Recovery Timeline
Following is a brief timeline of important events regarding recovery from double jaw surgery. If you only had a single jaw operated on, your recovery will be much quicker than this.
Keep in mind that every person recovers at a different pace, and also that every surgeon has their own agenda during the recovery process. This is simply the sequence of important events that took place during my personal recovery.
Day 0 (Surgery)
- You’ll be eating/drinking through a syringe
- You’ll be unable to sleep very much
- You may be freezing all night long due to the ice packs wrapped around your face
- You’ll feel extremely weak
- You won’t be able to talk
- You will drool constantly (but you’ll have the suction tube in the hospital to take care of that)
- Lots of blood will be churning up inside your nose, mouth and throat
- Your jaw will randomly spasm (and it will be painful)
Day 1
- Swelling will begin
Day 3
- Swelling will peak
- Your bowels will start working again around this time
Day 5
- Feeling will begin to return to parts of your face
- Swelling will start to decrease
Day 7 (1 week)
- You’ll be able to move your mouth a bit easier, so your talking will become more understandable
- At your 1-week appointment, you’ll be able to brush your teeth, both inside and out (and it will feel amazing)
Day 10
- Drooling won’t be as rampant any longer
- You’ll regain slight control over your lips
Day 14 (2 weeks)
- Most of the swelling will be gone
- You’ll be able to start drinking from a cup (although it may be messy at first)
- You can probably remove a few of the elastics clamping your teeth together, so talking will become infinitely more simple
- Sleeping through the night should no longer be a problem
Day 15
- Your elastics will start snapping daily, due to your rapid increase in speaking
Day 18
- Your breath will become bearable again, due to the fact that you’ve been eating different foods and brushing more often
Day 21 (3 weeks)
- Your energy will start to come back. Take advantage of it! Go for walks and take your bike out for a spin.
Day 22
- You’ll be receiving substantial feeling back in your upper lip and cheeks. Your nose, lower lip and chin, however, will remain completely numb.
Day 28 (4 weeks)
- Talking will hardly be an issue any longer. If you have a splint/bite plate in, you’ll sound ridiculous, but people will be able to understand you.
- Your desire to be social and spend time with people will return in full force. Make sure you take advantage of it, and remember that your friends are not judging you.
Day 29
- Feeling will begin to return to your lower lip and chin. That feeling will come in the form of pins and needles, but you’ll appreciate it regardless. If no feeling has returned to these parts yet, don’t worry. Surgeons say that it make take up to 90 days for feeling to begin coming back.
Day 31 (1 month)
- If your elastics are off, you’ll be able to speak quite well by now
- You won’t drool or spill any longer while eating
Day 32
- You’ll have most of your normal energy back by now
- You’ll begin to feel like you’re ready to take life on again. Be warned though: you’re not quite there yet. Give it another month before you go crazy.
Day 38
- More patches of feeling will return to your chin and lower lip
- You should no longer have to wear elastics during the day
Day 42 (6 weeks)
- You should be able to drink through a straw quite easily by now
Day 45
- Most of your stitches should have dissolved by now
Day 49 (7 weeks)
- If you had a splint in, it should definitely be removed by now
- Be prepared to readjust back into the world of orthodontics
Day 56 (8 weeks)
- You should be able to eat with a small spoon or fork again
- Licking your lips should be no problem at this point
Day 58
- You’ll most likely be allowed to blow your nose again. Be gentle, though, because you don’t want to pop a blood vessel.
Day 70 (10 weeks)
- If you haven’t been able to eat solid food yet, start now. Even if the task of eating involves mashing soft food up against the roof of your mouth, do it anyway. You’ll never gain your strength back on liquid alone.
Day 84 (12 weeks)
- You should enjoy the freedom of eating just about anything you want by now
- Consider practising whistling in order to break up the scar tissue that’s sure to be keeping your upper lip from enjoying its full range of motion
Day 90 (3 months)
- Your three months have finally come to an end! Enjoy eating, breathing and smiling to their full effect.
- Changes will be fairly slow from this point forward. The results you find yourself with at the 6-month mark will most likely be the results you’ll live with for the rest of your life.
July 11, 2012 at 12:13 pm
Graham
My son Jason(20 years old) will have the upper and lower surgery tomorrow. The diffence between the upper and lower jaw is 15mm. He has the under bite This site is great for the nervous parents.
Thanks for the support!
July 11, 2012 at 4:31 pm
I wish your son all the best tomorrow. His surgery will move along perfectly fine and he’ll be back to a regular lifestyle in just a few short months. Take good care of him, especially during those initial couple of weeks!
July 10, 2012 at 4:34 pm
I almost have 2 weeks of having surgery today is my 11th day and the second day of having surgery already brushed my teeth and i can eat with a little spoon. I eat soup and oats. my recovery has been really fast but im still a little bit swelled up but just a little
July 11, 2012 at 4:15 pm
Louhann, it sounds like you’re recovering a lot more quickly than I did. I’m a little jealous of the speed at which you’re healing!
Soup and oats sounds like a winning combination at this point. It’s filling and gets some salt into your system.
Enjoy the next few weeks!
July 9, 2012 at 2:04 pm
The swallowing is definitely getting better over the last couple of days and in fact everything is moving right along. I had an orthodontist appointment and he said everything looks good. I also overheard one of the techs telling a patient with a palate expander that he may have trouble swallowing because your tongue thinks the foreign object is food, which makes complete sense to me now. I can’t wait for the splint to come out.
July 8, 2012 at 10:10 pm
Jennifer i had the same swollowing problem for the 1st week and the nurses were on top of my head always saying i should start drinking juices but i would only pretend however i discovered that water only helped my swollowing problem i just had little sips of cold water at a time and that problem was solved a week later i think that happens because our throat is swollen.
July 8, 2012 at 11:59 am
Thanks so much! Your blog has literally saved me from jumping out of a window over the past few days. My surgery was uncomplicated but the care I received after was sub par at best. So I feel like I didn’t get all the knowledge from the nurses that I should have.
July 8, 2012 at 3:17 am
So I am 6 days post-op and an in utter hell. I am swollen and tingly, but the most frustrating is the difficulty I am having swallowing. I kept mentioning this to the surgeons while I was in the hospital and it seemed like it was no big deal. I don’t know if it is because of the splint or something else, but I am almost to the point that I am worried I’m going to chjoke. Does everyone have this issue?
July 8, 2012 at 11:38 am
Hi Jennifer,
I also had trouble swallowing for the first week and a half of my recovery. I think it was due to both swelling and the splint. Some people end up vomiting as a result of this during the first few weeks, so if that hasn’t happened to you yet, you’re still in better shape than others.
You can rest assured that it’s an expected frustration and should disappear over the course of the next week. =)
July 7, 2012 at 10:10 pm
LOL im from australia and its winter now so creamy pumpkin soup was good. Thank you so much for ur reply. I really like the idea of this site i only wish i found it earlier.
July 6, 2012 at 11:16 pm
One question for graham im a type of girl that loves to look after my apperance and seeing my face swelled up like this is driving me crazy. My sister done the same surgery7 years ago and she looked awfull the first few months but if u see her now she looks gourgous im really scard i hope i get good results when the swelling goes down do u have any idea how long its gana take? coz i cant remember much from my sister.
July 6, 2012 at 11:07 pm
I had double jaw surgery on may 30th 2012, the first two days i have to admit was hell i honestly started thinking to my self i would rather die than suffer all this discomfort however it went really quick and i started talking 5 days after breathing normal after day 5 a survived on pumpkin soup for 3 weeks i started sleeping normal about a week later i started driving 1 week later i recovered well quick because i believe if u give strength to ur self u will recover quick and well so be strong and ofcourse u will get pain in ur gum and ears nose remember its a big procedure we went through u got to be happy that u got through it well, recovery will take time but think of the end results its worth it and thats what will keep u going! Be positive and feel free to ask any questions : )
July 7, 2012 at 12:35 pm
I’m glad to hear you managed to battle your way through those initial days, Athra! Positive thinking is honestly the best offense, isn’t it?
As for your lack of confidence in your physical appearance right now, I encourage you not to worry about it. People are much more understanding than we give them credit for—strangers included. I believe I began to look like a regular human begin again at around the 2-month mark, but minor swelling may stay around for roughly 4 months. My honest advice is to trust that people will be understanding.
I must also admit that I have a craving for pumpkin soup now! =)
June 27, 2012 at 10:01 am
Hi , I am 13 days post-ops ..
I did a double-jaw surgery .
I had a review today , and the docs told me that 2 teeth have reclining gums .. exposing the root of the teeth.. i am very worry .. is this normal ?
June 22, 2012 at 9:29 am
Hi Mary,
You’ll definitely be eating relatively normally after two and a half months, but you may still be slightly swollen. You’ll be back to normal shortly after that point, though, so I honestly wouldn’t worry about it. =)
June 22, 2012 at 9:18 am
Brian, breathing will indeed by difficult when eating and brushing due to the swelling. My only advice is to go about everything slowly and focus on your breathing so you don’t panic. We all had to slow down when eating and brushing for the first few months. You’ll do great, pal!
June 22, 2012 at 9:14 am
Joe, I wasn’t able to open my mouth to its full extent until approximately 4 months post-op. Movement comes as you eat and speak more.
June 21, 2012 at 10:05 am
I’m on day 14 post op from double jaw surgery and chin advancement and I’m feeling better everyday! I have the majority of my swelling down except around my nose and upper lip and it feels amazing that I am getting feeling back everyday! The only thing I’m worried about is that my elastics have all snapped in the first week after my surgery because I was coughing uncontrollably but my doctor didn’t seem too worried about it. Also, I leave for college about 2 and a half months after the surgery, do you know if I will be able to look back to normal again in both looks and also be able to eat almost normally by then? Your blog is great! It has really helped me get through the past 2 weeks!
June 20, 2012 at 4:31 am
Thanks Tara and graham for your comments, they made me smile. Well im on day 13 still have the same original elastics on so I’m still on a liquid diet (with syringe).
However things are getting brighter on my end:) I no longer require the syringe to drink, only eat. I can drink out of a glass which is so much easier:D I’m sleeping through the night and the swelling has gone down considerably:) I still have a numb nose and still mumble but I have an appointment this coming Monday and he should be freeing me of some elastics then. Fingers are crossed.
I know it’s only been 13 days but I’m so glad I’ve progressed to where I am now from where I was even a short week ago.
It DOES get better!…and I can’t wait to see the improvement days and weeks from now!
Thank you to everyone on here for all your tips, stories and words of encouragement:D it’s great to see people taking the time to help others out in a time of need:)
June 17, 2012 at 9:05 pm
Hey my mom has commented on your blog before, and I had my surgery three days ago, so im at the peak of my swelling. I somehow was able to sleep on my stomach without much breathing problems, but what I was wondering is how I clean my splint/teeth with water when trying to take in liquids causing troubles. Even when I attempted to clean it with water, it was just as a challenge to create a easier breathing situation.
OH and I don’t know if my mom mentioned, but I have a collapsed wall in my nose, making it impossible to breath out of one side of my nose, even before the surgery. Anyways I might be able to keep my one good side of my nose open so i can breath through it when trying to “eat”?
June 17, 2012 at 8:00 pm
Hi Graham, sorry to bombard you with questions, but at what point were you able to open your mouth and move your jaw side to side?
June 16, 2012 at 4:32 pm
Tammy, if you do happen to invent a time machine that will let you skip ahead for 3 months at a time, let me know. I’d love to be business partners in a venture such as that. =)
June 16, 2012 at 4:27 pm
Julia, if you didn’t have a splint in immediately following surgery, you won’t be receiving one. Consider yourself lucky. =)
June 15, 2012 at 3:57 pm
Thanks Graham 🙂
Oh, Tammy, you are in the trenches right now. The first 2 weeks, esp. the 2nd (for me) are the roughest. It does get easier. I had moments of getting frustrated but they passed.
I thought it might be helpful to share my experience for people who are afraid of having the surgery done: it will be much easier to have it done when you are younger as you heal faster and hopefully have a mom to tend to you. I’m the mom now! And I’m in grad school. I just have to slow down. Graham, I wanted you to know that your posts about exercising inspired me to book myself with an exercise therapist as I think I will feel better as I do more. I’m a “recovering national level athlete” too which means I don’t do taking it easy very well or gentle exercise. But I need to get my body moving.
Anyway, what a well-done blog, Graham, with generosity of spirit galore. Awesome. You’re a talented writer with artistic vision that comes through here, too.
I will definitely be checking in as time goes on.