numbness

[Guest guest]

Hi all. I had upper and lower surgery as well as genioplasty over 4

months ago. Recovery has come down to a crawl since then (hopefully

not a complete stop).

Bands are still tweaking my teeth, providing the usual soreness to

keep me from eating harder foods. But my main concern is numbness of

the lower lip.

I realize how recovery from numbness varies *greatly* from person to

person. But I'm still just curious to know how long it took you

veterans to recover an acceptable amount of feeling.

By " acceptable " , I mean being able to fork a bite in your mouth

without tripping on the lower lip, being able to whistle, licking

your lips without having to concentrate, and I guess having a good

50-75% of feeling.

The inside of my lower lip is completely numb. The outside has maybe

5% feeling (as it's had for the last 3 months), but it's a very

strange/uncomfortable/useless sensation, a bit like hitting one's

funny bone.

Thanks to that numbness, I'm still worst off eating than I was

before surgery. I have to wipe my mouth after every single bite and

I admit I'm starting to become very frustrated. Sometimes I just

crash the fork into my teeth and have to try again. I get the

impression my OD thinks it's unusual to still be numb. He keeps

asking (expectedly) if I'm feeling any burning sensation, but I'm

not.

For those of you who were in a similar situation 4 months post-op,

how much longer did it take the numbness to fade a good amount?

Thanks,

Yann