The Small(er) Reveal

I follow a lot of remodeling blogs.  Not because I have the time, money, or desire to remodel our current town home (mostly based on the time & money factor) - or because we are in a place to upgrade to a house that would require an overhaul to call it home.  I follow remodeling blogs because I love to see change, especially big changes. I love change. In the blogging world, remodel blogs are where I can get my fix of "The Big Reveals".

My mother pointed out to me last night that I owe you, my own blogging audience, it's own Big Reveal after publicly blogging my post surgery pictures... even though it doesn't make sense to call it "The Big Reveal" given that part of my nose was actually removed.  I am finally at the point, my friends, that I feel I can give you the apparently highly anticipated Small(er) Reveal!

Where we left off....

I looked like I was attempting to recreate my 2nd grade Halloween costume of a Raccoon OR trying to create my own superhero persona including built in mask.

Again, this was 5 days post surgery.

Below is at Dr. G's office, one week post surgery, right before they pulled the stints in my nose out.  Pulling the stints was BY FAR the worst part of the entire experience.  It was 10 seconds of a weird  pulling, almost sucking type pain that channeled up the center of my nose to a nerve center right between my eyes.  Followed by another 10 seconds of a weird  pulling...(you get the point) as Dr. G removed the stint from the other nostril.

This picture was obviously taken before the above experience.  I was not smiling or giving thumbs up after that. In fact, I went home, popped a few Percocet (the first I had needed for 3 days), and went to bed.  When in pain, I pass out.

Here I am 3 days post removal of stints, bandages, and stitches (9 days post surgery).  I was headed to my first public outing to celebrate a great friend's birthday (Happy Birthday Amanda!!!)  You can't see it very well, but the bruising was pretty much all gone over the top of my eyes and directly under the eyes.  The only bruising that remained was where the blood was pooling at the very bottom of my eye socket, top of my cheek bones.  I did the best I could to cover up the bruising with makeup and took the Southern approach of styling my hair extra big to hopefully take some of the attention away from my face.  I still got some strange looks at dinner.

That last little bit of bruising has stuck around a lot longer than I expected, just now getting to the point where  its faded and makeup can fully cover it.  It is still there, but I think it looks more now like I didn't get the 9 hours of sleep I need a night... for a month.

Keep in mind when looking at the picture, that Dr. G has shared that a person's skin has memory.  This means that even though the bump has been removed, the skin on my nose still has some hints that its there.  And because of the trauma of the surgery, there is still a little bit of swelling that will continue to be there for some time.  Basically, in his own words, it will take up to 6 months before the nose has officially "settled" into my face.

Which means, given that I'm extremely happy so far with the result and that I can already feel an improvement in my breathing, it will only get better from here.

Oh wait, I'm forgetting the process shown by my beloved remodel blogs.  First I have to remind you of what my nose USED to look like, before surgery;)

Remember, this was my nose after the second break.

Here's the side by side profile, which I think shows how the "bump" had actually shifted to the left.  If you look for where the light hits the top bridge of my nose, in the photo on the left, you can see that's where the bump ended up.

And here's the best picture that I have that shows from the front how much my nose ended up being off center because of the second break.  It's the best picture only because it has Jeff's puppy Mooser in it. Every picture that has a puppy in it is automatically better than those without.

Drum roll please... here's my nose now:

Please forgive the frizzy "lion mane" hair... I just got it cut and am trying to figure out the new amount of product needed to control the curls without using too much.  (I'm sure that my curly haired friends can sympathize).

Oh- and the pug in the picture is my friend Kathleen's.  Her name is Judith (Judy for short).  These pictures were taken at girls night over at Kathleen's last night.  Judy wanted to be in the picture with me because she also had surgery on her nose to help her breathing the exact same day that I did.  And again, pictures with puppies in it automatically get more smiles.

I am very happy with the results so far.  I am glad that I made the decision to keep "the length" of my nose and had Dr. G focus on removing the bump and realigning my nose so it was more centered and symmetrical   This makes me feel like it still is a part of the original me and feels a bit more familiar.

It still has taken me a some time to get used to the "new" nose.  I will occasionally run my finger so very lightly down the center of my nose, something that I used to do pre-surgery (lightly because its another broken nose - the sucker still hurts like CRAZY if it gets bumped).  My finger still remembers the left jog on the bridge, still anticipates the bump.  This slight slope belongs on someone else's face.  This is going to sound silly to most of you, but one of the things that I've done that has been the most helpful in helping my mind adjust is to keep the mirror open on the sun flap in my car.  All last week, when I would be stopped at a stop light on my morning and evening commute, I would flip the sun flap down and look at my face, adjusting the flap to different angles so I could see my nose at equally different angles.  It took pretty much the whole week before it really sunk in... This is me - now.

Now the only anxiety I have is seeing friends and family for the first time.  Confronting the obvious.  I know that for those of you who care for me - my close friends & family - a nose won't change the way you think of me, won't make you love me more or less... But for so many of the younger years of my life, I worked to convince myself that my nose didn't define my inner beauty or personality to those who didn't know me, or were meeting me for the first time (although, in part, it did define me because I let myself unconsciously think about it in that way). I know now that its ridiculous to think of it like that... its also human. For what was probably the body part that I hated the most and hated to talk about or have referenced, I have forced myself to be very public about this process.  I went back and forth on if I should include the outside world in on this surgery.  In the end, I went forward and shared via my blog because in my head, that is part of the healing - both physically and mentally. It made sense to share because it took what could be perceived as shame out of the conversation.  I have controlled the dialog, shared my thoughts/fears/hopes & asked for your support.  I also have opened myself up to be part of the conversation, and I understand that people may have viewpoints that differ from mine about the subject matter.  Especially after its all said and done.  There are people out there who may say "she chose that nose over what she had or could have gotten?!"

Last Friday night I went out to an impromptu happy hour with my Fort Collins friends.  There were about 20 of us there - many of which I hadn't seen post surgery. And we were drinking beer... I knew I would hear the truth of what people thought, whether I wanted to or not.

I heard nothing but positive comments, which I should have expected.  My friends here have gotten the brute of my fear talk, and have been consistently supportive.  I have always surrounded myself with good people, my FoCo friends are some of the best.

My favorite, the one that really hit home and echo'd the statement "This is me - now", came from my friend LeighAnn - who always can be counted on to tell it as it is:  "I keep looking at the end of the table, see you smile and laugh; all I can think is 'That sassy nose finally fits her sassy personality."

Thank you again, my friends, for supporting me thru this journey.  For your encouragement, positive thoughts and prayers for speedy healing, soup, cards, get well packages, flowers that I couldn't smell for a few days, and for helping me laugh thru it all - since the whole process started back in November.  I'm glad that the decision making, stress, and the majority of the physical pain and discomfort is behind me.

Well, until I sneeze that is...that still hurts A LOT... for right now....



PS- Here are some funny out takes of the "Photo Shoot" that Judy and I did last night for this blog.  They don't officially make the cut... I'm not sure if the blurriness is due to Judy and I moving, or the wine consumption of either/or/both the photographer (Leigh Ann) and me.  All I know is that we took way more pictures than I thought necessary, until I started looking thru the pictures needed today for the blog.  Turns out, we needed to take a lot of pictures...

"Judy, show them your right profile."

Judy: "This isn't a left profile shot?!"

"Leigh Ann - which way do you want me to look now?"

The Tao of Katy

Have you ever thought of your personal mission statement or personal philosophy?  Not the words that you live by, but the message that your actions tell about you, your personal goals, and what drives you to be... well... you.  The way that you move forward when bad things happen, and how you pursue happiness.

Have you ever really thought about how you think and approach life?

My freshman year in college, I briefly took an intro to philosophy class.  Briefly, because I dropped it 6 weeks in.  When we moved to Colorado five years ago, I found the first assignment given in this class in the very small box of college academic items that I had kept to reference later on (small because I was anything but an academic in college - I didn't keep much).

The assignment:
Write about your personal philosophy & how you believe that you have come to adapt this as the correct way of thinking.

I titled the paper "The Tao of Katy" - which is actually pretty ironic because at the time, I didn't know much about Eastern philosophy and dubbed it such because Tao was the only philosophical reference that I could think of that sounded catchy.  However, as my TA noted after reading my essay, my personal philosophy had many hints of Buddhism and questioned me if I had researched or studied the religion before.  I had not - which I think made the difference in the grade that I received (an A... the last that I was to get in the class... which was why the class was dropped so quickly).

I recently went looking for the paper again - to remind myself of the exact statements that an 19 year old Katy Bell was trying to establish herself by living out.  See if I was, in part, somewhat successful in training myself to be who I wanted to be back when I was 19.  I must have thrown the paper out - not surprising if you know how much I hate clutter.  However, I have kept in mind for some time the main ideas that I was graded so highly.  A grade that felt like I was getting a "thumbs up" from a professional thinker that if I followed this written personal philosophy, my life would be ok.  (Actually, now that I think about it that way - maybe that's why I was so quick to drop the class when I did so poorly on the first few tests....  Why take a class that makes you feel like your failing at "thinking" when you really just started learning to think for yourself?)

Anyway... if you are still reading, I'm guessing that you are somewhat interested in "The Tao of Katy".  To sum it up, it consisted of four ideas:

1. Believe in Simplicity
2. Remove Hierarchy
3. Allow the world to happen
4. Know that you can control only your actions & reactions - let them be honest

Again, I wish I had the paper to reference - because I know I spent a significant amount of time identifying and dissecting each concept individually. Below is a quick, not nearly as eloquent, description that I am attempting to pull from memory (and there have been a lot of brain cells killed since I originally wrote the paper):

Believe in Simplicity:
There are many reasons why things happen in this world.  You can create story lines and conspiracies, you can create or observe drama to heighten an event or series of events and make it more interesting.  But to believe in simplicity is to understand the root and get rid of the noise.  If you must understand something, know the root as it is what grounds the subject.  The simplest answer is the truth, and everything else  branches from that deep, single reason.

Example: You watch a friend who is in a terrible relationship and wonder what she sees in him.  You see that they are not compatible and you see that they have caused each other pain.  You can not understand her reason for staying in the relationship.  The simplest reason is she is in love.  That love may be built on things you don't understand, but all you need to know is her simple reason for staying in the relationship.


Remove Hierarchy:
There is no better or best, unless in a race or competition.  No one is really better or worse than each other.  We assign those values at moments of weakness.  Instead of giving yourself a value of better/worse than someone, understand that you are equals with differences.   Do not see a person who is in the room with you as competitor just because you are sharing the space.  If you admire something about them, you admire it.  It does not mean that you are less because they do something well.  It means that they do something well, and you could do the same thing well.  Or maybe you don't.  But because they do something well does not mean that you are less of a person than them.  If they have different ideas, it doesn't mean that their ideas are better or worse than yours.  Just different. If someone acts or believes themselves to be better than you, it is because they are not strong enough in their own mind, opinions, perceptions to recognize that you have valid points that may differ from theirs.  Anyone who is in the same room together deserves each other's attention as equals.

Example: Same friend.  You think that because you see her relationship and it's weak points, that you're relationship with your boyfriend/husband/lover is better & happier.   If your relationship fails, you feel an extra edge of disappointment because you see that your friend is holding her "terrible" relationship together - you must be undesirable or terrible at relationships.  In truth, there is no formula that works in relationships.  Each couple has to pave their own way to happiness based on their own needs and wants. 

Sidenote:  I think that this step is especially difficult for women...and that's coming from a woman who consciously reminds herself about this way of thinking



Allow the World to Happen:
If you were not on this earth, it would continue to spin.  Acknowledge that there are things that happen because of other people's decisions, other circumstances, other forces  that may impact you but are not a reflection of you.  Do not get in the way the way of the world- it will only bring stress and frustration into your life. Stress & frustration over these things creates an inner feeling of helplessness because you know within yourself that you had no choice in the matter.  Stress & frustration over such things is choosing stress & frustration, rather than peace of mind that is created by the pure acceptance that something happened.

Example: Same friend.  Her relationship does end (eventually).  You begin to worry for her - how will this breakup affect her future relationships, what kind of impact will this have on her future choices, why the hell did she wait so long to break up with the guy, how much time will you have to spend with her to help her get over this relationship, what can you do to help her get over this guy, why is she dating so quickly after ending the relationship, etc. etc. etc.  You are worrying about her choices, and her decisions - maybe even upset about the fact that she's not taking your opinion to heart when making these decisions & choices.  But it's HER life, that she's living.  Not yours.  She's making the best decisions that are obvious for her at the time (just like staying in the relationship was obvious for her at the time).  By accepting that she probably is considering a lot more things than you realize, and accepting that she is doing what is best for her, you are allowing for her life to continue to develop as it's supposed to AND take all that emotion/worry out of your life.

Great Real Life Example:  Remember Katy & Kendall's wedding during the 500 year flood and how we had to re-plan about 75% of the logistical details the week before the wedding... Yep, I could have let myself be riddled over the stress all the way thru the wedding and let it "ruin our wedding day" as I heard so many other brides say after the Iowa floods.  And I did have one really ugly cry in my friend Amanda's closet (because I didn't want her to see me - it was a really UGLY cry).  But after that, I just acknowledged that it happened and we were still going to find a way to get married.  Which we did, and it was a blast!


Know that You can Control ONLY Your Actions & Reactions - Let Them Be Honest:
Paired closely with the above (Allow the World to Happen), know that your one duty in participating on this Earth and contributing to your family, friends, & colleagues is to be honest in your feelings that create your actions & reactions, but choose kindness as a way to guide them.  You can be angry and speak words that reflect that emotion, but you can choose kind words that further the conversation rather than slamming doors or calling your target cruel names.  When you are not honest in your actions & reactions, you are forcing others to base their actions & reactions off of a lie.  This, in turn, may create other actions & reactions that are lies - a chain of events that was not supposed to be, and something that will lead to the feeling of regret and unhappiness.  Understanding your impact as part of a conversation, and positive nature that being honest and kind - even in moments of  disagreement - is accepting your direct responsibility in your own happiness.

Example:  Same friend.  The very first time that you met her and her now ex, you weren't crazy about the guy.  But when she asked you what you thought about him, you told her that he seemed like a nice guy. You gave your blessing, when you didn't feel good about him - which then may (or may not have)  influenced your friend to keep dating the guy and develop deeper feelings.  If you would have instead said something along the lines of "You know, he seems like a nice guy but I noticed that he seemed to (insert example of the thing that turned you off).  You've shared you don't care for that in the past.  Does that bother you when he does that?" - she may have thought about it a little bit more.  She would have been able to be held accountable for continuing to date a guy (if she would have continued to date him) that had a trait that drives her nuts and you would have been honest with how you felt. 


At the time, it was just an assignment that I was trying to think of principles that could and would apply to philosophy - things that I had recognized in my life or observed in those around me that made or could make a difference.   If I'm 100% honest, I would say that at the time, I remember feeling like I was writing a paper was written with 90% bs filler (most college papers are - or at least mine were... again, not the academic... graduated with a hospitality degree).

Now, as I have gotten older, I realize that these concepts are pretty spot on - for me.  I'm not saying that everyone can or should buy into them. I also am acknowledging  they aren't easy - in fact, I would say that they are pretty damn hard.  The more people that come in and out of my life, the more commitments and responsibilities I take on - it becomes harder and harder to push out the noise, remember that I'm good enough, that I'm not in control of it all, but I can make conscious choices that I can change as needed to make sure that I am being true to who I am. But that's what a personal philosophy is - something to guide you, to push you, to fall back on. Something that you work towards that you may not always, or ever, achieve 100%.  At least I tried.

For the past five years, ever since I've found the original paper, I have had a handwritten post it with the Tao of Katy kept within arms reach of my work computer.  I've kept it close, because I know that I achieve the greatest success when I have reminders. With something as important and intimate as a personal philosophy, I feel it's best to have a daily reminder.  A reminder - this is who I wanted to be, this is how I thought I could get there.

This is how I still think I can get there.

Nose Goes (Part 2)

I am at the stage of life where my facebook page is filled with posts of friends who are excited to share updated photos of the progression of their pregnant baby bellies each month.  FINALLY I may have something comparable and just as entertaining - the progression pictures of my nose surgery!

I have had a lot of people who have asked for me to send pictures.  I will warn you - they are not pretty.  Not pretty AT ALL!  In an effort to make them a little less dramatic, I will say that I did run the photos thru Instagram to actually make them look better than what they initially look like.  I don't think I was that successful...

I also should share that the pain has not been nearly as bad as what I expected.  In fact, it's been quite minor to what I had built up in my head.  However, the swelling and bruising is about 10 times worse than what I expected.  Which is infinately more entertaining.

So without further ado....

My surgery started at 7 a.m. last Thursday.  Intially it was supposed to be an hour and a half to two hours long tops.  However, my doctor ended up keeping me under for close to three hours because I had significant scar damage from a prior break (softball between the eyes in 8th grade is our best guess). This scar damage was in a unique pattern that required much more attention that initially expected.  Kendall said Dr. G had shared that it was hooking or circling around itself in a way that even the good doctor had never seen.  The doctor was predicting that by removing this scar tissue my breathing will improve by at least 70%!  That alone is worth all of the thumbs ups that you are about to see...

I was out of surgery by 11 a.m., home by noon.  I don't really remember any of this. 

Here I am about 2 p.m. (3 hours post surgery).  This was the first that I was up and awake, giving Kendall permission to take photos.  He said that he wished that I would have told him it was ok to take photos before the surgery because every time that he came into the bedroom, it kept getting worse.  I guess when I came out of surgery, he was actually surprised at how normal I looked. Even here, I don't look that bad....

 

 That did not last long.

 

This is just before bed on Thursday night (9 p.m. the day of the surgery).  Still rocking the thumbs up.  Way to be optimistic drugged up Katy....

 

This is at 6 a.m. on Friday morning - basically 24 hours post surgery... this is where the anesthesia was probably worn off, with reality and the swelling really starting to set in.  The mask underneith my nose was catching the "drainage".  Kendall was replacing the gauze about every 3 hours thru Friday.  I  hated that thing.

 

This is Friday afternoon, about 3 p.m.  I finally made it downstairs to the couch and promptely fell asleep, sitting up.  The dogs were very cuddly and sympathetic - although they kept wanting to smell and lick my nose.  I'm sure they were confused by the "bloody" smell that was now hanging around my face.  Luckily neither of them got close enough to bump my nose.

 

Friday night, around 9 p.m.  I am starting to understand what my doctor meant when he told me to expect full "Raccoon Eyes."  But hey - at least I'm still giving the thumbs up and am smiling (again - great drugs, GREAT DRUGS!)

 

I believe that the above was the picture that I sent to both my mom and my aunt, to which they both texted me back that it was really too bad that there wasn't a Zombie Crawl for me to partake in this weekend.  I appreciate their sense of humor.  Laughter is the best medicine - unless you just had nose surgery and laughing pulls at the stiches that are under your nose.....

 

 

This is Saturday.  Still swollen, with crazy purple eyes, but no drainage!  And my friend that is a dentist sent me a postive text that shared that all looked good because it was very symetrical and showed little inflamation!  Success!

 

And who would have thought that that color of purple would have brought out the blue in my eyes so well?!  I may need to get myself some new eyeshaddow in a few weeks....

 

 

Here's the picture from yesterday (Sunday).  The swelling went down tremendously around the eyes, and also around the nose.  I don't think that you can really see that in this picture so much, but I could feel it.  I could also now feel the tubes that were placed up both nostrals to help keep the airways clear and I could start to breathe thru my nose.  This has started to give me hope that things may return to normal one of these days.  I felt much better, to the point where I even went over to a neighbors to watch the Super Bowl.  Only a few people commented on the fact that my eye black matched Ray Lewis's.

 

And here I am this morning (Monday) - 4 days post surgery.  The swelling in my eyes is almost 100% gone.  I have limited myself to 1 pain pill every 8 hours.  I am back to feeling like myself - but am glad that I took today as a sick day as well.  I'm planning on working from home the rest of the week with limited phone calls and carrying out some mindless admin tasks that have been building up.  Please don't judge me on that I am wearing the same sweatshirt or am giving a half ass attempt at my a thumbs up, which now I regret.  But that's about the only thing that I regret.  Although some day I may regret sharing these photos so publically. Well, probably not.  It's a pretty good documentation for anyone who may be thinking about going thru something similar.  I wish that there would have been something similar for me to look to when I was coaching myself thru pre-surgery anxiety.  Other than Doctor 90210 episodes, that is.



I also want to use this blog as a venue to send a huge thank you out to Kendall for being such a great nurse.  This will have been the fourth surgery that we've been thru together during the eleven years that we've been together, the first where he has had the opportunity to serve on the side of caretaker.  The nurse/caretaker roles have been very one sided for quite some time as he has been on a cycle of having one limb reconstructed about every other year.   It has been a running joke that he would owe me BIG TIME after his first elbow surgery when he briefly thought about having both elbows taken care of at the same time.  (That was quickly dismissed when his doctor asked him how he planned to wipe his own A#$ with both arms in casts up to his armpits... we weren't even engaged yet... Kendall looked over at me and I walked out of the room).

I think I had built an idea up in my head of what my own surgery experience would be like based off of Kendall's.  Unfortunately, I don't think I gave him quite as many funny moments as he gave me the multiple times that he's had coming out of surgery.  There was no Diana Ross singing, although I did throw out some Seinfeld references (the crackers were making me thirsty, that's kind of a given line).  He's been telling people that I have been a much better patient than he ever was - I think the difference may have been in that I couldn't really see due to the swelling, therefore I was VERY limited in what I could actually perceive that I could do by myself.  I couldn't help myself around if I tried.  I was 100% dependent on him thru Sunday and was glad that he set aside the entire weekend to make sure that I was taking medication on time, making sure that I was eating and drinking, keeping the dogs at bay, helping me keep ice packs on my face, take the above pictures, update my parents and friends on my progress, and playing episode after episode of "How I Met Your Mother" on netflix so I had something to hear in the background when I wasn't sleeping.  It was a gorgeous weekend here in Fort Collins with temperatures in the 50's.   I'm sure that he spent a lot of time looking out the window and wishing that I would have scheduled my surgery during a different stretch of the month.  Even I would have rather been hiking.  Well, I would have rather been doing a lot of other things - but I am glad to have finally gotten this off of my to-do list.

So that's where we stand my friends.  Tubes, stiches, and tape is all removed on Wednesday afternoon and then we will get the first good hint of what my new nose may look like.  I have been told that it could take up to 6 months before all is "settled" to what it will look like in the in long run.  Which means that I may look different in every picture you see from here until July.  I'll do my best to post photos - but I don't think that any will be nearly as dramatic as these here will be.

And again, thank you to all of you for your support and for all of the well wishes, prayers and love sent my way.   Your support has made this a much easier decision and process for me.

Cheers!