Diagram illustrates a one piece Lefort I procedure. A two piece involves an additional fracture vertical underneath the nose for horizontal expansion or re angling.
Illustrates fracture made to reposition the chin. This is sometimes necessary to aesthetically balance the jaw repositioning and/or to make sure the lips are in a natural position after structural movement. The things you don't think of!
I was figuring he would need to work on both jaws, so imagine the sigh of relief upon hearing this. Yes, quite a laundry list of challenges to hurdle with upper jaw surgery, but escaping the additional list accompanying a BSSO (lower jaw) surgery is a treat. This is the plan, anyways, pending the Ortho's ability to get my chompers into the most beneficial position. I am aware that this can all change up to the 11th hour to include BSSO but to those that ask, I tell them upper jaw only, while mentally preparing myself for the possibility of both - not obsessively though.
Okay, I'm kind of on a roll now that I've started sharing so I'll give you my rationale for being happy not to have this already well behind me and paid for by my parents. By default, it also includes my personal feeling on the cosmetic vs function debate as it pertains to me ONLY.
*The disclaimer: this is in no way a dis against those who take an opposing view on the subject as it's a highly individual matter of perspective, just my opinion on how it fits with my story, personally. With this in mind, please don't bite my head off if you disagree...I have no problem with others choosing to the contrary :) *
I find it strange that my #1 motivation for wanting this as a teen was aesthetics, whereas now it's one of my biggest fears. Heck, I'm no beauty queen, but this is what I've looked like for just shy of 30 years and I've gotten rather used to it. This is me. Perhaps there's a bit of "the devil you know is better than..." going on, but really I'm quite happily married to an extremely handsome man and we have 3 very beautiful (if I do say so myself) children, malocclusion be darned. If I were to do anything for aesthetics, I would get a boob job : simpler (even with complications) cheaper, and more instantly gratifying (though I'd never actually get one!). But change my face? What if I hate it?Not exactly something you can hide under a bulky sweater and chose to show off now and then with a nice push-up, if you know what I mean! Bottom line: for ME (again just my personal choice...), cosmetics is not sufficient to entice me to take such drastic measures. Matters of character just seem much more important. I'm thankful my parents chose not to proceed. Circumstances change. Pain is a stronger motivator.
In light of the above paragraph, I don't believe I was informed or cared enough about all the risks and complications. Heck, even just the routine road blocks of a picture perfect recovery would've been nasty. (True, we'll never know for sure and maybe if it was done I would never have the discomfort of wearing disks, strained joint and whacked out teeth. But it was a crap shoot - lots of folks have bite issues to varying degrees and don't seem to suffer at all. I wish that was me!) I doubt I'd have been able to go through this process with the amount of grace and long-term vision that I would like to think I can rustle up now. That gift of hindsight: I thought I was mature and capable in so many things but let's face it, my priorities at that age were just so narrow/ different. I look back and realize just how naive and blissfully unaware, as well. Even emotionally I know there will be challenges, but I'm past trying to (re)invent myself and hope to be able to remember the big picture & where I fit within it. (If anyone stumbles across this blog, feel free to remind meof this later!) I can make more well-informed decisions as an adult, and have no one else to blame but myself regarding the outcome.
Wow, Guess I should have warned you I'm a windy talker...nothing a quick scroll wouldn't have revealed anyways! Meh, once all the history's out of the way I imagine I'll pipe it down a bit.
Okay, I'm kind of on a roll now that I've started sharing so I'll give you my rationale for being happy not to have this already well behind me and paid for by my parents. By default, it also includes my personal feeling on the cosmetic vs function debate as it pertains to me ONLY.
*The disclaimer: this is in no way a dis against those who take an opposing view on the subject as it's a highly individual matter of perspective, just my opinion on how it fits with my story, personally. With this in mind, please don't bite my head off if you disagree...I have no problem with others choosing to the contrary :) *
I find it strange that my #1 motivation for wanting this as a teen was aesthetics, whereas now it's one of my biggest fears. Heck, I'm no beauty queen, but this is what I've looked like for just shy of 30 years and I've gotten rather used to it. This is me. Perhaps there's a bit of "the devil you know is better than..." going on, but really I'm quite happily married to an extremely handsome man and we have 3 very beautiful (if I do say so myself) children, malocclusion be darned. If I were to do anything for aesthetics, I would get a boob job : simpler (even with complications) cheaper, and more instantly gratifying (though I'd never actually get one!). But change my face? What if I hate it?Not exactly something you can hide under a bulky sweater and chose to show off now and then with a nice push-up, if you know what I mean! Bottom line: for ME (again just my personal choice...), cosmetics is not sufficient to entice me to take such drastic measures. Matters of character just seem much more important. I'm thankful my parents chose not to proceed. Circumstances change. Pain is a stronger motivator.
In light of the above paragraph, I don't believe I was informed or cared enough about all the risks and complications. Heck, even just the routine road blocks of a picture perfect recovery would've been nasty. (True, we'll never know for sure and maybe if it was done I would never have the discomfort of wearing disks, strained joint and whacked out teeth. But it was a crap shoot - lots of folks have bite issues to varying degrees and don't seem to suffer at all. I wish that was me!) I doubt I'd have been able to go through this process with the amount of grace and long-term vision that I would like to think I can rustle up now. That gift of hindsight: I thought I was mature and capable in so many things but let's face it, my priorities at that age were just so narrow/ different. I look back and realize just how naive and blissfully unaware, as well. Even emotionally I know there will be challenges, but I'm past trying to (re)invent myself and hope to be able to remember the big picture & where I fit within it. (If anyone stumbles across this blog, feel free to remind meof this later!) I can make more well-informed decisions as an adult, and have no one else to blame but myself regarding the outcome.
Wow, Guess I should have warned you I'm a windy talker...nothing a quick scroll wouldn't have revealed anyways! Meh, once all the history's out of the way I imagine I'll pipe it down a bit.
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Hi Katherine! Welcome to the ortho fold. I am with you almost 100% on the cosmetic vs. function debate. I never had a problem with how my face looked until my horrendous profile was pointed out to me, but even then I was completely terrified of what the surgery would do to how I looked. I'm still a little terrified, to be honest. It's such a slow recovery, there's not much instant gratification to be had, and six weeks on I still don't know what my 'after' picture will really look like. But! I have high hopes for how it will all turn out once all the swelling is gone, and I KNOW I will be happier with my teeth at the very least. It's definitely a scary thing, though.
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