....but it was nothing to the hues and shades of color creating the purplish bruising displayed on my visage. This is to be expected as I am only at day five of post op, and we are seeing reduction in the color already. A combination of the swelling of my face and particularly my nose and a compression strap arrangement to aid in the healing has sleeping difficult so far and is making Deb's job of caring for me all the more difficult with me being rather bitchy much of the time (remember the comments of the Russian boys on the beach?) In the five nights since surgery I haven't slept for more than a couple of hours at a time. It is kind of a drag and I can really bitch well but it is part of the price of what I chose to do so feel free to tell me to suck it up..... (and I will come back at you for making me cry!).
Next Tuesday they plan to remove the coronal incision sutures and eye lid sutures as well as the nose bandage. The lip lift sutures and the ones inside of my mouth are dissolving sutures and will take their own sweet time to set themselves free. I am really looking forward to Tuesday's unveiling. The hints of what I can see are very promising and have me excited. Just looking at the early on before and after photos that Deb posted a few days ago show a considerable change to my nose/forehead area and those are with bandages and two days post op.
FacialTeam has been wonderful through out all of this. During this week of recovery, they are providing daily nurse visits to take care of issues and check on healing. My patient coordinator, Isabel, is wonderful and she gave me a phone with her number on speed dial. This morning I had an acupuncture session with another more aggressive one scheduled for this afternoon. The intention of these, combined with laser therapy and previous lymphatic massages (amazingly soft and gentle) has been to improve drainage and aid in bruise reduction. They have also supplied me with a pharmaceutical cream that is to stimulate nutrient flow for greater bruise resuction. They have even been providing rides to and from the hospital and airport as needed to help reduce the strain of it all. Whether all of this smoke and mirrors is effective or not is yet to be see (and felt) but so far it appears to be working and I just flat out enjoy the pampering!
Enough for now, this is turning into a wall of words and most folks have probably fallen asleep a few paragraphs ago. Deb is down on the beach for lunch and drooling. We will post more later.
Love you all,
Tia Anne
