Shelby Cass's Weblog

So here’s something interesting. Ever since the rubber-banding of my teeth together, I have not had jaw pain. Since the surgery I find that every time I think about it, I am completely clenching my jaw…and it no feel so good. I’ve been in kind of deep headachey jaw pain mode since the surgery, and now…despite the braces issue (which is NOTHING compared to the jaw ache), I have NONE. No pain. I sleep better. I wonder if they’ll let me keep these… Uh okay not really. I’d like my lips back. But oh my GOODNESS! It feels so good. I’m gunna do the head-bobby no-pain dance. It does involve the shoulders, but it feels so gooooood.

Do you remember those sexy C&R commercials? Oh boy, I wanted me a fireman. okay anywho…

So yesterday I was guy smiley…until smiling became not my friend and my lips formed an odd attachment to hooks and…well, don’t click on this picture if you don’t want to see extreme ick closeup.

notice the LACK of smile

So taking the bands on and off is NOT an option since it takes me and my butterfingers at least 10 minutes to try and try again to get every single tooth hooked…and obviously the corners of my mouth are not happy with that game either.

The good news is (and yes, there is always good news) that Operation Birthday Suit is progressing in leaps and bounds (thank you sick diet!) and I am very very close to my OBS goal. I fit into another pair of pants that have been collecting dust since Operation Cake A Day, and I believe I weigh less than my boyfriend. Awesome!!!!

So, have a good evening. Eat something. Chew and revel in the chewiness.

Oh Dr Quo how I do love thee, despite the pain thou dost inflict upon me. I can’t help it. She’s so sweet! And everyone who works there is an angel, so I LOVE going…but I don’t so much love how I feel for a few days afterwards. Always a trade. Kind of like this kidney infection sucked big time, but since any pressure on my kidney from my stomach caused immediate pain/pukeage I had to eat much less and consequently got down to 151.5 for a moment!!!! That means I’m down 10 pounds!!! Hooray sick diet!

So this is what the good Dr. Quo did to me today:

One full week of this she says, but after 3 days I shouldn’t hurt as much. As much? Well, she explained with a kind of apologetic pained expression that my teeth were going to hurt A LOT…possibly more than they did when I FIRST GOT BRACES. Wow. I knew I should have eaten breakfast. By the time I got to work the throbbing in the head had begun and I couldn’t get pills into my mouth without un-banding (which I didn’t want to do). My boss and co-workers are wonderful and supportive and told me to get the H out of there since my job is talking and that wasn’t working well. I did some work, came home, and got some pain meds down. I’m just going to say this is all for the best and at least it’s all happening in one big fat chunk instead of sporadically. Right?

Ooh, here’s some fun news. Court bought me Guitar Hero the 80′s edition. Rock on sistah! I REALLY didn’t like the music on the first one…too heavy…hurt my head. But my new friend Lisa showed me the song list on the 80′s version (How can you say no to “Turning Japanese” and anything Oingo Boingo?), so I sat my butt down and rocked it. Mochi helped.

On a less pleasant note, I have officially confirmed my suspicions that the smell of leather makes me VERY nauseated, especially in a car, or probably any confined not extremely ventilated space.  Add a the stop start stop start of traffic, and you’ve got me tossing my cookies on the side of the highway.  That’s hot.  NOT!  Friday night it was raining, my friend Lisa picked me up, and the second I got into her car I felt REALLY bad. Leather seats have always been a problem for me, but I think since Dr. Li fixed my deviated septum and gave me ultra super smell power +5, it’s just plain unbearable. I wonder what that is. Allergy? On the one hand, I’m thrilled to be breathing better, but on the other, I had uber sensitive scent picking-uping nose before, and the more air in with each inhale thing makes stinky times EXTRA STINKY. I was hypnotized once by The Amazing Alexander. He told me his breath smelled like a rose and I couldnt’ get close enough. Then he told me his breath was horrible and foul and I gagged and almost uked on him and he had to quickly tell me the smell was gone. Maybe I need to get hypnotized to not be bothered by smells because Court is severely bummed now since the he was hoping his next car would have leather seats.

What to do…what to do… For now I think I’ll just concentrate on healing everywhere. Maybe if I get really in shape I’ll just run alongside the new leather-seated car. hahhaah

Just thought it was time for a picture.

I don’t think it’s a complete match on the very back laft molars, but I did the chompy dance for Court the other night…  The chompy dance is where you chomp your teeth together so people can hear but you do it with a big smile and bob your head and pick a catchy beat.

Jaws are still extremely stiff and I know I  just sit around and clench 24/7 but…my teeth touch!  Celebration!!!!!

I ate a sandwich yesterday. Like…opened my mouth and bit both the top and bottom pieces of the ROLL and didn’t squish all the insides out. I’m gunna celebrate by eating the other half now.

Last night I found out that it doesn’t matter how much you like the shoes, if they give you blisters and you have to stop walking in the middle of University Avenue while your boyfriend runs to the car and brings the clogs you grudgingly brought along (Court requested that “Just in Case”), perhaps you must give up the ghost and realise the only thing getting Broken in is the skin on the balls of your feet.

I set up my jewelry table yesterday and made 2 necklaces. Awesome. I keep punishing myself by not allowing myself to make jewelry or do things I want to do when I want to do them. I think it has something to do with when I was little. My room was always a mess (shocker) and whenever I asked if I could do anything other than homework, the answer was, “After you clean your room.” Only problem was, inevitably I would come across a book I hadn’t read in a while, and 3 hours later my mom would find me curled up in a ball asleep on the floor in the closet. So art projects were a huge rarity in my home and if they happened, it must have been my birthday or something. Nowadays whenever I want to sit down and make jewelry or watch an episode or 20 of Buffy, I always feel extreme guilt (which I found out watching House can be caused by a lack of B12–haha) and usually end up “trying to clean” which means Court finds me 3 hours later curled up on the floor of the closet. Some things never change.

1. Anne Says:
   August 23rd, 2007 at 3:40 pm eHi Shelby. I don’t know if you remember me or not but we conversed a bit when you were newly-chinned. I have been reading your site regularly even though I haven’t commented alot. You are funny chick.Well, I am glad to tell you that I have a surgery date! Do you have any advice for someone two months from having surgery. I have the blenders (stick and regular) and advice on what to make to eat. I have my white board and case of chapstick. I am borrowing a recliner from my folks so I will have a place to hang out that is really comfy during the post-op time. I don’t have a kitty (DH is allergic) but I have a Bassett Hound that is pretty good company.

   I like your idea of Operation Birthday Suit – where it isn’t so much a competition as assured mutual destruction or success.

*************

Anne,

Well congrats on getting that date set! My first advice to you is to grab a piece of fruit, open your mouth, and take a big bite. Revel in that. When’s the big day? I’m so excited for you. Not for the first part of post-surgery, but the part where the rest of your life is a different color called AWAKE. The good news about post surgery is 1. You’re on drugs (not that they make you feel good, but without them….yeah, don’t go there) and 2. Your body will forget the pain. As much physical pain as you will experience and endure, you will remember the emotional aspect far longer than the physical, so I think your best approach is one of positivity. Because it WILL get better…and better…and better.

Who will be taking care of you, besides your much needed bassett hound? I’m thinking the person who will go through the most emotional turmoil immediately post-op is going to be your partner. Perhaps creating a few special meaning signs to communicate your gratefulness would be good prep. I learned the sign for Thank you (which involves getting your hand really close to your chin so watch out!) and sometimes that was all I could do, but it was something.

The first couple weeks you won’t be “eating” anything. It’s mostly syringe work and getting the calories and protein in. That’s where the Ensure and such comes in handy. As soon as you’re able to get your mouth open and possibly get “real” food in, you’ll get pretty tired pretty quickly, so make every bite worth it. I became Queen of scrambled eggs. May sound odd, but when I was little my dad put cream cheese in scrambled eggs and it was HEAVEN. Cream cheese in scrambled eggs is a bit of a decadence now, but post op…so worth it. One other thing I liked when I couldn’t quite muster much jaw action was cheese soup. I felt like I was really eating something solid…and add a little enchilada sauce. Instant liquid cheese enchilada minus the tortilla. I’m partial to Mexican food though, so take that as you will, with a salt lick or a jalapeno or something. Go to Penzey’s spices online and order…you know…spices. I made Italian eggs, Mexican eggs, French eggs…actually I have no idea how one might make french eggs…add garlic and snails? Anyhow, I loved me some spices. But that was once my mouth could handle spices. Honestly, for the first couple weeks you’ll be bland bland Central. Trader Joe’s has awesome chicken broth. Oh, one Trader Joe’s soup I LOVED was Ginger something Broth…so good. In general, Trader Joe’s had the best selection of interesting broths, so go there and have fun.

I became a regular in the baby food aisle…but again, that was once I could open my mouth.

My biggest advice is to get an alarm clock or 10 and set them for when you need to take your drugs. You do NOT want to get behind on pain management. Ask whoever is taking care of you to bring food/liquid whether you ask or not.

What else? Reading material will do you very little good. Instead, invest in seasons of your favorite shows. In my case, Court actually ordered cable for me (we don’t watch regular tv, only dvds) with DVR so I could record all the lame ass shows I wanted and watch them when no one else was around. I became a big fan of Bobby Flay from Boy Meets Grill. As if I could even imagine eating BBQ anytime near post-op, but it was fun to watch. After 2 months I asked him to cancel it (there is such a thing as too much trash tv) but it was SO worth it.

Get a pill crusher.

Get children’s liquid motrin (COSTCO sells it in bulk)

No citrus…your mouth will have open wounds for a long time, so don’t go doing shots of tobasco anytime soon. I guess, if that’s your thing, do some now ’cause it will be a while before you can again. So also, eat lots of oranges and spicy food now. If you need a suck a lemon, do that now too because I think they’re in season.

My fave Indian restaurant was nice enough to send sauces home with Court. Sometimes the flavor just hits the spot. One night I NEEDED salt so I drank pickle juice. Listen to your body and give it what it wants.

Do you have a laptop? I did NOT want to get up and sit at a computer so I was all set up on my chaise with my laptop and that was very nice. Bookmark www.cuteoverload.com in case you’re feeling down and need to see horribly cute things.

Don’t encourage people to come over. The drugs you’ll be on will be challenging enough. Trying to concentrate on entertaining could be a little too much.

Oh…do all the jumping jacks you want to right now. And maybe ride a roller coaster or go on the bumper cars.

If there’s any chance you may get in a bar brawl, do it before surgery.

Other things to do before surgery:

Get a pedicure.

Get a haircut.

One word: pizza

Enter a hot dog eating contest.

Make no plans for at least a month post-surgery.

yawn REALLY BIG and enjoy it!

Enjoy your sneezes too.

Get yodeling out of your system.

This is a long post and now I’m hungry.

chomp

Mochi is my favorite thing about New Year’s Day.  It’s yummy sticky poofy rice goodness…and I cannot wait for these braces to come off so I can eat it again!

Anyhow, I’ve got mochi on the brain because we got our new kitteh and her name is officially Mochi.Ta-Da!

I can’t stop there though.  No. I have to fill this post with sticky sweet pictures of our bebe.  Why?  Because we are taking turns sleeping with her until she is integrated into the Rira House and tonight (er, last night) was my night and even though she passed out COLD for a few hours, 5am seems to be her PARTY hour and my no more sleep time…so i escape..only to post pictures of her.  Sad.

She’s a licker.

She was almost named Sake…she seems to like it a leeetle too much.

she’s actually Court’s baby

Ooh Feet!  Tinky!!!

Lounge kittehs welcome.  Like my bruise?  I’m good at that.

Here’s what I look like recently:

Hello!

Want to see my chin? Okay:

Happy Saturday!  I hope most of you are still sleeping!  I know I’m going to attempt a few more winks.  Hasta!

Okay campers, here’s the dish. Went to see the lovely Dr. Li yesterday and before I could get into the exam room, I was accosted by a woman with X-Ray gear attached to her head and a big x-ray blocking bib. She gave me a big braces grin (twins!) and introduced herself, then asked me to meet her mom. I was kind of reeling. Someone I did not know was excited to meet me, and wanted to introduce me to their mother? She obviously had the wrong person, but I wasn’t going to say anything. But no, we quickly established that I am Shelby Cass blogger of sleep apnea joy (aka Dreamette on sleepnet.com) and then Dr. Li got really super pissed off and dropped some ninja moves on us to get her back into x-ray and me back into my exam room.

(Not really, but can’t you see it?)

Anyhow, I settled into my chair and Dr. Li asked how I was doing and I said, “You’re going to be mad at me.” “I’m never mad at you” encouraged Papa Li. I sighed. “Okay then disappointed.” He gave me a funny side of the head twisted smile look that said “whatever” and said he looked forward to my visits because they made him laugh. Aww! So I told him I had not gone to PT as per his instructions. Lo and behold, he didn’t drop kick me out of his office. Instead, he asked me to open my mouth and wiggle my jaw (again I was reprimanded about moving my lips and not my jaw side to side – hey now, I got it right eventually!) and then sat back on his toadstool and said I was doing fine.

Fine? What?! I expressed my shock at this statement since other people had told me their jaws were opening MUCH wider than mine only a few months post surgery and here I was 7.5 months post and having graceful banana eating issues.

Dr. Li got his “Poor poor Shelby, let me teach you a thing or two and I’ll talk slowly so you may understand some of it” look. He got out his cool metal mouth opening measuring tool and we eeked 26mm out of it. He then told me that people are able to function pretty normally with 30-35mm. I was still bummed about my seeming lack of progress, but then he told me that because I had such a small jaw to start with, and he had moved it SO MUCH, it made sense that it would still be this stiff (ligaments all stretched an whatnot) and I’m doing fine.

If the doc says, I will believe.

I do have to do much gentle stretching…oh that was one thing…he didn’t like that when I tried to stretch things I caused myself pain. He said NO PAIN. Liking him more and more. When he tells me I have to eat donuts on a regular basis, I will propose.

Speaking of donuts… Enter a new phase in the life o’me: Operation Birthday Suit. I have a friend (who will be hereto referred to as Smartass) whose birthday is also in October. We have both been thinking (read:lamenting) a lot about how much better clothing fit say 15 pounds ago, and have entered a phase in our lives when action will definitely speak louder and probably benefit our bodies a lot more…so we decided to lose the weight. Our goal? 10 pounds by October. Our reward should we meet this goal? $10/per pound and a little jaunt to the mall (or something) for some skinny clothes. Caveat: We must both meet the goal for the field trip to happen. We typically IM each other throughout the course of the day updating snack history and sending bits of “don’t touch that it’s EVIL” encouragement.

I told Dr. Li about Operation Birthday Suit and he cracked up. He said “So your goal is to lose weight until you can stand to look at yourself in your birthday suit.” Sure. Why not. And then he said, “Or when Court likes you in yor birthday suit” and I said “Court LOVES me just the way I am” (or something like that) and Dr. Li chuckled and said “Yes, yes. I know.” Was that a hint of patronization? Grrr. I couldn’t help myself, I blurted “I lost 5 pounds!” And his immediate response was “Yes! And you look 5 pounds lighter.” Then he got an evil look in his eye and said “Tell you what, I want to see you at the end of this Operation Birthday Suit. Why don’t you make your next appointment around there? If you are still having trouble with your jaw we can do a little PT then.” You’re on. NOTE: There will be no viewing of my birthday suit. If I’m so hot I can’t stand it, I will wear a bathing suit. hahahha. I’d advise againt breath holding.

And so I leave you with a pep talk between me and Smartass:

-Shelby Cass
Think of the skinny clothes you could buy with that money in 2 months

-smartass
I know
I’m not good with delayed gratification though

-Shelby Cass
me neither.
I suck at it.
I had bacon on my turkey sandwich yesterday

-smartass
heh, me too

-Shelby Cass
but I did NOT have a scoop of cookie dough which is taunting me from the fridge.
Good thing the chocolate chips hurt my jaw to chew

-smartass
maybe I need to get punched in the face so it’s harder for me to eat

-Shelby Cass
no, I’m thinking not.

-smartass
yeah, that’s probably not a good idea

-Shelby Cass
Remember, I paid someone 50,000 to break my jaw and I STILL gained weight.

-smartass:
yeah

Peace out!

I’m about to go see The Famous Dr. Li in Palo Alto and I thought I would post that info so that I would be forced to post the details later.  I’m going to hear a lot about my non-compliance with his instructions to see a PT…and evidently people who have had this surgery can all open their mouths wider than I can MUCH SOONER so I am a double wuss-slacker.

I measured my all the way open between the upper and lower teeth distance as a little over an inch.  Yeah, I know.  Far from ideal.

And so I go, tail between legs, to be reprimanded by my doc who will hear nothing but uh-huhs and yeah you’re right’s…UNLESS he insists I have not lost weight (3-5 lbs depending on the day thank you very much)  in which case I will probably get kicked out his office for being loud(er) and abnoxious(er).