Warning: long update ahead! :)
Hi friends!
First of all, thank you for your prayers for my oral surgeon appointment yesterday. I will get to all the details in a minute so just be patient with me while I get you up to date on everything going on in my life, ending with yesterday’s appointment and some prayer requests.
Ezra is doing great! His leg seems to be all healed up and he got to take his first real walk yesterday evening. He was thrilled! He has wanted to go on his normal walks, but couldn’t due to vet orders to rest, but those weeks of rest ended yesterday. I was so thankful to see him tolerate the walk without any limping and my heart is so happy to see him back to himself again!
Therapy is going well. I haven’t officially started the program yet, but I have some exercises to work on while we get everything in place to start the official program. I now have a new companion in the form of a continuous pulse oximeter strapped to my wrist and thumb to monitor and record my heart rate. The program itself is a very rigorous 5 days a week therapy. 3 days cardio and 2 days weight. On cardio days my target range for my heart rate is to keep it between 140 and 160bpm while working for 3 minutes and then rest until it comes down below 140bpm and go again. Let’s just say, that range is NOT very comfortable, but I’ve had higher so I’ll live. ;) We are hoping to start the program next week as long as we can coordinate our schedules where I can go in daily for at least 2 weeks.
And some dreadful news…I am having issues with my last batch of formula. I started having tummy pain on Palm Sunday after starting my formula, but didn’t put the two together. I figured it was just one of those bajillion things that can “randomly” happen with MCAS. Then I started getting a mysterious itchy rash on my face come Tuesday and I couldn’t pin down the trigger which was absolutely driving me insane because I didn’t know what to avoid. By Thursday I was having bad tummy pain and my intestines were clearly completely rejecting my formula. THAT’S when I put two and two together. I tried to push through but it just kept getting worse and worse. We just so happened to notice that my formula company was recently bought out by none other than my previous formula company that ruined my previous formula to make it more cost effective for them while making me very sick. Yeah, I’m less than pleased! We have a call in to the company to attempt to find out what’s different this time. It is SO frustrating! Sometimes I think if they had to taste just a tiny bit of what they put patients like me through maybe they would at least think twice before sabotaging someone’s only means of nutrition. I plan to attempt to run some formula today out of my older stock and see if I still tolerate the older manufactured formula. If I do then that’ll tell me there is definitely SOMETHING that has changed.
Now…for the news I’m sure everyone is chomping at the bits to know…how did my oral surgeon appointment go……
It went very well! I’m really pleased with the oral surgeon. He is very kind, compassionate, and understanding. When he first came in the room, he was acting as though he wasn’t going to do it because I’m so sensitive to nearly everything and he was afraid I would react after going through all of it. I was hoping he wasn’t going to say no…I just knew I would burst into tears because I’ve been tossed about so much and have struggled to find anyone that can do it inpatient in the hospital OR. I felt like the Lord had finally found me one and now the surgeon was going to say no. But we explained to him that EVERYTHING I do in life is a risk. I told him I knew the potential danger and what could happen but I was willing to take that risk. He said ok but he would have to get clearance from my doctor. He took a look at my facial CT and said my lower jaw bone is deteriorating and will eventually get like knife thin and the gum tissue is already disintegrating which is what really has to anchor around the implants. As of right now they’ll have to angle the two outer implants because they would hit nerve and blood supply if they went straight down. The deterioration is a continual process that happens unless you have teeth or implants. This is really my best option with me being young. He said they don’t really worry about it when someone is in their 70s because it’s not like they’re going to have them for a really long time whereas a young person has a good length of time and the bone and tissue will just continually disappear even with dentures because your body doesn’t recognize them as teeth. He was able to talk to my local MCAS doctor while we were in the office and have a detailed conversation. My doctor told him that pretty much everything with me is uncharted territory. He wouldn’t generally recommend it, but that he understood the desire and frankly the necessity for teeth and implants so he told the surgeon to start with just having me hold the metal for the implants (or tape it to me) for a week. If that goes well, do surgery to place one implant and see how I do with that. If all goes well, then I should be cleared for the other 3 implant rods to be placed. If I react I’ll have to have it removed. So far the metal is doing perfectly fine on my skin. Soooo….the plan (if all continues to go well on my skin) is to eventually have 4 post implants in my lower jaw and have a special denture made that anchors to the implants but is removable for cleaning. My top jaw is already gone so I plan to try a regular denture up top and see how it works. If I don’t have enough upper ridge and the regular denture ends up not working then I would most likely get the extended implants that actually anchor in the cheek bones, but we’ll cross that bridge if we come to it. All that being said, this venture is going to be VERY pricey! Just the lower implants alone (not including the teeth part) is like over $17,000 pricey that has to be paid a week before the surgery. They don’t accept my insurance so it will all be out of pocket expense….. We’re working on getting some fund raising stuff set up so if you are interested in helping out with the cost, keep your eyes peeled for an update with all that info coming soon, Lord willing. I have been without any teeth for almost 16 months and need to get something soon before my jawbones deteriorate completely.
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| My sis insisted I post this silly pic of me at the oral surgeon's office. Me as a peacock thanks to the tree behind me! 🤣 |
Specific prayer requests
•I would be able to go ahead and start the official program in therapy, all will go smoothly, and it’ll help improve my daily life.
•My formula will start working for me again or I’ll be able to easily (first try would be nice!) find another one that I can safely use.
•I won’t react to the metal they are testing on my skin for the implants.
•I won’t react once they place the first implant.
•The Lord would provide the funds I need to be able to get the implants placed and the teeth made.
•Grace and strength through this very emotional journey of getting teeth.
