Lucy is doing well. As you can see from the photo above she can open her mouth significantly more. That is probably like 8-10 mm. She was at 4 mm before surgery. In the operating room the surgeon used the orastretch press I talked about last year to stretch her mouth open to 34 mm. Of course, so was unconscious, completely relaxed and couldn’t feel a thing. When we do this at home it will be another story.
For the amputation and artificial joint installation they had to detach her muscles from her lower jaw. This means it may now be hard for her to keep her mouth closed until the muscles reattach. Therefore they installed wires around her teeth on top and bottom. They are wrapped around several teeth to stay in place and then they have hooks coming off of them that we will attach rubber bands to later this week. This has been what she has been complaining about the most. She keeps asking to get them out if her mouth!!
She is doing remarkably well considering all she has been through. Her swelling showed up last night and is very minimal and not too much bruising either!! I’m sure this is in direct correlation to all of the prayers and sacrifices on her behalf. Again, we are so grateful for the support of family, friend ms and probably hundreds of people we don’t even know.
The ICU has been great. The nurses are wonderful and really look to us for direction on how Lucy is doing, does she need more pain medicine, asking what we want to do, letting me give her the meds, take BP cuff off to get her comfortable, etc. Such a different experience from 3 years ago. We defiantly are not being treated like degenerate prisoners this time, even though we have the tattoos!!
They plan to move her out of ICU sometime today when a bed opens up and if she does well she may go home today. We are hoping they will get us out of the ICU before it rolls past 24 hours. While it’s been great, she is stable and no longer in need of it and I’m a little worried about how this will affect the final bill. Not too much though, I know God will provide.
From her CT scan until the surgery we raised just enough money for the down payment!! Two times in a row. Pretty cool.
Anyways, I guess that is it for now.
In Christ’s Peace,
Katie
Great news! PTL
Divine protection, guidance, assistance, and provision!!!!!!
Thank you so much for letting us all know the GOOD news!
If yesterday was emotional for me; I can only imagine how it
was for you, dearest Katie. Now I am tearing up again for JOY!
I send LOVE,
Renee
God is so amazing! so happy things are going well & its been a good experience (well however good a situation like this can be!) still praying and know God will continue to bless yall, His faithful servants!
Love that news….thank you! My heart has been so heavy for your sweet girl. :)