With that under my belt, I decided to give butterscotch pudding a shot, sipping it off the spoon, into my mouth. This was messy business to say the least and I found myself scraping food off my mouth and surrounding face the same as I do for Orin. Hehe. I will probably leave things of this density for a little while longer because it was tiring and may have created mild suction in my mouth - not a good idea.
I wasn't deterred altogether though. For supper, I decided to try a smoothy/shake. I mixed up 250ml of chocolate milk, 1/2 a banana and 2 tbsp of peanut butter in the blender. It was alright.....the peanut butter gave it a bit of a texture because, while it is labeled "smooth" peanut butter, this brand is a little grainy, which was off-putting for someone like me (i.e. fussy about texture). I also learned that frozen fruit both blends better and brings a little extra chill to drinks (I had to put ice cubes in it to chill it enough to make it palatable). Overall, a good option. I may try it with ice cream next time to make it more milkshake-like.
Swelling is going down still....although the changes are subtle now and it can be flared up if I talk any great amount. If I had to put a number on it, I would say that my swelling has reduced by about 65% from the worst. The bruising is fading very quickly...I have small pea soup-coloured patches on my lower face and neck and some dark mottling around my eyes and chin and that is it. I am feeling more inside my mouth now, which means more to worry about. Every time I feel something, I worry that I've damaged something.
The only feeling of real concern is a familiar one, surprisingly. When I had my palate spread, there was, for a long time, a feeling of flexibility and fragility and sometimes even small shooting pains in it. I didn't expect this to return because, my understanding is that they didn't do any work on my palate (beyond likely some minor bumping while they worked on my top jaw). I am a little befuddled by the return of these feelings and will be mentioning them to my surgeon when I see him on Wednesday.
For now, here are some photos:
