Talking and Healing

I went in for a post-op check up today, which was a few days early. I have been having quite a bit of new swelling and pain since Friday that had me concerned and I wanted to get it looked at. Good news! My doctor said that the scar and swelling is healing nicely, perfectly in fact. I was very glad to hear that. He said the swelling is from the filler he put in my cheek called Alloderm and that my body just takes some time getting used to the foreign material in it. I was relieved to hear that it wasn't fluid build up called  a seroma as a thought it might be as that can take a while longer to recover from. I'm ready to be over this whole thing!  He said that he was hoping that my paralysis would be better than it is right now (no improvement so far), but he tested all of my nerves during surgery and they responded, so he'd be shocked if the paralysis was permanent. 

I took this picture in the hospital and sent it to my
brother the day after surgery saying "Everything
 looks normal, right?" (Of course he said yes) I wasn't
going to put it on here, but Brian and I still crack
up at it, so I thought I'd share. Laughter is the best
medicine, right? :)

I go in for another check up in two weeks, so hopefully by then I'm getting some movement. My right eye doesn't close completely, which is annoying. I get soap in my eye every time I wash my face and it gets dry easily, but he wasn't concerned about this either and it should go away. I still have very low energy and am tired most of the day, but that is to be expected still even for the next few weeks. Please pray that I have the energy to keep up with my kids come Thursday when Brian's parents leave!  I still will have my lifting restriction for a few more weeks, but I'm hoping to teach Levi how to climb in and out of the car seat by himself soon. Beyond that, I should be able to manage not lifting him during the day I hope.

Speaking of Levi, he has had a very good week of speech therapy, really impressing his therapist at UNMC with cooperating and even initiating some sounds. It is still difficult for him to get the sounds out right, but his initiating the speech is huge. Praise God for that!