The cab appeared right on time, and I assumed they would do this quite often for the clinic, Dr. Ousterhout said he has done over 560 girls when I was there in August. My only difficulty was in telling the driver where I wanted to go, I thought he already knew, and the best I could say at first was, “The hospital!” We eventually decided he could find the Emergency Room at Davis Medical Center, and I was on my way. I felt excited, but not at all apprehensive, as I checked in at the front desk. The hospital required me to have blood work done prior to surgery that morning, and was sent to the Lab, to have the work done. Problem was, I was there so early, that the door to the Lab was locked, and dark. I knew that wasn’t going to be a problem, after all I’d gone through to get to this point, so I wandered the halls circling the Lab, knocking and trying every door until I found an entrance that was unlocked, I was wandering around inside the department, located someone in a white coat, so I knew I was where I needed to be. Eventually my blood was drawn, and I was sent up to the next floor for surgery. I was getting more an more nervous, as I was having to make decisions about where to go, and what to do, my previous hospital experiences were much more controlled from the moment I checked in until I checked out, whereas her, it was up to me. That can be a dangerous thing, especially that early in the morning. I found the Nurse’s station, and was directed to my private pre-op room. I then put all my clothes in a bag, and donned that stylish backless gown we always get in surgery pre-op, but I had brought my wallet. BIG mistake. They had to cal security to come up to my room, and then take the wallet to a safe haven. So I delayed my surgery until they could arrive.
Dr. O came in after they safely removed all my belongings, and asked if I had any final questions. I was too excited to think of any. He explained once again what procedures he was going to do, and then explained about the recovery process, and the pain management system they have in place there. As the nursing staff is usually stretched rather thin, they have a morphine pump, and was told to push it whenever I thought about it during the stay at the hospital. For the work I was having done the surgery was only going to be 6 hours long. I was to have a tracheal shave, my chin moved back and tapered, my jaw tapered, and a lip lift. He said I would awaken in my hospital room, and would be there overnight, because of the tracheal shave, and the possibilities of complications from that surgery. He also explained that one in a hundred cases, there may be a loss of range in the voice because of this surgery, but it was rare. I didn’t listen too carefully; I just wanted to get going. Then the anesthesiologist came in to explain that I was going to be under conscious sedation. That sounded awful, but he assured me that I would be out, and unaware of what was happening.
Next, an orderly came in, and gave me a shot to relax me. I started imagining what I would do if I awoke from the anesthesia, and they were still operating on me….then things began happening very quickly. An orderly came, asked if I could get on the gurney from the bed I was on, and he helped me on, and of course it was cold. I believe it is a rule the temperature in hospitals has to be low to retard the growth of bacteria. I remember laying on the gurney, looking up at the ceiling as I was being whisked down the hall to the OR, and saying to myself goodbye old me, here comes Allison. When we arrived at the O.R. there were 6 people busily preparing to do me bodily harm, someone stuck needles in for the anesthesia and whatever, and taped sensors on. The anesthesiologist came over, looked down at me and said, you will probably be getting sleeeeeep…..
When I awoke, I was in a strange room, which I assumed was my hospital room, I had stuff attached to me, and a catheter I was told when I finally asked to get up to go to the bathroom. Well, I never heard of such a thing, it took a little getting used to, toilet training being so embedded in my subconscious, but you adapt. They explained to morphine pump to me, and I began to use it. As I awoke, I asked the time, and was told it was 10:00, I said wow, that was quick. No way, it was 10:00 at night. They had been on me longer than they thought they would have to be, but they said everything went great, and gave me a mirror to see what the results were. OMG, it would have scared even my mother. With drainage collectors on either side on my head, and a bandage that goes around everything, I was not a pretty site. What on earth had I done? I think there was a television in the room, but I was sleepy, and dozed, and when I woke, I pushed the pump, and dozed some more. It was morning and they began to unhook me from all my paraphernalia, and that felt much better. Dr O came in early and gave me a mirror to show me what he had done, and it wasn’t any better from the site I saw the night before.
The jaw and chin work was accomplished through a large incision all around the base of the gums on the inside of the mouth between the teeth and cheeks. This wound area was not immediately apparent to me, as my chin was completely numb. It was difficult to open my mouth very wide, and that made it difficult to eat anything but liquids. It wasn’t possible to open my mouth very wide.
Dr. O made an incision at the base of my nose, and moved my upper lip closer to my nose, and stitched it in place, and they were quite swollen, but I didn’t know they were, I thought I got a bonus procedure, as he didn’t tell me he was going to do a lip lift. Lastly, Dr. Ousterhout made a small incision up under my chin, through which he removed sections of tracheal cartilage to eliminate my "adam's apple". I had a prominent adam’s apple and the area was bruised and swollen in the photo, but not too painful. I had to keep my voice rather low and soft to avoid pain from procedure.
He said that everything had gone smoothly, and that in four months, I could return and get the lifts, because the bone removal at my chin and jaw will leave extra skin that I may wish to have removed. I couldn’t come any sooner because of the swelling that I had, and it would take that long for it to return to normal.
