HELP! Is anybody else mad at their surgeon post-op?

November 12, 2005

I'm nine weeks post-op from upper and lower jaw surgery. I had my

upper jaw split into three sections, widened, moved forward a few mm

and shortened vertically. My lower was advanced about 7mm, and the

chin bone sectioned and advanced 6mm.

The good news: I now have a nice profile and my teeth line up

properly for a good bite. I am 80% recovered from surgery and

confident my remaining nerves will come back.

The bad news: Although my teeth line up properly to each other.

My " tooth box " as a whole, is about one or two degrees out of level

to the horizon. In other words, if you drew a rectangle where the top

two points were my pupils, the bottom points being the tops of my

teeth, the bottom right point of the box is higher than the bottom

left point.

When I think about this or look in the mirror, I want to cry. I'm 42

years old and have endured so much trauma with my mouth and teeth

over the years. When I decided two years ago to get braces (again)

and really go for it, I hoped to correct a multitude of sins

including: open bite, sleep apnea, poor profile, gummy smile. All of

those things were fixed.

I should be happy, but now my jaw slips when I chew, and when I look

in the mirror, I have to tilt my head for my teeth to look straight.

In addition, there was a big gap vertically between my back molars,

my OD said that will be fixed quickly with rubber bands. In three

weeks, the teeth are closer, but I also worry if that change will

revert when the rubber bands are removed down the road. Does anybody

else have any experience with this long-term?

Still, with all the money my OS makes, couldn't he have made sure my

facial box was square also? It just sucks to come this close, and

have fixed one problem, but created another. It was really hard for

me to agree to the upper jaw surgery. And recovering has been no

picnic. My lower right lip is still numb. One of my upper eye-teeth

has some blackness now. Dead root? decay?

I'm struggling with this emotionally. Does anybody have any similar

experiences and/or feedback/suggestions?

Thanks,

Tarzan

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